No, but I have a AQ Forest and it was so so, I also have a AQ Vodka and it was better. Both of them were used for my home theater actually. The Coffee is a step up compared to the previous two. I can hear the SQ improvement from each upgrade.
AQ must has a huge back ordered list. The Firebird HDMI was ordered in late March and now I was told it will not be shipped out until mid-May! Really? I rarely had such long a wait for any component order before.
Has it actually been released? I was told not until the end of May, at least here in Canada.
On AQ website it is listed as a current product, I don’t think it’s a new product actually. Maybe they will tell me by mid-May it is not ready again.
Is it the Firebird48?
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Yes, it is. I didn’t realize it is brand new product. Well, no wonder I was asked to give a review.
Patience is a virtue indeed… Last September I’ve ordered the AQ Diamond… no longer available. A new line of HDMI cables was about to be launched, so I changed the order to the FireBird 48. After months of waiting, this cable showed up last week. Now it’s breaking in…
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How’s the sound so far? Do you think it will be as good as the hype?
I received my Firebird 48 last week too. Initially it sounded just okay compared to my AQ Coffee HDMI. But after 48 hours everything improved. Today is the fourth day and the sound is simply amazing! I have listened to some old CDs that I could turn up the volume without fatigue. In the past they hurt my ears. The new AQ 48 line is the best one I have heard so far. Coffee was a lot better than Vodka, but the Firebird 48 made a bigger jump in terms of improvement.
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I have the Thunderbird 48 and couldn’t be happier with it. It was a huge improvement over both the stock HDMI cable and the Harmonic Technology Magic cable.
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This is very encouraging. Still waiting for mine in Canada.
Any new impressions of the cable?
I like the Firebird 48 quite a bit. It is on the warmer side yet it reveals tons of details. But two weeks ago I also changed my speaker cables to Silversmith Fidelium. They sound very different from other sp. cables I have tried. The sound is detailed, fast and warm. The sound stage is deeper too. My system sounded different and better than before and I don’t know which cable contributed more.
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I recently picked up a previous loved cable designed and assembled by Pink Faun.
This one:
I spent a couple of hours last evening swapping it in and out of the system (DS Sr./DMP combination). The “B” to its “A” was a .5M stock PSA HDMI cable that used to be supplied by PSA (not their “higher end” AC12 HDMI).
My primary test track was “Walking in Memphis”, off of Marc Cohn’s eponymous CD from 1991. I sampled various parts of the song, listened to the song over and over all the way through and sprinkled in some other songs and song segments from the CD using each of the cables.
I will do some more comparative listening with an SACD or two and perhaps another CD or two when I have some time.
However, so far, I really have not observed any discernible difference between the performance of these two HDMI cables. 
I would appreciate hearing from others that are familiar with the Pink Faun cable and the PS Audio stock cable (what was your experience in comparing the performance of these cables?).
Also, for those that have recently upgraded their HDMI cable for use with a PSA DS DAC, what was the most apparent quality or observation that led you to declare a particular HDMI cable “better” than another?
I really expected to hear a difference with the Pink Faun. But, so far, I guess it appears to live up to this claim of its maker:
“The Digital Cable Series are all designed to minimize the influence of the cable while transporting the digital signal. Our cables are very neutral, without any harshness or coloration.”
Regards.
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This reminds me of my experience with the higher-end XLO cables. I don’t so much hear the cable as what immediately precedes it in the chain of music reproduction.
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Have you tried a WW Platinum 7S HDMI? I use to use the .5m cable that came with my DMP. I find the WW sounded less harsh and more natural with more resolution than the PS Audio cable. Only the RAL HDMI sounded more transparent and revealing than the WW.
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Today I plugged in my AQ Coffee for the first time to compare with the new Firebird48. They clearly sound different. With Coffee the singer is more forward, like a couple feet closer to me. The high is a bit brighter (it is not bright sounding) only in comparison, and the bass is a bit deeper and it has a bit clearer separation. This tells me Firebird has not reached its peak performance yet. AQ cables typically needed hundreds of hours and Firebird is no exception. But Firebird sounds warmer (like analog) and has more details than Coffee. Also the soundstage is deeper. It probably had a couple hundred hours on it and I think it needs a few hundred more hours before I can make the final verdict.
But I am already like it better than Coffee.
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I have not.
Thank you.
As the Audioquest ThunderBird 48 HDMI cable continues to break-in I’m becoming more and more impressed with it’s sound. Explosive dynamics, better extension at the frequency extremes, tighter bass, seductive midrange, open airy and detailed highs, while sounding much smoother than the stock HDMI cable. Imaging has also become much more holographic and pin point.
Really wanted to order and try the RAL cable which everyone is raving about, but didn’t want to put myself through the agony of dealing with the poor customer service. Ordering the Audioquest through the Music Room was painless and delivered within a week after placing my order.
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Haven’t tried the Dragon. I’m sure it’s better, but more than I wanted to spend.