Hi Gang,

Sharing this information for what it may be worth.....

During my ongoing audio investigations and experiments, I came across an interesting situation. I decided to check L/R Balance on my Triton Ones and, to my surprise, I found the Left Audio to be noticeably lower in volume than the Right Audio. I have a set of Stereophile Audio Test Files which includes a Balance test - which I used to identify this difference. After some experimenting, I narrowed the problem to my Quest Audio Red River Balanced XLR Cables. One cable produced lower audio volume than the other cable.

My cables are still under warranty, so I contacted Quest Audio to discuss my findings. They confirmed that this problem can occur and that cables so affected can either be repaired or replaced. I am in the process of returning the cables to them for either repair or replacement. In the interim, I have reverted to unbalanced cables between my DAC and my Amp (standard RCA type cables).

I would not have detected this issue had I not been experimenting with other sound options. In the course of those experiments, I needed to check the balance between my Ones - which resulted in finding the issue.

Henceforth, I will periodically check the L/R balance between my speakers.

Happy :Listening,

Art

Hi Art,

Great point and good observation. I have hand terminated my Nordost Tyr cables which have very fragile wires. I have found in the past the exact same thing you describe. One reason could be because one of the leads will break off from bending or tightening it too much. Because the system is fully balanced this means basically you are (in best case) operating one side as a balanced connection and the other side as a single ended. Because the single-ended has half the voltage, you will definitely perceive a volume difference. I suppose a similar symptom could also show itself if there is a grounding of one side of the balanced cable due to stray wires connecting to neutral but I'm not in expert in this area.

Good that you caught it while the cable is under warranty!

Jim

www.bluejeanscable.com/store/balancedaudio/index.htm

Problem solved.

My problem will be solved when AudioQuest repairs or replaces my cables.

I don't plan to spend additional money to buy different cables.

Did I mis-understand your post?

Kudos to Audio Quest. As soon as they received my returned cables, they shipped a new replacement pair via Fed-X. The replacements arrived Tuesday and work perfectly.

Happy Listening on Oak Lane again.

Art