Audioquest have now produced a range of audiophile grade lightning to USB cables that are made with solid silver conductors and are perfect for audio transfer. Audioquest Lightning USB Cables are available in a range of prices and specification.
Audioquest Diamond Lightning USB Cable
Ever since CDs first appeared, and CD transports and processors required a cable designed for digital to be used between them, AudioQuest has been advancing the frontier of what’s possible. Starting with those first digital-coaxial (S/P-DIF) and Toslink cables, on through AES/EBU, AT&T ST, FireWire, HDMI, Ethernet and USB, AudioQuest has over and over again proven that digital audio data is as delicate and vulnerable as analogue audio, sometimes even more so.
While digital data is in many ways more robust than analogue data, the transmission of digital information is itself an analogue function. The turning on & off, or the variation in voltage required to signify a “bit” of data, is an imperfect analogue process. It’s an attempt to produce, transmit and receive a perfect square wave – an impossible ideal. Audioquest’s declaration “Do No Harm!” is as pertinent for real-time digital data and packetised digital data as it was for Audioquest’s first analogue cables back in 1978.
The latest addition to AudioQuest’s comprehensive USB cable lineup includes 4 existing models now available
with Apple’s Lightning™ connector (as used on all recent iOS devices) on one end, and the standard USB A connector on the other end. Whether connecting mobile devices and their content to the USB ports now common
to so many automobile entertainment systems, or to a full-blown stereo system at home, a cable with minimal distortion is required for sound that is full, engaging and 3 Dimensional. Thin and flat is a great form factor for an iPhone or iPad ®, but that’s not how the music from those marvelous devices should sound! These new versions of Forest, Cinnamon, Carbon and Diamond all use solid conductors, as is true for all AudioQuest’s USB cables. Solid conductors eliminate strand interaction, one of the biggest sources of distortion in cables.
Three of the models use silver plating over LGC copper because silver plating is a very cost-effective way to gain much of the low-distortion advantage of solid silver at a fraction of the cost. Forest’s superior sound is in part made possible by its solid 0.5% silver conductors. Cinnamon employs 1.25% silver conductors and adds a Noise-Dissipation System (NDS) layer. Carbon’s solid 5% silver conductors and Carbon-Based 3-layer NDS significantly increase the sense of audio immersion, and Diamond, with its solid 100% Perfect-Surface Silver (PSS) conductors and Dielectric-Bias System (DBS), offers the ultimate in natural ease and sonic purity. AQ’s take-no-prisoners Lightning connector uses an ABS shell, over a solid one-piece die-cast shield, over the properly stress-free internal connections.
