Acoustic Revive USB-1.0PL Triple-C

Acoustic Revive is a Japanese company founded in 1997 and led by Mr. Ken Ishiguro. It specializes in interconnect cables, anti-vibration products, but also offers innovative products with the University of Tokyo usually behind the ideas. We are testing a USB cable made of Triple-C copper and a USB filter with material doped with kiyoh-stone mineral.

One of my favorite tales about how sensible, intelligent and well-educated people can think in a tunnel-vision way, involves a test of Acoustic Revive USB cables by me. I cite it from time to time, perhaps even too often, perhaps even a bit intrusively, but it's still relevant. Published in March 2011, it sparked a discussion, continued mainly on Wykop, and a wave of emails to me, in which - this is part of my story—reasonable people turned out to be simply short-sighted. And lazy.

The thing is, I wrote that Acoustic Revive's USB interconnects "sound" different from ordinary industrial USB cables and are simply better; more HERE. There was no end to the mockery, the teasing was in full swing, and I just knew what I knew—USB cables change the signal that flows through them, which manifests itself in sound modifications. Exactly a year later, in issue 95 of HF, I conducted a test of LAN cables from the same manufacturer, and the same thing—laughing-giggles and teasing all over.

However, it was already after two tests of products that should not be tested at all, following the logic of my adversaries, after which I was richer with experience that proved to be unique and useful for all the years to come.

USB-1.0PL Triple-C

One of the basic solutions that was proposed at the time by this Japanese company, which was associated with the medical industry and therefore well "established" in technology and research, was separation of signal and power runs. So much so that in one version of the cable, there were two plugs on the transmitting that had to be plugged into two separate USB ports in the computer. Or go even further and power the power line (5VDC) from the battery. The manufacturer writes:

Did you know that all USB cables have a signal line and a power line? It is well known in audio that if the signal cable and power cable are run in parallel, the radiation noise and magnetic field of the power cable will affect the signal and deteriorate sound quality. However, currently not all USB cables take this issue into account. What's more, the power line in a USB cable carries a lot of interference from the computer, which seriously affects the signal line. (…)

Some USB cables offered by audio manufacturers have separate signal and power lines, but only the signal lines are shielded in them. Due to their close proximity, the effect of shielding is limited.

acousticrevive.jp , accessed: 22.10.2024.

Separating data signals from clock signals, and running them in separate cables is one of the best methods for minimizing interference. Ken Ishiguro, head of the company, points out that commercially available USB and LAN cables made of a single wire with strands twisted from thin wires produce stray currents called "crosstalk," making signal transmission much more difficult. He first used this technique in the aforementioned USB cables, the USB-1.0SP and USB-5.0PL models. Years later, a similar solution would also find a place in the company's LAN cables, in the LAN Quadrant Triple-C model; test HERE.

Seperating runs—this has already been done. So another modification is equally important. In the newer version of these cables, PCOCC-A copper has been replaced by another, with the company's name Triple-C. As we've already written, High Fidelity was one of the first magazines in the world, and certainly the first outside Japan, to receive Acoustic Revive cables using PC Triple-C copper for testing, and published such a test (№ 126, October 1, 2014). Just a month ahead of us at the time was the Japanese magazine Audio Accessory.

The material, called PC Triple-C, or Pure Copper-Continuous Crystal Construction, is used in a process similar to forging, in which the wire is repeatedly struck. The strikes have the correct angle and direction, chosen through experimentation. As a result of this processing, it reduces its volume by 70%. This is an unmistakable reference to Japanese sword forging traditions, which is why Acoustic Revive ads used to feature an image of a katana blade.

Although this material does not have some particularly high purity expressed in "N" (6N, 7N, etc.), it actually has very low barriers between crystals. Mr. Ishiguro even says that the transitions are less visible than in the best copper yet invented, namely PCOOC-A (Pure Copper Ohno Continuous Cast Advanced). Triple-C copper, in small quantities, is produced by a separate part of Furukawa's conglomerate, Fine Chemicals & Materials (FCM).

In Acoustic Revive cables, solid-core wires feature a Teflon dielectric. Their diameter is the smallest currently achievable with this technique. Both runs are shielded with copper foil in this cable, giving—as the manufacturer assures—100% coverage. The outermost part of the cable features a carbon SF tube (CSF), which is designed to dampen noise generated by the cable, prevent external noise from entering the cable and has an "anti-static effect on the cable itself," thus minimizing interference between the signal line and the power line.

They are finished with gold-plated plugs on both sides with bodies made of aircraft-grade aluminum. Which is also significant. According to the manufacturer, the USB plugs have machined bodies made of Aerospace Aluminum Alloy 2017S, which is said to improve sound quality due to its "excellent vibration dampening effect." The connection between the USB plug and the cable is not molded, as in most USB cables on the market today, but uses high-quality audio solder, and everything, the manufacturer assures, "has been made to ensure high sound quality."

RUT-1K

RUT-1K is a product that can be found separately or can complement other cables. It is a filter designed to minimize high-frequency noise. It takes the form of a plug that plugs into an unused USB type A (flat) socket. The small housing contains materials used in other products from this manufacturer, RCA and XLR filters; more HERE.

So expect to find dark rock crystal and a mix of silk, quartz and other minerals in the RUT-1K. Since this is the version with a K at the end, this means that the interior has been painted with a solution containing kiyoh-stone, a rare earth element whose main ingredient is aluminum silicate ("aluminum silicate").

kiyoh-stone

A new version of the RUT-1K filter features black body, and the older, one without letter K, featured grey body

For the first time kiyoh-stone was featured in Acoustic Revive products in 2021. We had already written about it when we tested the acoustic panels RWL-III Absolute (HERE) and it was already known then that more products with K were in the pipeline, for example, a turntable mat, AC voltage filter and artificial ground and cable stands.

As Mr. Elia Hontai-san of Muson, Acoustic Revive's representative outside Japan, wrote me at the time, kiyoh-stone is a rare earth element whose main ingredient is aluminum silicate ("aluminum silicate"). It is available in only one place in the Land of Cherry Blossom, in Gunma Prefecture. That's no coincidence, he says, since the same prefecture is where Acoustic Revive is headquartered.

The property of this material that Mr. Ishiguro-san was keen on is that under vibration it easily produces negative ions of high intensity, the maximum of which is in the far-infrared end of spectrum. kiyoh-stone generates up to 40 times more ions than tourmaline. This material was used in the form of paint, which was painted on the inside of the filter. Elia Hontai adds that it is one of the more expensive materials of this type available on the market, and it’s available only in limited quantities.

SOUND

HOW WE LISTENED

The cable and USB filter from Acoustic Revive were tested in a High Fidelity reference system. The transport section of the Lumin T3 file player was used as the signal source, and the output section of the Ayon Audio CD-35 HF Edition SACD player was used as the DAC. The cable was compared to the reference cable, Tiglon TPL-2000U (HERE) . From the router, powered by a JCAT Optimo 3 Duo, the signal ran to a Silent Angel N16 LPS LAN switch (cable length 1.55 m) and then to the player. The test was a run as AA/BB/A and BB/AA/B comparison with known A's and B's.

RECORDINGS USED FOR THE TEST

Berny Kessel, The Poll Winners – Ride Again, Contemporary Records/Fantasy/Tidal, FLAC 16/44,1 (1959/1991).

Eric Clapton, Meanwhile, Surfdog Records/Tidal, FLAC 24/96 (2024).

Brian Ferry, Is Your Love Strong Enough?, Virgin Records/Tidal, SP, FLAC 16/44,1 (2024).

Warhaus, Where The Names Are Real, Play It Again Sam/Tidal, SP, FLAC 24/44,1 (2024).

Mel Torme, Tormé, Verve Records/UMG Recordings/Tidal, FLAC 16/44,1 (1958/2003).

Wojtek Mazolewski Quintet, Beautiful People, NoPaper Records/Tidal, FLAC 24/48 (2024).

Skalpel, Break-In – Magiera Remix, Ninja Tune/NoPaper Records/Tidal, SP, FLAC 24/44,1 (2024).

Tracks used for the test are available @ TIDAL HERE

The USB cables are no different from any other connection in an audio system—they have power. That is, they change the sound in an equally powerful way, both quantitatively and qualitatively. I compared Acoustic Revive's cable to that of another Japanese manufacturer, which, however, chose significantly different solutions and technologies. And this can also be easily heard. The USB connection, it seems to me, is one of the most difficult audio connections and such a cable has a considerable role to play.

Because, for example, let's listen to the opening track of The Poll Winners - Ride Again by Berny Kessel , the Be Deedle De Do. Recorded wonderfully by Roy DuNann for Contemporary Records, it is incredibly open, dynamic and yet "here and now." We know that the recordings were made in the shipping warehouse of the pressing plant, in a room with packed records, which gave these recordings a unique character.

Switching from the reference cable to the Acoustic Revive opened up the presentation, bringing the foreground closer and distancing those at the rear. It is, so it seems, a more resolving cable. And more selective. Ray Brown's double bass in the left channel had a clearer string strike, was faster and more accurate. In the same way, by the way, I perceived the drums. It was something wonderful—something that might make most modern sound engineers cry, because we can no longer record in a similar way.

The Triple-C copper cable showed the whole performance in a fast, dynamic and open way. The Tiglon played it in a warmer, and smoother manner. It also had a stronger emphasis on midrange breakthrough and bottom end. The tested cable is different. It doesn't warm up the sound, it doesn't obscure anything, it goes deeper into the matter of sound. Its selectivity is higher, so that instruments are more strongly separated, but also the resolution is higher, which in turn gives a wonderful saturation of spatial, color and dynamic information.

I had, truth be told, a repeat of what I heard when testing the Quadrant Triple-C LAN cable. That is to say, a move toward openness and speed. But also without lightening the sound. Eric Clapton's voice in You’ve Changed, a track from his latest album Meanwhile, was still a bit scratchy, not quite "arranged" in the mix—at least that's how I see it—because of the strong compression. But it wasn't taken out of the mix. There are, after all, a warm guitar underneath and strings placed far away in the mix, creating a sort of "cape" for the whole song.

The Japanese cable took me deeper into the recording than the Tiglon did. That is, it moved, figuratively speaking, the sounds, now having stronger drawing and more air around them. Because of it the mass of sound was slightly lower and its saturation decreased, which again is forté of the Tiglon cables. But, as usual, you get some you lose some. What the USB-1.0PL Triple-C does is worthy of respect and appreciation.

This is because it doesn't prevent a story from also being built with recordings that are themselves quite tonally light and lack sufficient midrange saturation. Let me mention, for example, Brian Ferry's "Is Your Love Strong Enough?" from the digital single of the same title, accompanying the album Retrospective..., which collects his greatest hits.

But when there is strong low vocals in a song, then the presentation is low and is saturated. It was from this angle that I listened to Warhaus' latest single Where The Names Are Real and Gloomy Sunday by Mel Torme, superbly arranged and conducted by Marty Pitch.

Listen to the latter with Acoustic Revive cables, and you'll get both a selective, clear picture of brass, with wonderful trumpet on the left, saxophone in the middle, and drums in the back, played sensitively by Shelly Manne. Norman Grantz is responsible for the recording, and this is one of the Verve label's better productions. All those flavors, changes in dynamics, timbre and emotional tension we are dealing with here, were extremely clear with the tested cable.

For these are, it seems to me, very honest cables. This category is rarely invoked. And wrongly so. It seems little glamorous, and readers and consumers driven by hyperactive socials have to have everything triple 'most' to pay attention to it at all. And 'honesty' seems so ordinary, doesn't it? In fact, it's one of the key qualities in audio. Honest is one that doesn't exaggerate in any direction and tries to remove itself from the picture. Rather neutral than expressive. But also natural, because that's what honesty with the listener demands.

The Wojtek Mazolewski Quintet's Beautiful People thus sounded extremely consistent with this idea. And that's because Mazolewski's playing and recordings are also honest. They don't pretend anything, they are what they appear to be. But it's because of this that they acquire meaning, a kind of three-dimensionality. And I'm thinking not only of space, although this space is vast and multidimensional, with perfectly arranged plans. I'm also thinking of such a display of changes in the recording, which would give a similar effect, also in terms of bodies and in terms of energy.

RUT-1K

We've featured the RUT-1K before, discussing the CS-3K power supply voltage filter HERE. This time we tested it not only on the output of the file player, but also with a router to which the Silent Angel N16 LPS LAN switch is connected, with its two modules in series, powered by a Tiglon TPL-2000 cable. It is part of the system I work with on a daily basis; more about it HERE PL.

The RUT-1K does not give as clear-cut changes as a USB or LAN cable. I've already written about this—it's not that everything is suddenly better and we immediately buy this "dongle." After some time, however, it becomes clear that even such subtle changes are valuable and, in the case of files, can even be crucial. This is because the resolution of the smallest signals improves. This gives more natural space and deeper colored vocals. Without the RUT-1K, the sound gently "collapses" toward the center, and vocals sound more "HiFi," i.e. less natural, not as soft.

The timbre is almost unchanged, except that it seems to us that with the "dongle" it is smoother, and our attention is focused more on the midrange. As I say, these changes are not quantitatively large, but qualitatively they are valuable. We can live without the RUT-1K and nothing bad will happen to our files. However, if we plug it into a USB socket and leave it there for a while, simply listening to music, its removal will leave a slight "residue" of dissatisfaction.

Summary

Acoustic Revive USB-1.0PL Triple-C is an incredibly plastic cable when it comes to the presentation of different recordings. I mean it is differentiating. Listened to the Skalpel's track Break-In - Magiera Remix at the very end, that is, samples plus synths and trumpet, it sounded in a very similar way to Kessel's guitar trio at the beginning of the test. In the sense that I had the impression of similar energy coming from the recording, and also the sounds were equally clean and equally selective.

This, then, is a cable with an open, fast and energetic sound, it is selective, but above all, it is resolving. Therefore, it does not lighten anything or emphasize the attack of the sound, but saturates it with information. This is playing that is less about enjoying an afternoon, and more about playing music so that it moves us. This is a cable that is very neutral, but also stays on the natural side of timbre. A truly excellent addition to a high-end audio system.

When you add the RUT-1K filter, as the final touch, you get both an open and deep sound with outstanding energy.

Price (when reviewed):