Pairing with Metal Magic Research (MMR) Thummim
Thummim is MMR’s flagship tribrid IEM with a dark, deep sound driven by its grand-scale headroom. Thummim comes with the Eletech Plato cable which is another premium cable by Eletech, yet Plato still leaves out some room for Thummim’s improvement, especially in clarity and tonal vibrancy. Once paired with the Sonnet of Adam, Thummim gains wings to show off his full potential. The tone clarity and transparency are incredibly improved. The sound is scaled to an even bigger size with the overall resolution being boosted.
Mid-range is supported with more power and energy, bringing in air and vastness to the vocals. Thummim’s thick, profound vocal nuance is now topped with upper-mid clarity. Sonnet of Adam also does its work for the vocal tone, adding its signature creamy, silky tone to Thummim. The vocal textures are now finer and smoother, giving a silky sense to the ears. The textures feel to have gained more moisture which works to create a livelier tone for mids and highs. With Adam, Thummim’s trebles gained further tightness and clarity which were much needed.
Bass performance is a significant part of Thummim’s sound and Sonnet of Adam brings good things in this field too. The bass used to feel more “passive” in attitude with Plato, yet now the bass sounds more active and energetic once paired with Adam. The bass drops and vibrations are solid and clear, overall providing a stronger impact to the lows.
Pairing with 64 Audio Tia Fourte
The Tia Fourte is a steady-selling flagship IEM from 64 Audio with its timeless sound signature. Yet as known by most, the stock cable is subpar at its best. 64 Audio recently released an 8-braid pure silver cable and while the sound was quite pleasing, there still felt to be room for improvement available with the IEMs. Tia Fourte is not an easy IEM when it comes to finding an upgrade cable. First, it’s very sensitive to cable changes. Second, the tonal balance is very easy to get messed up by sounding fatiguing, thin, or just blurry overall. However, by no means of exaggeration, the Sonnet of Adam brings Tia Fourte two steps higher than it used to be, making the IEM sound shockingly better.
First of all, the overall resolution and clarity improve to a drastic extent, more than other IEM matchings. Not only the clarity has gone up but the sound depth has also gained benefits. The foreground and background sounds get perfectly yet naturally separated, offering a stronger, realistic three-dimensional soundstage. Compared to the alternative cables I used to pair with Tia Fourte, Sonnet of Adam simply differs in level for this matching when it comes to staging, texture details, and separation. For the time being, I’d suggest all Tia Fourte users demo this combo as it’s so far the best matching I’ve found for the Tia Fourte.
Comparison: Sonnet of Adam vs. Ode to Laura
Ode to Laura (Laura in short) is Eletech’s co-flagship product that sits in the same tier as Sonnet of Adam. Laura uses a special blend of copper materials whereas Adam mainly uses gold materials. Both cables are cables that bring out their unique taste without messing up the IEM’s originally intended signature. Laura and Adam are also the same in the sense that they care about sounding smooth while retrieving maximum texture details, giving this silky, refined sound to the IEMs. Yet once tuning into the details, they started to differ quite a lot.
Right off the bat, I can tell Laura has a warmer timbre with thicker bass groves. The bass is lush, bringing out meaty, thick-density dynamics more than the Adam. Laura treats the sound more “butter-smooth” as well. Vocals also have thicker density and body, giving more fullness to the mid-range. Meanwhile, Adam keeps the vocals slightly leaner yet pays more attention to the texture details – and most importantly, the airiness. The bass quantity is almost the same, yet Adam calm-downed the sub-bass reverbs more to give better technicality and a cleaner aftertaste. The bass feels snappier and more agile while keeping the smooth, musical dynamics found in Laura.
The overall sound is slightly more elevated on Adam – like gently bringing up the focal point of the sound. This really makes the vocals and trebles sound more heavenly. Adam also has the smooth, creamy nuance that Laura had but now with a touch of airy openness to mids and highs, giving a substantial boost in technical richness. Adam also feels to bring out more vibrancy and liveliness than Laura. Adam is still very natural and balanced, it’s just that Adam has more finesse and artful touches going on for the upper ends. In short, Laura’s definition of richness is derived from creamy tone and fullness. Adam’s definition of richness, on the other hand, is derived from sparkly strands of mid-treble details accompanied by a further controlled bass.
Comparison: Sonnet of Adam vs. PW Audio 1960S MKII
The next contestant for Adam is the 1960 MKII by PW Audio. The 1960S MKII is the new successor of the 1960S, which is perhaps the most popular cable in the IEM cable industry. The tuning philosophies of Eletech and PW Audio are very different, and these differences are apparent as we compare these two flagship cables. Adam has a neutral-white background tone whereas 1960S MKII has a dark or black background tone. The 1960S MKII noticeably highlights the low ends and adds warmth to the tone. It also offers a more grand, larger, and fuller sound than Adam. Because of this, the sound comes out thicker with deeper color tones. The ultra-low extension and density are superior to the 1960S MKII. For the lower ends and soundstage, Adam is no match to the 1960S MKII.
As for Sonnet of Adam, due to its neutral-tuning, the low-ends don’t gain much emphasis in quantity but focus more on the quality, presenting a cleaner, clearer bass tone. Because of this, the bass tone gets impressively deep despite the bass nuance almost remaining the same. I’d say Adam goes for more of a subtle way of bringing out mellowness to the bass while 1960S MKII makes bold moves for enriching the bass. While 1960S MKII got the lead for the lower ends, Adam shows its superiority to 1960S MKII regarding the upper ends and texture fineness.
Verdicts – The Golden Key for your IEM
The Sonnet of Adam is the golden key that opens up the hidden potentials of your flagship IEM, surprising you once again with how refined and clean the sound could get while sounding just as natural as it used to be. Being glamorous yet realistic, Adam knows how to play with the sounds. Elastic and powerful dynamics, creamy low-ends, and sparkly trebles work together to create a special sound that is unique to this cable. Eletech’s tuning skills on how to separate sound into fine strands have gotten even better since the days when the Illiad was released. If you’re looking for a flagship cable that would technically bring your endgame IEM to the next level while preserving all the good specific elements the original sound used to have, try tuning into this sonnet that Adam has to perform for you.
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Related Review: Eletech Illiad Review: The Dignified
