Eletech Sonnet of Adam Review: Dulcet and Glamorous
Custom cable is a niche hobby only enjoyed by a smaller population of hardcore audiophiles. As wireless audio took over a major amount of the pie, the competition within the custom cable industry became much more intense. However, there are still continuous inflows of new brands despite the high barrier to entry. Eletech is a fairly new high-end cable brand that appeared out of the blue yet promptly built a sturdy reputation among audiophile communities based on their seasoned tuning skills. Their first flagship cable, Illiad, particularly left a great impression on the many including myself. Positioned as a co-flagship product with “Ode to Laura”, Eletech now presents the “Sonnet of Adam” (Adam in short). Let’s see how Adam matches with different IEMs and cables, including its flagship sibling, the Ode to Laura.
Beautiful Packaging & Presentation
Sonnet of Adam comes in a gorgeously designed packaging box, in and out. Once opened reveals Michelangelo’s “The Creation of Adam” drawing on the lid, and an acrylic presentation plate that describes the cable’s specification. Other than the cable itself, Adam comes with a premium leather carrying case, a leather cable tie, a metal serial card, and a mini frame that is packed with the same drawing as the lid. This is likely the most elegant and beautiful packaging I’ve seen from a product. Very well aligns with the concept of the cable.
Three Different Gold-blends
The Sonnet of Adam is comprised of three different gold-blended wires that are produced and tuned proprietarily. Eletech cables are well known for their beautifully designed metal components and their co-flagships have gone the next step for the designs. The meticulous pattern art for the plug as well as the geometric Y-split design completes the elegant looks of the Adam. As for the cable itself, the wires are very light and soft, not causing any microphonics or trouble wearing.
Detailed specification of the cable is as follows:
- 23AWG, 4 Wire
- Triple Bespoke Premium Gold Blend (Gold-Silver Alloy, Gold-Plated Silver, Gold-Plated Copper)
- 9 Litz, Kevlar-infused Core wires
- Cryo-treated
- Eletech Bespoke Solder / Y-split / Connectors
- FlexiMax Insulation
The Sound of Adam (1/2)
Let’s talk about the general sound changes brought by the Sonnet of Adam. First, the sound overall gets deeper and cleaner, in density and detail. Custom cables commonly achieve a clean sound by filtering away the background dynamics, which definitely meets the purpose but feels like the ambiance is being lost. However, for the Sonnet of Adam, the ambience or background details are closer to being quietened than removed, thoroughly respecting the micro reverbs and details while achieving a clean, pure sound. This may feel like a minimal improvement at first but the more you listen, the more you realize its impact on the music’s nuance. Such a background portrayal of Adam maximizes the realness and liveliness of the sound.
Now for the vocals. The Sonnet of Adam displays a creamy, blissful tone with improved clarity and transparency. Vocals are sweetened not by directly coloring the tone but by creamy, thick textures accompanied by boosted transparency. It’s a type of creaminess that doesn’t get dull or soggy – but instead gets even crispier. Adam thoroughly respects the IEM’s intended tone and sound.
Speaking of texture, Adam’s one of the very strongest charms has to do with its micro-fine texture exposure. The Sonnet of Adam is one of the very best when it comes to presenting astoundingly natural and detailed texture details. While we’ll be discussing below for IEM matchings, the Sonnet of Adam unveils the hidden grains and musical details that you previously weren’t aware of from your favorite IEMs and tracks – to a daring extent. Yet then again, the end surface of the textures is very fine and smooth, so the sound doesn’t feel any coarse.
The Sound of Adam (2/2)
Normally, when people wish to bring the vocals forward or boost the clarity, we go for pure silver cables. Yet it’s soon enough to realize that pure silver cables are rather trickier to match because the upper ends easily get over-brightened or dry. Meanwhile, the Sonnet of Adam is able to significantly boost the vocal resolution and clarity without making the sound dry or fatiguing. Instead, Adam also throws in a creamy tone while boosting the clarity which doubles the musical enjoyment. The sibilant range on the upper mids is also managed perfectly and keeps a steady flow.
It’s no understatement to say Adam’s creamy and fine charms shine even brighter on the highs. In my personal experience, there are many cables that bring out good taste to the vocals but not so often for the trebles. The Sonnet of Adam can, however. The mellow, elsatic treble notes. The small treble splashes and sparkles that weren’t as clear are now rich and vibrant. A downgrade can be often experienced when diverting back to the original cable as the usual sound now feels bland and dull. The vibrancy and richness Adam brings are done within the natural range, hence not messing up the tone balance. The catharsis from the inflow of natural yet rich trebles is truly fascinating to hear.
Let’s now talk about the bass. While Adam’s sound is more oriented on a neutral-bright sound signature, Eletech makes it apparent that they haven’t left out on the bass quality either. Consistent with the above impressions, Adam’s bass mainly focuses on bringing out as much bass presence as possible within the range of respecting the IEM’s original sound signature. The bass shows clearer and stronger dynamics, offering a stronger density and slams. Another bass improvement is that the bass gets thicker in tone color. Lastly, Adam delivers a cleaner, clearer bass extension. These changes overall work together to make the bass sound more realistic and livelier. The sub-bass quantity also mildly increases as well, although by a small portion and this is highly dependent on what cable you’ve been using as the stock cable. Though it feels more like unveiling the bass rather than amplifying it, keeping the reverbs tight.
Next Page: Comparisons with Flagship IEMs and Cables