Review: PWaudio 1960s – Once you go black

PWaudio 1960s

Sound:

Cable sound, what a great topic to destroy an audiophile’s day. Countless evenings have been ruined because of it, and I bet there will be endless more. Can a cable alter the sound signature of a head- or earphone? I say yes, solely because I have heard it. Some products show the change more obvious than others, one particular that comes to my mind is the Noble Audio Katana. For cable reviews, I always use this one first. For one because of the before mentioned effect cables have on it, and also because I am in the fine position to have two sets of it. Enabling me to directly compare cable A to cable B. Calvin of Music Sanctuary recommended me a burn-in time of 200 hours for each cable, so they can settle in and unleash their full potential.

I will go through the perceived impressions on both 1960s cables separately, starting with the two-wire.

1960s 2-wire

The first thing I noticed when listening to Katana with the two-wire was the added warmth and body in the lower mids and upper bass, as well as the increased resolution. Katana on its own is a reference tuned monitor with nice body, but with the two-wire this body gets bigger and the entire presentation receives more blood, which makes it all sound more organic and smooth to me. The enhanced detail reproduction and resolution was also very well received. Not that Katana would be in the need for them. Noble’s co-flagship has a soft and slightly warmer treble tuning with the standard cable, which I like a lot. The 1960s however increases the richness of this region remarkably in my opinion, giving highs a certain character that makes it hard to look away.

Katana’s sound stage did also see some changes in terms of width and depth, it stretches a touch further into each direction. Going hand in hand with that, layering and instrumental separation did also see some enhancements.

Overall, I’d describe the 2-wire’s sound as neutrally warm with high resolution.

PWaudio 1960s

PWaudio 1960s

1960s 4-wire

For this part I have used both my Katanas plugged into the Chord Electronics Mojo, comparing the 1960s to each other.

The most noticeable difference between both definitely is the overall tone. Two-wire Katana sounds more organic and warmer than four-wire, which is leaner. With the four-wired 1960s attached to my Katanas, I hear the sub-bass slightly elevated compared to two-wired Katana. It is even more detailed with incredible transparency and resolution. Sound stage got a notch wider but stayed the same in depth. Treble is not as rich as before, but brighter and crisper.

In one sentence, I’d say the four-wire is neutrally bright with outstanding details and resolution.

This leads me to the conclusion that the two-wire is a better match for brighter and reference tuned monitors, where the four-wire would be ideal for warmer and darker sounding gear.

Pair-ups:

I hope the above gives you a good impression of how these cables do sound, but in order to give you an even better understanding I will include a few more pairings. In the attempt to not make this review too long and boring I’ll try to keep it short and simple.

Noble AudioKaiser Encore (2-wire)

The two-wire makes Encore sound more musical and organic compared to stock, with bigger bodied bass and lower mids. Sound stage is a little wider and deeper. Instruments did get a bit more air around them, enhancing separation and layering. Treble was slightly tamed, yet retained its wonderful richness.

Noble Audio – Kaiser Encore (4-wire)

With the four-wire 1960s Encore has a very wide and deep sound stage. It is impressively transparent but a touch too detail focussed for my taste. Treble is shimmering and crisp but lost some of its richness which always drew me to the Noble.

PWaudio 1960s

PWaudio 1960s

Noble Audio – Kaiser 10 (2-wire)

The K10 is one of the warmer and darker monitors I have in my possession. With the two-wire 1960s I hear the sound stage stretching further in width, enhanced instrumental separation and a tad warmer overall tonality. For my taste this is not an ideal pairing as it has resulted in a too warm sound. Maybe you’ll like it though.

Noble Audio – Kaiser 10 (4-wire)

Now this is more interesting for my preference. The added resolution and transparency took the K10 to a new level. Sound stage has been increased noticeably in width and depth. Layering got more precise. Treble now is a bit more focussed and revealing.

64 AudioA18t (2-wire)

The A18t is my pick of 2017 as Best Custom IEM. It is known for its extreme precision and resolution with a mind-numbing sound stage. I have done pair-ups exclusively with the M20 module installed. The two-wire PW Audio adds good portions of warmth to the lower registers, giving the Tzar more body and weight in tone. High notes are richer in comparison to the non-1960s A18t, not M15 levels but definitely at a very pleasing point.

64 Audio – A18t (4-wire)

The A18 Tzar reaches lower into the sub bass regions, though it lost some body. Sound stage got stretched in width and a bit in depth. The four-wire made the 64 Audio too detail focussed and bright up top for my taste.

Comparisons and Conclusion on the last page!

4.5/5 - (27 votes)
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A daytime code monkey with a passion for audio and his kids, Linus tends to look at gear with a technical approach, trying to understand why certain things sound the way they do. When there is no music around, Linus goes the extra mile and annoys the hell out of his colleagues with low level beatboxing.

5 Comments

  • Reply February 16, 2018

    WirePedant

    “The positive signals are 26 American Wire Gauge and use Teflon jackets while the negative conductor is only 24 AWG and uses a polyvinyl chloride (PVC) jacket.”

    AWG is weird, and smaller numbers are larger wires. So the negative conductor isn’t actually “only” 24 AWG, it’s in fact larger than the positive wire.

    • Reply February 16, 2018

      Linus

      Thanks for pointing that out! Changed 🙂

  • Reply September 18, 2018

    LUI XU YAO JONATHAN

    did u remember to rub some snake oil over the PW Audio cables?

    • Reply September 19, 2018

      Linus

      Yes of course, 7 litres and some fairy dust 😉

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