Who could have guessed that some 20 years after my first experiment with upgrading my radio shack wire with some entry level MIT Cables (Music Interface Technologies Cables) that I would still be investigating the effect of different wire on my ever evolving system. Even on my modest system of the time, the positive effects were clear to me. Based on my experience I was rather surprised to learn of all the continuing dissention regarding wire and it’s effects or lack thereof. I will not get into convincing the uninitiated- those who choose to stick with lamp chord go ahead. But man, will you be missing out. And those who are believers and do not give Verastarr Grand Illusion 2 series cables a serious shot are really missing out.
As time marched on and my interest in cable grew, the addition of power chords to the world of high-end wire took hold. For the first time, we could hear from the AC outlet down through the system what a wire designer has in mind when making his or her formulation. All told, I have counted no less than ten manufacturers that have strapped my components together. Of those, MIT Cables, Transparent, and Skogrand have represented the lunatic fringe of price and performance. Well into the five figures for the top-of-the-line from those manufacturers, only those of the most well heeled consumers could make it happen. It wasn’t until I got my hands on the subject of this review, the Verastarr Grand Illusion 2 power cords, interconnects and speaker wire that I got a clearer picture of where the current state-of-the-art is at prices that do not require the Craig’s listing of one’s vital organs. The pricing of the Verastarr lineup while not inexpensive ends where many other manufacturers prices just begin, alhough Verastarr does feature some products that reach the mid four-figure price range. While I admire Mike Powerll of Verastarr’s attempt at injecting a hypodermic full of sanity into wire pricing, it would all add up to a bad trip if the performance did not follow suit.
Per the company’s website, “As you might have noticed, it seems many established audio companies are using “Crystal” or “Hyper” or some other mysterious name for either Piezoelectric or Ferroelectric mineral treatment to their products. Some companies dope this material up into rolls with a wire through it for soldering inside components, others pour it inside power strips, or into little boxes with inputs and outputs.. Some will put it into cylinders that plug inline on speaker binding posts or at your IEC inlet for your components. These are all our own iterations of a similar treatment, which is to run the signal through a “field filter” that filters out EMI or RFI from the electromagnetic field around the cables, or does this filtering at the end of untreated cables, or inside the component. Other materials cause the electrons to “line up” making them flow much better through wire or any other circuit board level component.
We choose to put these treatments inside our cables to negate the need for treatment anywhere else in your audio system. No opening up your expensive components and “modding” them, or putting heavy adapter type “add-ons” to your cables stressing or possibly damaging the connector interface. Who wants heavy, clumsy improvements hanging off the back of your components ? We know we do not.
With Verastarr Audiofoil technology, we are able to treat these electrons over a vast surface area unlike any round cable designs. For instance we can use sensitive “field activated” wafers, which round wire can not. By doing so we treat a broad area of electrons rather than just the outer surface.
Verastarr has spent much time perfecting our treatments, which include ceramic nanospheres, single crystal resonating wafers, carbon nanofibers, Superconducting materials, Spin-inducing materials, Ferromagnetic minerals, and Piezoelectric minerals. We have tried dozens of combinations of minerals as well as combinations of granule or sphere sizes and or wafer thicknesses all so that you.. the seeker of Truth in Music, will enjoy the most accurate, smooth, noise free delivery of signal currently possible using cutting edge advances in material science.
So anything “CFT”, which includes all Grand Illusion 2 designs incorporate these technologies into the build of the cables.
Keep in mind ALL of this technology is passive and works OUTSIDE the actual signal path. Therefore this is an added advantage over our already phenominal sounding Grand Illusion series of cables…”
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