That cryo-treatment has a positive effect on the sound of LPs, I have already revealed in the article about CoolTech. I was just too curious to know what the cold does to vinyl. More common and recognized, of course, is the process with metals. Audioquest and Göbel High End have provided cables for experiments.

I know of some, especially smaller cable manufacturers, who cryogenically treat all of their cables; other large ones, such as Siltech and Crystal Cable, prefer to heat the conductors by sending a high current through them for a while. Audioquest, on the other hand, subjects its LF cables to a controlled burn-in process starting with the Thunderbird. It is pleasing that Audioquest agreed to provide me with two sets of balanced NF cables each, just like Göbel High End, which does not provide any information about the conditioning of its cables. Although I have long owned Goebel Lacorde Statement XLR with which I am very happy after intensive use the two pairs have different lengths, and with so many hours of operation on the hump that they should not be used for a comparison with new, treated cables. So I needed and got two brand new sets.

After consultation with company owner Bill Low, who had already experimented with cryo treatments decades ago, did not recognize any great advantages, but did not want to exclude that cryo technology had also made progress in the meantime, Rob Hay, Audioquest's Marketing Director for Europe, also promised me two cable sets. However, they were to be priced in a different market segment than the Lacordes. In the end, we agreed on two sets of two-meter-long Yukon, whose conductors are made of Perfect Surface Copper+ and which are priced at 500 euros in one-meter lengths.

CoolTech boss Wolfgang Lausecker had put a pair each of Audioquest and Goebel cables in his cryogenic chamber together with the records and some tools, which I was not allowed to see, let alone photograph, and subjected them to CoolTech's own 15-hour cooling and warming cycle. In my listening room, the sticker-marked treated Yukon then took over the task otherwise done by my current favorite, the Audioquest Dragon, which is to transfer the signals from the DAC to the preamp. I did not listen to the Dragon again before the cable swap, since this and the Yukon are in completely different price ranges, and experience shows that price and sound quality are closely correlated at Audioquest.