Review and Lab: Paul Miller

Edwin Rynveld, Siltech’s CEO, has been driving the innovation behind this 43-year-old brand since 1992. His willingness to break with convention has informed the design of both Siltech’s amplifiers [HFN Jun ’13] and, more recently, its loudspeakers [HFN Dec ’25] but that same fresh approach has always been visible – and audible – in its cables. Now divided into three key series – the Explorer, Classic and Crown – it’s that middle range, and the Legend in particular, that marks the transition from ‘monocrystal copper’ to a proprietary silver/gold alloy, now in its ninth generation (G9). And silver is where Siltech (SILver TECHnologies) likes to hang its metallurgical hat.

If you’ll pardon the pun, there’s been a redrawing of the map at Atlas with the Scottish cable company now clearly dividing its wares into three distinct ranges dubbed 'Upgrade', 'Aspire' and 'High End'. The Ailsa Duo OCC interconnect featured here is joined by the established Hyper cable in the brand’s mid-ranked Aspire range, both these cables now bearing the ‘Duo’ moniker.

Cryogenic treatment is key to almost every Furutech cable and connector, as is the promise of exceptional build and finish quality [HFN Mar '18]. With cables, of course, the material engineering can easily be quantified, but with the Japanese brand's 'noise busting' NCF Clear Line plugs – supplied with RCA and XLR terminations for insertion into unused audio inputs – the science can easily lose some clarity. Prices are £205 for each RCA-equipped plug and £260 for the bigger male and female XLR derivatives.

Few loudspeaker brands come racing from the gate, but Perlisten, from Wisconsin, US, has gone from unheard of to a serious challenger in very short order. First up, in 2022, was the EISA Award-winning S7t floorstander [HFN Apr '22], which introduced the company as a high-end marque, and this was quickly followed by its second-tier R series [HFN Aug '22]. Now we get the S5t, essentially a slimmed down version of the S7t, with all the appeal that this entails.