˻ PREMIERE ˼

⌈ WK AUDIO is a company owned by Witold Kamiński, founded in 2017 in Plichtów, near Łódź. An architect by profession, passionate about music, author of columns in "High Fidelity" about broadly understood culture, he offers a record clamp, an anti-vibration platform and three AC power cables. We are testing the latest such cable, the new version of TheOne cable (Mk II).

IS ADVENTURE WITH AUDIO Witek Kamiński started with anti-vibration platforms. I remember the photos of the prototypes he sent and the enthusiasm with which he approached the subject. The result exceeded all expectations - the platform called PURO looked great, worked very well in practice and therefore became an export hit of WK Audio, finding its place in dozens of systems, mainly in Asia.

And yet it was the AC power cable that was the first product of this company that we tested at "High Fidelity". TheOne model, presented by us in January 2018, was also on the cover of HF (test → HERE). Its successor, TheOne Mk II, has just been introduced, and we are testing it again. Despite its name, this is not WK Audio's most expensive product - 'The One' usually suggests something most important, yet as of today it is the middle model in the lineup. Above it there are THE AIR and THE RED, and below there is The Two.

▌ TheOne Mk II

Five years have passed since 2018, when we tested the first version of TheOne cable. As you will see in a moment, this is actually a completely different cable, made of more expensive conductors, and yet its price has increased only slightly - from PLN 5500 to PLN 6900 (PLN – Polish zloty).

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| A few simple words...

WITEK KAMIŃSKI
Owner, designer

TheOne Mk II POWER CABLE, apart from the color of the braid, plugs and a similar price, differs in everything from its predecessor. I kept the name TheOne due to the middle position in the offer. The previous version was made of copper with a cross-section of 14 mm2. TheOne Mk II is also made of a copper conductor, but very pure, cryogenically treated one, with a total cross-section of over 18 mm2.

This cable, like all WK AUDIO products, is made by hand, thanks to which each run can have a different structure. It has a completely different braiding and anti-vibration materials than TheOne. In fact, it is a completely new cable, whose name only refers to the item in the price list. MK

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THEONE Mk II MAY LOOK similar to the first version, but - as we already know - it is actually a completely new product. It’s diameter is not particularly big ,and under the black mesh you can clearly feel three intertwined veins. The manufacturer does not reveal details regarding the topology, apart from information about the conductors - they are now made of high-purity copper that underwent a cryogenization process. It focuses on ordering the crystal structure of the metal, which translates into lower distortion. Pioneers in this type of processing were Japanese companies, and probably one of the companies from that country is the source of the conductors used in TheOne Mk II.

An important element of the design seems to be the emphasis on protection against harmful vibrations that constantly affect each power cable. As Witek said in the review of the Mk I version, from his knowledge and experience, it is the mechanical structure of the power cable, next to its electrical structure, that is the clou of its sound.

TheOne Mk II is terminated with solid Furutech plugs with rhodium-plated contacts: FI-E38(R) and FI-28(R). On request, it can be terminated with a high-current IEC 20 A plug. All metal parts are made of non-magnetic materials (bronze and OCC copper) coated with a layer of rhodium, subjected to the Alpha process. Alpha, in the company's nomenclature described as Pure Transmission, consists in cryogenic processing of the material and its demagnetization (Alpha Super Cryogenic and Demagnetizing). The front part of the plug is made of nylon, the back part is made of polycarbonate. One of the special features of these plugs is the presence of a patented grounding system called System Earth (Ground) Jumper (US patent number: 6,629,491).

Standard lengths are 1.5 m and 2 m, others are available upon order. A steel plate with the model name and the company's logo was attached to the cable with a strip of red lacquered leather. The cable is packed in a neat wooden box with a lid engraved with the company logo. The box is padded with a foam, but I did not find a manual in it.

▌ SOUND

⸜ HOW WE LISTENED The tested cable powered the Ayon Audio CD-35 HF Edition (№ 1/50) player during the listening session and was compared to my reference, the Siltech Triple Crown power cable. The test consisted of an A/B/A comparison, with A and B known, using short, two-minute samples from a given album./p>

Both cables were plugged into the AC Acoustic Revive RPT-4EU Absolute power strip, which in turn was powered by the 2.5-meter Acrolink Mexcel 7N-PC9500 AC cable. The Acrolink was connected to the Furutech NCF wall socket with its own separate power line with its own HPA fuse. This line is made of a 6-meter section of Oyaide Tunami Nigo cable.

⸜ Recordings used for the test | a selection

⸜ JOHN COLTRANE, Blue Train, Blue Note/Universal Classics & Jazz UCGQ-9031, SHM-SACD (1957/2022).
⸜ ISAO SUZUKI TRIO/QUARTET, Blow Up, Three Blind Mice/Impex Records IMP8307, Gold HDCD (1973/2004).
⸜ BILLIE HOLIDAY, Body and Soul, Verve Records/Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab UDCD 658, seria „Original Master Recording, Ultradisc II”, Gold -CD (1957/?).
⸜ FLEETWOOD MAC, Tango In the Night, Warner Bros. Records WPCR-17713/4, SHM-CD (1987/2017).
⸜ RIVERSIDE, ID.Entity, Mystic Production/Sony Records Int’l SICP 31600, Blu-spec CD2 (2023).

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THE SECOND VERSION OF THEONE is a really good cable. I didn't have both versions for direct comparison, but based on my notes, I can risk saying that it is more refined than the Mk I. It's not about something the original version didn’t do, but about the strong, dense sound that the new WK Audio cable offers.

Midrange seems to be the most important part of its presentation. Although Philly Lee Jones's cymbals from JOHN COLTRANE's Blue Train were clear and "sat" nicely in the back, behind the other instruments - we are talking about the monophonic version - it was the leader's saxophone, and even the low set Lee Morgan's trumpet and even more so Chris Fuller's trombone took the lead. The highs of the saxophone and trumpet were slightly softened, but it did not affect their readability. Also the reverberation, heard mainly with the trombone, was long and strong just as - as it seems - imagined by Rudy Van Gelder, who recorded this album.

Stronger treble was shown on ISAO SUZUKI TRIO, QUARTET’S Blow Up. Released in 1974 by the Japanese label Three Blind Mice, it is a perfect example of the fact that its boss was a fan of Van Gelder's recordings, mainly from Blue Note albums (more about the techniques used by Rudy Van Gelder → HERE). Although it is actually a contemporary recording, Yohishiko Kannari, who made the recordings, immersed them in the nostalgia of the 1950s, arranging the recordings in a classic way for that period: piano on one side, drums on the other, and double bass in the middle. There is also a modification of this paradigm, because the drums are stereophonic and start on the listening axis and end on the right side.

KEVIN GRAY from Cohearent Audio, who remastered the version I have - the same one who is responsible for the new version of Blue Train - did not brighten the sound, although the TBM label strived for maximum clarity in its recordings. The sound of the Suzuki album is therefore covered with a patina. The tested cable showed all these nuances really well, reliably, and with panache.

The sound was set slightly higher than in the reference cable. I did not get such a deep and dense bass, and the cymbals had a bit more energy. The accent shift, because that's what we're talking about, was small and did not affect the overall tonal balance. It was still mostly about midrange, but supported by a strong, saturated bass and open treble with resonant and clean cymbals.

It's actually a cable that can open up the sound of a recording without brightening it up, a really cool feature. BILLIE HOLLIDAY's voice on Body and Soul, the 1958 album, had a characteristic sound, that is, on the one hand, dark, saturated with cigarette smoke, but also open due to the microphone it was recorded with. The vocals were not pushed forward. The WK Audio cable pulls up the background a bit, but does not bring the foreground closer, even if it is recorded very close to the microphone, like the one on Body....

This is because the space that is created thanks to this cable has very good proportions. The reverberations are clear, and the positioning of the instruments on the axis in monophonic recordings is clearly differentiated. Barney Kessel's guitar accompanying Holliday was clear, yet set further back in the mix. Unless he played the intro, like in Darn That Dream, then it had clear edges and more volume. However, this was the choice of the album producer, not the cable manufacturer.

ALTHOUGH THE TESTED CABLE'S bass does not go very low and its lowest range is not as selective as the above part of the range, TheOne Mk II will surprise you with full lower range. Its mid and upper parts are saturated and full. This gives a great bass foundation, in both jazz and popular music. Listened to immediately afterwards, the Tango In the Night by FLEETWOOD MAC, remastered in 2017, released in Japan on SHM-CD, sounded strong and dense. It is easy to brighten its sound as the upper midrange is quite strong on it. In the test, however, the cable showed above all the saturation of the sound, its richness.

Also its resolution is very good. Although the backing vocals positioned on the axis behind Steve Nicks' vocals in Seven Wonders were not as legible and moved back compared to the reference cable, but that's how it should be, TheOne Mk II is a relatively inexpensive cable. However, in the next album Everywhere, where the backing vocals are spread out from left to right, they had volume and structure, thanks to which they filled the space on a par with the synthesizer heard in the right channel.

And at the same time Witek's cable is very fast. It has mass and volume, that's for sure. But they don't stop the impact. The filling is the most important feature here, that's also clear. But not at the cost of attack. It has a slightly rounded "edge", and yet the recordings keep the rhythm, move forward, are coherent. Even if the recording engineer turned off the treble, as on the ID.Entity by Riverside.

Released in Japan on the Blu-spec CD2, it sounds great, but is rather focused in the lower end, rather in the midrange, so it could easily lose its rhythm. With TheOne Mk II it did not. The latter did a nice job playing the bass guitar and the signature riff in the intro to Friend or Foe?, as well as the kick-drum on the Fleetwood Mac album. And it is only with strong volumes of sound that its limitations can be heard. The sound then sticks together a bit, both in terms of dynamics and layers.

▌ Summary

BUT nobody's perfect AS THE CLASSIC SAYS. The important thing is not to be perfect, because it usually ends with dead sound, but to show its advantages in the most coherent way. The WK Audio cable does it very well. It has a dense midrange sound. Its bass, however, is strong and dense, and the upper midrange is open, which does not allow it to slow down the sound. So this one is fast and dynamic. Yes, it is a very nice, refined cable. ●