May 27, 2011

  • Cardas Cross, Part 5

    I mentioned in yesterday's post that, in late spring 1986, I went over to my friend Elias' house.  The neighbor across the street hung out in the garage, and used a boombox to play KFOG.  On came GTR's "When The Heart Rules The Mind" and The Fixx's "Secret Separation."

    One of the last times I heard "Secret Separation" on the radio was during the summer of 1986, when I had my Walkman with me at Pagoda floating restaurant.  So while radio stations play other Fixx songs, let us not forget about the excellent and enjoyable "Secret Separation."

    We have the internally bi-wired Cardas Cross speaker cable.  At the speaker end, the leads are not-so-secretly separated.  However, do take note that one pair of leads is longer than the other.  This is so that the cable will hang without stress, while it dangles from the speaker.  Kudos to Cardas for making the leads long enough and flexible enough.  I've had bi-wire speaker cables from Nordost, Tara Labs, Wireworld, and XLO, which were too short and too stiff.

    In this case, the leads marked "high" are longer.  That typically corresponds to the tweeter binding post, which, on most speakers, lies above the woofer post.  Thankfully, Cardas have clearly marked which leads are "high," and which are "low."  Furthermore, Cardas have color-coded the leads so that negative is black, and positive is red.  These labels make it easy for the user to determine which lead goes where.  Now, if only the speakers themselves were so clearly labeled!