Specifications

Price: Eight foot Silver Oval: $499
One Meter Silver Oval-in
Interconnects: $630 per meter
Address:
Analysis Plus
6321 N. McKinley Rd.
Flushing, MI 48433
Telephone: 888.579.0386
Web: www.analysis-plus.com

The latest cable of choice for my playback system was a no brainer. It usually takes about three years for a set of wires to come and go in my listening room. Back in ‘94, Cardas Golden Hexlink V meshed well with a Krell KPS-20il CD player and a Krell KSA 300 amplifier that were in front of my Alon V MK.II's by Acarian Systems.

In 1997, I opted to change out the Krell KPS 20il CD player with a Sony S7000 DVD player feeding bits to a Museatex Bidat D/A converter. Apart from some very slight givebacks in sound stage width and bass extension, I didn't miss the Krell CD player, while finding the Sony/Bidat combo to be the more musical of the two (I like the added feature viewing DVD quality movies out of the S7000 on my Sony XBR TV). Shortly thereafter, I advanced my amplification to the Krell FPB-300 amplifier. This is the third Krell amplifier in a row to take charge of my speakers. It wasn’t long the new Krell that after I discovered Goertz Silver Interconnect and speaker cable which provided my sonic landscape with additional detail in a more open, airy and convincing manner.

Since then I've tweaked my speakers and "polished the apple" with various other gadgets, but have made no equipment or cable changes to my system. Then the telephone rang one evening last winter and sure enough, it was Clement Perry my gregarious editor. This, the same Clement Perry, who had suggested I look into using Goertz Silver back in ‘92.

"You have to try this new wire by Analysis Plus. Its called "Silver Oval, he exclaimed" I explained that the Goertz wire is flat and fits nicely under the door of my adjoining room. No oval wire will do that. He disagreed and then suggested I possibly do a follow-up review. He had already finished with his own evaluation, and the review was due up on the site. I could sense a wad of drool about to come through the receiver of my telephone, so I quickly agreed and hung up before I got splashed.

The Analysis Plus people later informed me that thanks to Perry's positive review of the "Silver Oval" they were backlogged with orders for speaker cable, but the interconnect should arrive shortly.

When the interconnects finally arrived, my girlfriend Josephine and John, a very close family friend, were in the adjoining room playing with "Pins," our new hedgehog. This gave me the perfect opportunity to install the Analysis without Josephine or John noticing. After a quick installation, I turned on the system, strapped my ‘72 stratocaster on, and began to wail with B.B. King. Josephine and John then came in, then sat down on the sofa without saying a word. Finally, John looked up at me smiling said, "sounding better, ah Jim." I admitted that I'd been practicing faithfully for two hours every day. Then Josephine qualified "It sounds more real." She usually goofs on me for playing the same thing over and over again. "Do, Do, Do, Do, Do." "Damn it I said, I'm getting better, aren't I?" They both almost slid off the sofa from laughing and then explained that they were referring to the B.B. King CD.

They both noticed a significant improvement in presence and timbre of the system. This was obvious to non-audiophiles; people who have sometimes interpreted certain tweaks that I have made to be a mild form of insanity or downright foolishness.

I sat down in the middle of the sofa and asked for a moment of silence. They were clearly correct in their observations! B.B. King's guitar was more truthful in timbre and tone. This was also noticeably true for bass guitar and drums. Cymbals were more realistically presented, not because they soundstaged differently, but because they were more truthful in tonality, adding to the illusion that they were in fact in the room.

A short time later, the AP Silver Oval speaker cable arrived, and the results were the same. While others may point out attributes that are important to the overall musical gestalt of a given presentation such as soundstage, width, depth, focus and detail, I'd like to point to the Silver Oval as a leader--right up there with the best cables I’ve heard. It delivers admirably with all soundstaging virtues solidly intact.

The quality that makes the Silver Oval more enjoyable to listen through over other cables, and clearly makes this cable worth the asking price, is its truth of timbre and tone, while piggybacked to clarity and cleanliness of sound stage presentation. Remember that non-audiophiles were able to hear this immediately, so obvious was the transformation to my system.

It is the year 2000, and the Silver Oval now resides as my new reference. Right on schedule. I live in peaceful co-existence with a pit bull, a cat, a hedgehog, a very truthful sound system, and Josephine. I'd be willing to wager that if one were to buy a one meter length of "Silver Oval" and install it anywhere in one's system, one would race back to the store to get the complementing speaker wire. There is nothing like live music! The "Silver Oval" brings us that much closer to the "Live Experience."

When my system is on, people gather on my sofa now more regularly. When I'm on the guitar, they make coffee and visit the hedgehog, leaving the pitbull as my only audience. Maybe the folks at Analysis Plus will make a guitar jack next. Just in case I started taking lessons from Dave Rubin in Manhattan. He does the Robert Johnson instructional videos. No self-respecting blues man from Brooklyn should ever be upstaged by a hedgehog - wire or no wire!

Martin Appel Seconds the Motion….

I received a call from friend and publisher, Clement Perry, about new cable company Analysis Plus. I was then given the job to do a follow-up review of the Silver Oval to see if my system would reap the same benefits as his and Stu McCreary’s.

Of course, after seeing the reviews, I agreed to call Mark Markel, AP president, who was kind enough to send the very same product along for a follow-up review. These rather diminutive cables arrived and were put into my system with a good dose of skepticism. About a year ago, I replaced my cables with all big, and heavy top of the line Harmonic Technology designs cables and interconnects. As every audiophile knows, the bigger, the fatter, the heavier, the better, right? Wrong.

Cold, straight out of the box, a new sense of musical excitement arrived. Instruments had more solidity and detail, while voices were more three-dimensional with greater air and transparency. I tried to stop listening and go through a proper burn-in process, but I couldn't. At first glance, I noticed on some CD's, a slight brittleness in the very highest frequencies. This, as expected, disappeared over a short burn-in period.

After one month straight of listening, I can say I am extremely awed by the improvements these cables brought to my systems sonic reproduction. I'm not going to say everyone will love these cables, but everyone should give them a major audition before spending another dime on their system. If this isn't one of the best bargains in high end today, I don't know what is.
Keep listening.