Report published:
∙ in Polish on Dec 16th 2011, No. 92
∙ in English on Jan 3th 2012, No.92

Argento Audio cables belong to the kind I decided to disregard a long time ago – this kind are silver PCs. It's not about all silver products being poor, as I know Siltech cables that deliver breathtaking midrange, incredible vocals and so on. Also many less expensive cables like silver plated Chord are capable of delivering exceptionally good sound. But when it comes to my own system silver is out of question, period. That's the reason why I was avoiding reviewing any Argento cables for quite some time as the name of the company implied what conductor they used. This Danish manufacturer created even a separate brand – Organic Cables – for their new, copper products to avoid mix-up with their main, silver products. My problem was the pressure I felt coming from friends and readers asking all the time: “Have you tried Argento power cables yet? Are you going to? You should try them – they are really good, you won't be disappointed.” All right, all right, I'm getting to it. But I make no promises…

Flow Master Reference is the top Argento model and obviously the most expensive, too. It is a very solid looking PC that comes packed in a very nice, wooden box. It is quite flexible and they used some white, sleek material for outer sleeve which is quite unusual and surely making it different from most competitors. Plugs are manufacturer's pride and joy – contact surfaces and the main body look similar to what I already know from Wattgate, Furutech, or Oyaide products. Contact surfaces are first silver plated and then rhodium plated. Although instead of standard external „housing” here they used thick, long aluminum pipes. The internal part (the one with contacts) is glued inside those aluminum pipes that are filled with some kind of damping resin. To make the cables even more special the manufacturer prints a serial number on the surface of each plug. As you can read in the materials supplied by the manufacturer, each conductor is insulated separately and damped against vibrations. The manufacturer mentions VDM (Vibration Damping Material), which is a proprietary formula designed to efficiently damp micro-vibrations. There are three times more conductor strands used here than in the Flow line. The conductors are made of the purest silver featuring quasi-ribbon geometry, but have no edges resulting in a close to hyper-elliptic shape. I remember that the same thing was also highly praised by the Japanese Oyaide. Both conductors and plugs undergo a long-term cryo-treatment – they are first treated with sudden temperature drop (with liquid nitrogen) down to -193 °C, and then the temperature is slowly raised. This process allows to achieve an orderly crystal metallic structure – you can see under the microscope that after the process all crystals are parallel to each other, aligned in one direction. The cables are not shielded. As you may know, the first Argento Audio designer moved to join Vitus Audio some time ago. The present Argento designer – Ulrik Gydesen Madsen – started his adventure in Argento with the Flow line. Flow Master Reference is a further development of the Flow line.

SOUND

Recordings used during test:

• Depeche Mode, Enjoy The Silence, Sire/Reprise, 21490-2, MS CD (1990).
• Depeche Mode, Personal Jesus/Dangerous, Sire/Reprise, 21328-2, MS CD (1989).
• Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong, Ella and Louis, Verve/Lasting Impression Music, LIM UHD 045, UltraHD CD (2010).
• Eva Cassidy, Songbird, Blix Street Records/JVC, VICJ-010-0045, XRCD24 (2010).
• Glen Gould, Bach: The Art Of The Fugue, Sony Music/Sony Classical, SMK 52 595, The Glen Gould Edition, SBM CD (1997).
• Marc Copland & John Abercombie, Speak To Me, Pirouet Records, PIT3058, CD (2011).
• Pieter Nooten & Michael Brook, Sleeps With The Fishes, 4AD, GAD 710 CD, CD (1987).
• Pink Floyd, Wish You Were Here, Experience Edition, EMI/EMI Music Japan, TOCP-71169-90, 2 x CD (2011).
• Project by Jarre for VIP room, Geometry Of Love, Aero Prod, 4606932, CD.
• Lucrezia Vizzana, Componimenti Musicali (1623), wyk. Musica Secreta i Catherine King, Linn Records, CKD 071, CD (1998).

Japanese versions of the discs are available at CD Japan.

This is not going to be a particularly long text. Not because I can't write one or because there is nothing to write about. To put it simply, the Argento modifies sound in such a way and on so many levels that I'm unable to firmly judge all pros and cons. Sure I will try to compare them to my reference cables - Acrolink Mexcel 7N-PC9300 and to some other high-end power cables I know. But this time I will not offer you my final conclusion – it will rather be a kind of report on my time I spent with these power cords. I think that to properly evaluate the Argento cables one would have to spend at least couple of weeks, maybe even months with them in one's system. I can't afford such a luxury. But I will try to give you some hints, directions, impressions, and to present them in an orderly way so that when you try the Flow Master Reference for yourself you should know what to pay your attention to. That's the least I can do and I hope it will be helpful for you.

I'd like to start with some simple impressions, hopefully quite clear and easy to comprehend. You might notice that some of them seem to contradict the others – that's not a mistake, it only shows what kind of changes this cable introduces to the system (although cable doesn't make sound by itself, right?), proving its complex „nature”. I will elaborate on some of the „expressions” in the next paragraph.

The Argento cable doesn't sound like a typical silver cable; it doesn't sound like copper one either; bass doesn't go as deep as with the Acrolink; its bass differentiation is better than the Acrolink's; its tonal balance is set a bit higher than the Acrolink's; soundstage width is bigger than from the Japanese reference cable, each shift of phase, each movement on the stage introduced by the sound-engineer is clearly shown on the soundstage; its sound is extremely smooth; one might even say that it sounds somewhat „sweet”; sound is never bright nor harsh; the dynamics seems a bit averaged; it can surprise the listener with a very palpable sound of suddenly, strongly entering instrument; sibilants are in perfect balance with the rest of frequency range; midrange seems to be the most important/preferred range; but sometimes it seemed that bass range was the most important one; from time to time I thought that this cable increased clarity of a particular recording delivering better picture of the vocalist or some instrument; but usually it seemed to deliver sound in the form of large spots rather than precise, sharp 3D blocks. Enough for now.

Its amazing smoothness and clarity at the same time is what makes it impossible to simply classify the Argento to one of standard „audiophile” categories. You can't say by listening to it that it's made of silver – no way. I heard that from some manufacturers and distributors before but I had to listen to it myself to fully comprehend and confirm this opinion. If I didn’t know I would have never guessed after a blind listening session that the Flow Master Reference was made of silver. Maybe, just maybe, after a long time exposure to its sound I might start guessing that the cable is some mixture of silver, copper and maybe gold, because it reminded me a bit some most expensive Siltech cables. But just a bit. Yet pure silver – no way.
I would've never believed that. Why? Because the sound was too smooth for pure silver. This kind of sound usually comes from very expensive copper cables. What's more – many copper cables sound, comparing to Argento, brighter, flatter, not to say thinner. In these aspects the Flow MR seemed absolutely extraordinary, amazing.
At the same time its tonal balance is set slightly higher than in my ‘9300’, reminding me more of my previous reference – the Acrolink ‘9100’. The Danish Power Cord delivers flashy, well defined bass. It didn't matter if I listened to some electronic music like Project by Jarre, acoustic guitar from Personal Jesus by Depeche Mode, or some airy sounds of XVII century music by Lucrezia Vizzana – each and every time this amazing bass definition made the sound very clear, spatial but not too bright.
The Argento created the sound in a different way than the Acrolink, differently showing the instruments as 3D blocks in space. Silver cables usually deliver hardened attack which creates impression of better sound definition. By and large, this tough attack is not followed by rich saturation so the final effect is rather thin, sound doesn't have the proper “body”. This doesn’t happen here. It is not quite as rich and saturated sound as with my reference cable but, to be honest, no other cable compares to the Acrolink. So, comparing with any other cable except my '9300” the Argento is simply amazing with its incredibly rich, fleshy and smooth sound. Again, one notice – comparing to the Acrolink its tonal balance is slightly shifted up.
The Flow MR doesn't harden attack. That's why the outlines of phantom images don't have real, clear edge, but are rather „soft”, and one phantom image is more „attached” to the others. Probably that's why I thought that dynamics was slightly averaged. As I already wrote – when some instruments entered strongly it was shown in a strong, distinct, palpable way (the cable surely doesn't lack resolution). But most of the time the presentation was rather laid back, relaxed.

Writing all this I claim that these cables represent top level performance. For my needs and taste the Acrolink cables are still best suited, but it doesn't mean it would be so with different setup. Stronger, richer, more dense midrange (and bass) of the Japanese cable versus amazing smoothness, silkiness, and a touch of class by the Argento – you need to figure that out for yourself. And please don't treat this Danish masterpiece only as „silver that doesn't sound like silver” – it's so much more than that. My statement that the Flow MR doesn't sound like silver cable is just an interesting finding not a definition of this product because it doesn't really matter what the cable is made of but how it works when plugged to a system. The Argento Audio Flow Master Reference does an amazing job, and it does it in a different way than most cables I know do. Does the name of the city where the company's headquarters are (Silkeborg, which means Silk Castle) have anything to do with this fabulous smoothness, silkiness of the sound? I don't know and I don't care. What's important – I can honestly recommend these cables – have your own listening session and find out for yourself if that's your ideal sound.

Polish distributor:
RCM

ul. Matejki 4 | 40-077 Katowice
tel.: (32) 206-40-16 | (32) 201-40-96
fax: (32) 253-71-88

e-mail: rcm@rcm.com.pl

URL: www.rcm.com.pl