Up to just a few weeks ago I'd never heard of tellurium q, not really being up to date with British mags the name had passed me by and the scene here due to the stronger distributors tending to carry American brands you tend to read about US products much more than you do about UK ones, so this new name in the cable world escaped me.
'Oh no' you may well be saying not another cable company putting their own spin on their wonderful new idea of why their cable stands out more than the others and is the best yet, yawn you may well think, I've read it all before, a cable is just a cable.
I must also point out that I'm not a great lover of reviews simply because I think you need to have a product for a good fews months to really see and understand what it is doing, have some thing for a few days or weeks really only gives a partial side, which can be wrong, why do I think this? simply through experience, for example trying the John Blue JB4 MKII, only first play I thought my god what are these, these are horrid and if I had written a quick fire review I would have got it all so wrong because now some 4 to 5 months down the line the sound has changed completely and now I love them, they image like no other, they may lack air and bass, but the resolution in the midrange is so pure and clean many other speakers sound murky in the all important mid range, hence why I believe you need a product and to make a kind of blog of what you discover on your journey of testing.
So getting back to the tellurium q range this is what I thought I would do, I'd make it in to a kind of blog, a progress report over time instead of a quick fire, hey man these are the best cables I've ever heard!
As I said it's new name to me and I was offered the opportunity to test and try the cables of which I am grateful to Colin and Geoff for allowing me the pleasure to see what all the fuss is about as by now I have read up on them and they a creating a bit of storm both on forums and in the specialist Hifi press, so hang on folks this many be a bumpy ride but lets get stuck in.
I noticed on the tellurium q website they don't go for fancy packaging so I had in mind when Geoff contact me the cables would turn up in a jiffy bag, how wrong could I be, in face the turned up in a very adequate box, perfect for the job, who really need a velvet luxury box and cables with fancy bits of wood stuck on them? The boxes do the job and they look more than good enough.
So what was eden audio sent, I was sent two cables, the Blue and the Black, the Blue being the entry level model at £16 I believe, this is sold without termination while Green comes factory terminated, I don't know if this will always remain the case but at the moment that's how it is.
If you don't know by now here is the system I would do the testing on:
Firstly my little demo room is kitted out with Acoustic revive RWL-3 acoustic panel diffusers, a dedicated mains line, power block is an Oyaide MTS6e, a CSE RK100 mains regenerater is used on the Astin Trew At3500 CD player which sits on an Acoustic Revive RAF-48 air isolation platform, the Astin Trew is also fed by is an Acoustic revive power cables and an Acoustic Revive RAS-14 mains stabilizer. Pre amp is a Kingrex preference feed by an Acoustic revive power cord, mono blocks are Huygens MHz power amplifiers feed by Oyaide Black mamba power cords, the speakers are the Kudos C30 sitting on Acoustic Revive RST-38 quartz filled isolation platforms, current speakers cables are the Acoustic revive SPC reference and interconnects are Oyaide AZ-910 which are pure silver, that gives you an idea of what system I would do the testing.
Looking at the cables, they are easy to use, by this I mean they are not stiff, unyielding and difficult to use, I hate cables that pull on your gear, why? I like the flexibility the Tellerium cables provide, they are thin and bend in to place easily. The Tellerium black also come with some very nice & well fitting bananas and heatshrinks with the name Tellerium printed on them in Gold.
First impressions are positive, Geoff told me to run them in which I have been doing over the past week, but now I need to send them off to a friend and I'll continue with this once I get them back, but first impressions are proving to be very positive, by replacing the Acoustic revive SPC cables which set very high standards at a very slightly higher price point than the Black, the Tellurium had a pretty hard act to follow, but follow it did, these cables offer a very similar performance quality.
I've not got the most refined tastes when it comes to music and I don't listen to the type of music one would normally associate with your average audiophile, so I've tried to use a eclectic choice of music ranging from demo CD to pop, vocal and jazz etc to get a more rounded idea of how the cables sound with each type of music.
Happily I can start of by saying you get a very refined sound for your money, I'm going to start of with the black, the black offers a lovely treble quality, many people say the Kudos C30s treble sounds harsh, no way josè, the treble is beautifully smooth and liquid in its presentation, no brightness, spitiness or ear ache here, nothing is forced upon you or will cause you to wince in anguish and cover your ears, instead you get a beautifully poised treble that is nicely detailed and very smooth, you wont or don't hear every single wart and all imperfection instead you get the music, in fact it sounds as if your not listening to an electronic device such as a Hifi system, the cables don't go out for the jugular attack and assault on your ears, instead they treat them with care and tenderness in the way they caress them with such an enjoyable and refined sound.
Moving on to the soundstage, I like a well defined sound stage where every thing is in it's correct place and infocus where the vocalist is dead bang in the centre and singing personally to you, the tellerium presents a very well defined stage, maybe a tad more forward than the Acoustic revive, a bit more presence in the vocals which makes the sound that little bit more holographic and 3D like sounding. Instruments such as harps really burst forth from the speaker cabinets, such as on Natalie Coles mona Lisa track, piano sound relaxed and unforced, it's all very smooth and musically enjoyable, there is nothing worse than HiFi that all it wants to do is impress you with it's boom and tizz and in yer face style but forgetting about other qualities such as micro dynamics, naturalness and realism. If your picking up on one strong focus point about the tellurium Black and this it is very natural in it's presentation style, matched to extreme smoothness this is a cable you can enjoy for hours and hours.
This afternoon out came to black and in went the Blue, were they to sound the same? what about expectation bias? I'm just passing on my subjective thought, no blind test or not knowing which cable is what I will admit to that, but subjectively I do indeed notice some quite clear differences, the first thing is that treble, with the Blue in place you for sure lose some of the finesse and smoothness of the Black, the Black is in a different league, it still is smooth, but more shut in, not as sweet on the ear, lacking detail of the Black, you loss some air, some of the decay and spacial clues the Black has in abundance, also quite noticeable is the bass, it doesn't have the depth or texture of the Black, the Black reaches down deeper, the Black may be a slight overkill for speakers like the Kudos C30 in a small room where the bass may cause some room issue and turn a bit heavy, but you can notice bass is held back with the blue and you lose a bit of information about what the bass player is doing and impact from the kick drum, it's not as warm or as informative in those important lower reasons, maybe I'm making the cable sound a bit lacking, but this is not the case, I just think the Black has set a really high standard, but at the end it boils down to budget, your not being short changed with the Blue far from it, but it lacks the magical qualities the Black posses, the sound stage feels a bit more compressed, less airy and holographic, however, the image is still accurate and life like with the smoothness of the Black.
Clearly the Blue is a quality cable, the problem for me is the Black, if you was never to hear the Black you'd be one happy bunny, but once you get the Black in place you appreciate why your paying the extra, which really isn't that great if you take in to account the Black comes terminated.
