⌈ The Japanese company TiGLON was founded in 2008. Initially named Kryna Pro, it changed its name to TiGLON in 2010, and its founder and chief designer is Mr. KENTARO OKINO. We are testing its latest LAN cable, TPL-2000L PROFESSIONAL. This is its press premiere outside Japan. ⌋

JAPANESE COMPANY TIGLON (its name is styled 'TiGLON' by the manufacturer) is a manufacturer specializing today in interconnect and power cables, but applying its expertise to other areas as well, such as products for minimizing vibration: speaker stands, audio racks, platforms, feet, and pads. Besides, it was with feet that it started its foray into perfectionist audio.

On its new website, the manufacturer writes:

We focused on blocking high-frequency electromagnetic waves, absorbing vibrations and dissipating them as heat, which is offered by the material called magnesium. The goal is to achieve high-fidelity reproduction of the original sound.

⸜ Our Technology, → TIGLON.co.jp, accessed: 29.11.2024.

As you can see, all of these products share Tiglon's basic technique of relying on materials in which it doped or infused magnesium. This metal serves both to dampen vibrations, and to suppress high-frequency interference. In the company's products in question, it is part of the shielding that protects the signal from external EMI and RFI interference, as well as filters.

▌ TPL-2000L Professional

THE LAN CABLE WE TEST is a revised version of cables that for a long time were part of the “High Fidelity” reference system, the TPL-2000L (L=LAN); more → HERE ˻PL˺. It was the third interconnect developed for TiGLON Premium Line 2000, which is the company's top series.

As it turned out, the manufacturer offered two models with the same symbol and the Tiglon TPL-2000L came in two versions: FOR AUDIO and DATA; the former was described on the box as “TPL-2000L Pro”, and the latter simply by the model name. Both had a very similar electrical and mechanical design but were not the same.

As the manufacturer wrote at the time, the Pro version was designed with sound quality in mind. The cable had a larger diameter, was stiffer, and its outer jacket was white; the 'regular' was gray. And, it seems, the latest cable, fully annotated 'Professional', is a development of the PL-2000L Pro version.

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| A few simple words…

KENTARO OKINO
owner, and designer

WOJCIECH PACUŁA: How do TPL-2000L and TPL-2000L Professional differ?
KENTARO OKINO • The TPL-2000L is Category 5E (CAT 5e) compliant and was intentionally designed for the lower category to optimize it for audio applications. In addition, its internal structure uses twisted pairs instead of a solid cable. However, this structure sometimes caused errors if there were optoisolators in the signal path. To solve this problem, which happened in recording or studio equipment, we developed the TPL-2000L Professional. The Professional model was designed to exceed Category 7 (CAT 7) standards.

WP: What is the design of the new cable, what’s the key technology used in it?
KO • Since I've already partially explained it above, I'll just provide additional details. The TPL-2000L Professional uses OFC (oxygen-free copper) as a conductor and is designed to meet Category 7 standards. It is a universal model based on the TPL-2000L, which was launched in 2020 as the third product in Tiglon's top-of-the-line 2000 series.

The TPL-2000L received a special Audio Accessory Excellence Award from Japan's Audio Accessory magazine for its operation in audio systems. To improve its compatibility with optical isolation devices and professional equipment, the basic conductor structure and transmission characteristics were improved - thus the TPL-2000L Professional model was created.

This model retains the key features of its predecessors, such as an advanced magnesium filter that ensures extremely low noise levels, and custom LAN connectors from German company Telegärtner. In addition, it has undergone annealing with the latest version of the device used for this purpose, called Dual HSE Treatment, to further improve compatibility. The result is a LAN cable that provides accurate and fast transmission of clear sound and can be used with professional equipment.

WP: What’s the next step for you?
KO • We have already started developing LAN cable for the top TPL-3000 line. ●

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THE TESTED CABLE IS DISTINGUISHED from the company's previous products by the unusual color of the outer mesh - red. Its diameter is also larger and it is stiffer than both previous versions of TPL-2000L.

The conductor in it is the same copper, obtained by a process called dip-formed oxygen-free copper (DF-OFC). DF-OFC is a copper with a formal purity of 99.99% patented by US company General Electric. In the mid-1970s, it was sold under license to Japan's SHOWA Electric Wire And Cable Co., Ltd. which is a separate division of Tokyo Electric Company (today: Toshiba Corporation). The process involves producing a thin wire and throwing it through a trough of molten copper. Once the thick core is formed, it is then hot-rolled.

The signal wires are surrounded by a patented magnesium shield (“Magnesium Shield”), and the outer jacket has been treated to minimize its electrostatic properties, with a process used primarily in the avionics industry. As Mr. Kentaro said, this is a more advanced version of it. These filters can be seen at both ends of the cable, enclosed in heat-shrink sleeves.

The cables are “burned-in” using the company's Hyper Saturated Energizer (HSE) technique. The “burn-in” process is explained as follows:

Burn-in, often referred to as the process by which audio equipment is subjected to a series of playbacks to achieve optimal sound quality, remains a topic of significant debate in both the audiophile community and relevant scientific fields. While some attribute perceived changes in sound quality to actual physical changes in equipment, an emerging perspective points to the interplay of physiological, psychological, and social factors that can influence these perceptions.

⸜ source: Beyond the Sound Waves…, National Library of Medicine, → pubmed.NCBI.nlm.nih.gov, accessed: 2.12.2024.

That’s what scientists think about it. However, in my experience, and not only mine, the effect of the burn-in on the sound is unequivocal and unequivocally positive.

The tested LAN cable is directional because the shielding foil is wrapped in the same direction and, the company's head says, this affects the sound. The direction of connection is marked with arrows on the heat shrink sleeves. It is also worth noting the excellent plugs. Their manufacturer is the German company Telegärtner and they are subjected to additional processing, presumably they are also subjected to burn-in process (however, the company does not disclose details).

▌ SOUND

HOW WE LISTENED • Tiglon's LAN cable was tested in a HIGH FIDELITY reference system. From the router, powered by a JCAT Optimo 3 Duo, the signal runs in it to the Silent Angel N16 LPS LAN switch (cable length 1.55 m). In the switch, two sections are connected by a short cable (30 cm), and the signal to the Lumin T3 file player is routed via another cable (1.55 m). They are all Acoustic Revive LAN → QUADRANT TRIPLE-C cables. I use them together with RLI-1GB Triple-C filters, two per cable - at the beginning and at the end. In turn, RLT-1K filters are plugged into the LAN switch, as many as five of them.

The Tiglon tested was compared to Acoustic Revive QUADRANT TRIPLE-C LAN cables. The test was an AA/BB/A comparison, with the familiar A and B. Music was played from a Lumin T3 file player.

» RECORDINGS USED FOR THE TEST ⸜ a selection

⸜ ELLA FITZGERALD, Mack The Knife: Ella in Berlin (Live),Verve/UMG Recording/Tidal, FLAC 24/96 (1960/?).
⸜ NINA SIMONE, Silk & Soul, RCA Victor/Sony Music Entertainment/Tidal, FLAC 16/44,1 (1967/2006).
⸜ The Bealtes ’64 (Music from Disney+ Documentary), soundtrack, UMG Recordings/Tidal, FLAC 16/44,1 (2024).
⸜ CHARLES MINGUS, Blues & Roots, Atlantic Recors/Atlantic Rwcording Corp./Tidal, FLAC 16/44,1 (1960/2005).
⸜ PAT METHENY, Bright Size Life, ECM Records/Tidal, FLAC 24/96 (1976/?).
⸜ BILLIE HOLIDAY, Lady Sings The Blues, Verve/UMG Recording/Tidal, FLAC 24/96 (1956/?).
⸜ THE ROY HARGROVE QUINTET, Earfood, Groovin’ High/Tidal, FLAC 16/44,1 (2008).

» The songs used in the test are available on the playlist of the TIDAL → HERE

IT WOULD SEEM THAT LAN TYPE CABLES, i.e., two-way cables that carry not audio signals but files, i.e., data packets protected from interference and errors, should not affect sound. Yet, they do. This is also indirectly acknowledged by IT companies, offering better and better products of this type, with more and more advanced protection against interference. If “LAN cable was just a LAN cable” and that was it, these developments would not be needed. Therefore, it is no longer a surprise to me that differences in the sound of a system in which we use one LAN cable or another occur and can be easily identified and named; in the rest of the test, for simplicity's sake, I will speak of “cable’s sound.” And yet again and again I am surprised by the intensity of these differences. As if it were a signal cable, speaker cable or power cable.

This was also the case with the TPL-2000L Professional. After switching the Lumin T3 file player from Acoustic Revive's LAN, I momentarily got a closer stage positioning and a more strongly defined midrange. ELLA FITZGERALD's live recording from Berlin, ˻ 8 ˺ Mack The Knife, from the album of the same title, sounded more direct, more “here and now” with the Professional version.

It was a modification bringing the foreground closer, that's for one thing. But also resulting from a slight emphasis on the lower midrange and the entire midrange in general, except, however, its upper part. It seems that the extremes, that is, the upper treble and lowest bass are softened and slightly hidden in the shadow of the midrange with the Tiglon. I'm not talking about withdrawing, because you don’t hear it that way. It is, in fact, a change more in the character of playing than in quantitative terms. Apparently, there is ‘less’ of bandwidth extremes than with the Acoustic Revive cables I used as a reference, and yet, the sound is still open and powerful.

I could perfectly hear it in the opening sequence of ˻ 6 ˺ I Wish I Knew How It Would To Be Free, a track from NINA SIMONE's phenomenal album Silk & Soul by RCA Victor. It begins with the sound of a piano assigned by the sound engineer to the left channel. Behind it, however, percussion can also be heard, but as if way back, as if in a different room.

Both the piano and percussion had a perfectly clear texture while being warm and silky. And rather massive. The drums were placed a bit closer and were rather warm. Also, coming in at 0:17, in the right channel, the finger snapping seemed close to me. The difference between the two planes, the warm piano and the bright, dynamic snapping, was clear, this is not a cable that blurs these kinds of differences. But they were also subjected to what I would call “analogizing”.

I'm referring to a stereotype at this point, because reference cables show sound in a very organic way that easily lends itself to such treatment, that is, it's easy to associate it with and connect it to it. But something like this just came to my mind when Simone started singing. Her vocals were warm, close to me and had a slightly rounded, sort of polished, edge. This is great news for anyone whose file player-based systems sound too light, not enough - let me repeat - “analog.”

THE JAPANESE CABLE ADDS WEIGHT, boosts up, warms up the sound. When, in the ˻ 3 ˺ Moanin’ played by CHARLES MINGUS, Pepper Adams' baritone saxophone enters at the beginning, in the right channel, and Willie Dennis' and Jimmy Knepper's trombones in the left channel, the Tiglon magnified them enough so that the musicians almost “stood” in my room. It wasn't as resolving and selective playing as with the reference cables or the expensive Siltech cables, that much was clear to me. But that's also not what this cable is, not the direction it takes us in.

If I had to guess what its designer had in mind, I'd say the same idea as the creators of XRCD technology, as the engineers reaching for vintage tube compressors in remasters, as all those who think “vinyl and only vinyl is the right choice”. That is, it's all about internal “coherence”, about warmth, and the sound being so organic. Listen to the beginning of the title track from the PATH METHENY’s ˻ 1 ˺ Bright Size Life. It's exactly what I was talking about. The bass is warm and strong with Tiglon, as is the leader's guitar.

Importantly, the cymbals are not depreciated in any noticeable way, their importance is not diminished. Although the upper treble is smoothed out and has less energy than with the Siltech, for example, this does not affect the tonal balance of the presentation. Stronger mid and lower bass - yes, this gives us something I wrote about, i.e. a firm grounding in timbre, it also improves the tangibility of the sound and enlarges its scale.

▌ Summary

WE WILL NOT BE BORED WITH THIS CABLE. It does not quench the energy or smooth out the feistiness of the recordings. It goes deeper into the sound, it's true, which gives a closer perspective, it also warms up the sound. But it's what keeps the vocals, like those of Nina Simone and Ella Fitzgerald before, and now BILLIE HOLIDAY, singing in ˻ 7 ˺ God Bless The Child from Lady Sings The Blues album, warm, close to us and large in scale.

Because it's a LAN cable that boosts up the sound, thus drawing us into the world of recordings. This is perhaps the most important aspect of its sound. It offers a low, saturated, even palpable bass, which gives recordings great scale and momentum. And the double bass, like the one that begins Strasbourg / St. Denis, a track from THE ROY HARGROVE QUINTET's album titled Earfood, will be powerful and saturated.

In a nutshell, the Tiglon TPL-2000L Professional will introduce “analogue” vibe into the system, in the stereotypical sense of the word. It may not be super-resolving, selectivity will not be at the forefront with it either, but tunefulness, energy - oh, yes, it will give you as much of it as possible. And this is something in which it is quite a bit better than the company's entry-level TPL-2000L model, also warm and saturated. The energy and insight into the recording with the Professional version are much better. Because it's just a very good, inexpensive cable for systems that are supposed to sound a lot like ones with turntables as sources. ●

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THIS TEST HAS BEEN DESIGNED ACCORDING TO THE GUIDELINES adopted by the Association of International Audiophile Publications, an international audio press association concerned with ethical and professional standards in our industry, of which HIGH FIDELITY is a founding member. More about the association and its constituent titles → HERE.

→ www.AIAP-online.org