Great to hear you are feeling better and are back to work; and don’t work too hard just yet! I really enjoy the Gen 2 XLR IC.
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Just call Bob for orders. We are restructuring the pricing MATRIX for the GEN I and GEN II speaker cables. The real wall is QTY we can get made in a timely fashion. It is a chore to make and assemble.
Best,
Galen
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We “could take” orders for Series II speaker cable but have no grasp on pricing. Belden has for the first time in a number of years recently announced an across the board price increase. Aside from raw material increases they cite labor shortages, supply chain issues and delays and increased costs in freight and shipping. In general the cost of doing business is going up. They did offer us a last time opportunity to purchase at the old price and as long as it was one the final PO, we could schedule delivery a couple of quarters out if necessary. I guess we all have been to the grocery store or bought gasoline lately! The world has changed under the current administration in more ways than I can count.
The new design presents an improvement is sound quality. It also presents an anticipated increase in the cost of bulk cable from Belden. They have not made a cable like this before, it maxes out the “Belden” production line capability in terms of the number of and size of the conductors in a bonded pair, single weave design. They are looking at the complexity and somewhat limited volume. There is far more potential for something in the manufacturing process to go astray with Series II cable. The more complex the design of the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the pipes. Belden does not lose money making cable.
Labor is still a “big if?” We will build and ship cables to Jay at Audio Bacon, Douglas Schroeder at Dagogo, the Houston Audio Society, the San Francisco Audiophile Society (if they are interested) and a pair to myself. We are looking for feedback on how the new design in TPC compares to the Series I cables. We know very well how the Series I cables perform. Since we only have TPC to work with then that is where we must start. As of today, I do not have a final part number or price from Belden. Lot of variables. Lots of considerations.
Please know that the BJC and Iconoclast business creed will remain. We tell you all about the product, the research, math and the science behind Galen’s designs. There is absolutely no “snake oil” associated with Iconoclast cable design. We understand that there will always be a subjective view of all things “hi-fi,” and that nay sayers will always exist. Our goal with incremental improvements is to give you “more” and completely audible performance. And we want to give you the “increase” in performance at or near the old cost of the previous series within genre. I hope that makes sense!
We will get this started as soon as Belden lets us with their pricing and after we get a better handle on labor. I am in hopes we can find a thermal strip tool solution to both simplify and speed the assembly process.
Thank you all so very much for your interest and your patience, I suspect there will be lots of happy smiles in the future.
I am compiling a list of those interested and will be happy to add additional names.
Bob
This is now an official Belden “patented” product. If you want the equivalent of having 60-minutes show up at your office on a Monday morning then mess with a Belden patent and watch what happens to you. There is a reason for our madness.
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Oh boy, not sure exactly what this means but I can speculate. Please keep politics out of this. COVID has messed up everyone …
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Going political?
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Interesting that this information appears here but not on the official Iconoclast website. Personally, it is great that you can share your progress here, but silence on the Iconoclast website, is well, I just don’t get it. More has been said here, which is very generous, than on your official platform. I’m not poking at your technical basis, or the generation II speaker cable’s capabilities having not heard them. I just thought your technical info would be widely available on the Iconoclast site primarily with links to that embedded here on the PS Audio Forum.
I get that there is a level of frustration with supply chain issues, employee and worker availability as we are still in the throes of a pandemic, but honestly the COVID-19 pandemic affects us all. Some things just may better left unsaid, and marketing could be best coming from BJC/Iconoclast website. Just my thoughts.
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Thanks, @pmotz
Yes, no politics. And let’s leave COVID alone as well.
We all know there are major supply chain issues which have caused significant problems for many businesses.
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Hopefully you have a speedy and full recovery my friend.
All of this stereo stuff can wait until you are healed. But THEN 
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The worldwide kink in the chain is no joke. We have a small sun room addition that was supposed to be complete in November of 2021. We made the down payment last May and so far they haven’t been able to get the pile of stuff big enough to be able to make it weather tight so nothing has been done yet. It is a reputable contractor that we have used off and on for the last 30 years so no worries about a scam.
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Go here. We’ll add the series II speaker cable tech to this site.
https://www.iconoclastcable.com/blog/
https://www.iconoclastcable.com/links.htm
What we need is a separate “blog” for customer comment, yes.
Best,
Galen Gareis
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Supply chain issues are World wide. We’re in Canada and my wife ordered new patio doors. One year later and no doors. The window supply company honoured our deposit and went to another door manufacturer. Again and example of issues impacting everyone.
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Hey BobBJC sorry to hear about your hospitalization with
pneumonia…
I thought my asthma was kicking inhard and causing
an incessant coughing…Finally went to get checked out only to find out it is pnumonia trying to do me in.
Good to hear you are on the mend
Wish you the best Bob
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At first I thought Bob meant Belden administration, but the rest of you now have me wondering.
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I apologize for my simple mind but could someone splain to me the changes to the interconnects and how those changes are expected to impact sound? What will the Gen 2 interconnects give me that I don’t already have with my 4X4 XLR’s?
gen 2 ICs are 4x4s. Same product.
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THAT’s what I thought.
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Ron,
You already have the series II that are Vp flattened with the 4x 30 AWG “conductors”. The XLR has sixteen wires and the RCA uses four to manage the Vp linearity.
We need low Capacitance on IC cables since the signal is a theoretically pure voltage. I don’t want to raise the capacitance above 18 pF nominal to manage Vp. There is no current into an infinite impedance load, we detect and transfer the voltage signal only. So we keep the low capacitance in place.
The low capacitance forces the Vp to get WORSE, though, as it is in the equation’s denominator.
To significantly off-set that I up the individually insulated signal wire DCR (103.2 ohm verses 32.37 ohms!) with 4x30 AWG pulling the Vp DOWN a bunch. So we have low cap and lower Vp differential. This is why the 1x4 and 4x4 sound different than the 1x1 and 4x1 design and people are very happy with the option.
We have;
- ) low cap at 18 Pf/foot nominal.
- ) lower BULK DCR for longer lengths (4 x 30 AWG CMA total area of 40 CMA verses 25 AWG 320 CMA).
-) 20% mitigated Vp linearity @ 10 KHz (see the calculated chart from measured data).
Best,
Galen Gareis
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You must not have read and understood Galen’s posts. I feel I understand what is different and was in a hurry to order. I will be removing a Stealth Audio Sakra V17 LE cable from my system for a Gen 2 version balanced interconnect. It is a rounding error in price compared to the Stealth. And yet I am confident it will stand up.
And hey guys shouting no politics, you made it political. Bob did not. He is just calling a spade a spade. At this current time price increases are coming at us from every angle. It’s unavoidable and who cares about pointing fingers. It is what it is and it’s not going to be solved in the next couple of years. Reading more into that is masterbatory at best…
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Well said.
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My understanding as well, communication is not their strong suit. To this day I do like my SPTPC RCA interconnects, THANKS RonP. I passed on the XLRs thinking they would be too stiff for my application as my equipment rack is necessarily placed up against the rear wall.