NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable Review – Well Well Well
Pros — Excellent build, haptic, and looks; rugged and attractive looking; good price.
Cons — None.
INTRODUCTION
The NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable is the company’s budget offering in terms of pure silver Litz wire at around $20. In this price category, most earphone cables are either pure copper, occ copper, or silver-plated copper. Since different materials harmonize differently with different earphones in some (but not all) cases, it is always good to have a cable of each material in your modding box.
SPECIFICATIONS
Product Name: NiceHCK 4N Litz pure silver cable
Material: 4N pure silver
Internal Core Structure: 0.08*10, 4 Strands 40 Cores; 1.2m±3cm, Internal Core 0.092mm with Litz
Cable Diameter: 28AWG（Inside Diameter 0.33mm，Cross Sectional Area 0.0553mm²）
Outer Material: American PVC
Insulation Material: Litz
Length: 1.2 m ± 3cm
Impedance: < 0.3ohm
Inudctance: 0.4uF/ft
Solder : WTB Solder Silver Solder
Plug Types: straight 3.5 /2.5 /4.4mm
Connector: MMCX/0.78mm 2Pin/QDC 2Pin/NX7 2Pin
Plug material: Carbon Fiber & Stainless Steel
Splitter Material: Carbon Fiber & Stainless Steel
Tested at: $20
Purchase Link: Nice HCK Store
PHYSICAL THINGS AND USABILITY
TECHNOLOGY
The important technologies used in the NiceHCK 4N cable are “Pure Silver” (material) and Litz (internal cable structure).
Litz is a special type of multistrand cable designed to reduce skin and proximity effect losses in conducturs at below 1 MHz. It consists of many thin wire strands, individually insulated and twisted or woven together, following one of several carefully prescribed patterns frequently involving several levels (groups of twisted wires are twisted together, etc.). The result of these winding patterns is to equalize the proportion of the overall length over which each strand is at the outside of the conductor. This has the effect of distributing the current equally among the wire strands, reducing the resistance.
The “N” number in 4N refers to degree of copper purity. 4 refers to four nines as in 99.99% pure copper (5N would mean 99.999% and so on).
HAPTIC & BUILD
NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable is rather filigree: it is thin, light, and inconspicuous. The braid is rather loose. The wire is is covered with PVC, which makes the cable soft and pliable, and that shiny outer material appears to be dirt and grease repellent. The MMCX connectors are of good quality…they clicked in snug wherever I tried. The memory wire is also thin and of intermediate tension. The wires were comfortable around my ears. The headphone plug is also robust and the chin slider comes in handy. I underline my description with some photos below.
COMFORT
The memory wire fits snug around the ears without pressure and the cable is as light as it gets so that the NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable is as comfortable as it gets – it is also comfortable against the skin. The chin slider helps holding the cable in place.
NOISE TRANSMISSION
There is zero microphonics. Very good.
COMPATIBILITY
The NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable comes with a variety of connectors to fit any conventional earphone shells: MMCX/0.78mm 2Pin/QDC 2Pin. You can also choose the plug: 3.5 /2.5 /4.4mm.
JEWELRY EFFECT/LOOKS
The NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable – as said – is on the subtle, inconspicuous side. The silver-and-black connectors are neutral enough looking to fit any earphone.
SOUND?
I had expressed my informed opinion on cable sound differences in my recent NiceHCK Blocc 5N UPOCC Copper Litz Cable review [HERE]. My main points are summarized as follows:
- Cables can make a sonic difference, mainly with multi-driver earphones
- This difference possibly relates to impedance, wire material, and wire structure
- Impedance differences may in some cases be large enough to result in different sound volumes and can also alter the earphone’s frequency response; such changes in the frequency response can be calculated
- Cables may not make any difference with some earphones
- Listeners often mistake volume increase due to lower impedance for sonic improvement
- The sonic differences between cables are largely independent of price
- If sonic differences between cables exist, they are not universally valid but only relate to that particular earphone and the cables used in that particular comparison
- Eartips are the cheaper alternative to achieve a different sound
- Expensive upgrade cables may sound worse with your favourite earphone than stock cable
- One may be better off spending the upgrade cable’s price on better earphones
From my experience, a silver-plated copper or an occ copper cable may add brightness, and therefore some sparkle to a warm sounding earphone, and a pure-copper cable helps taming boosted, piercing upper midrange peaks. This is just a rule of thumb that needs to be re-confirmed for every earphone. But these sonic differences are independent of price.
The NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable works very well with the rather polite KBEAR TRI I3 earphone that requires amplification and has an early treble rolloff – and I just kept this cable on as my go to. With this earphone, the pure silver cable works equally well or better than the NiceHCK Blocc 5N UPOCC Copper Litz Cable at 5 times the price (but was certainly not worse sounding) – but this is only valid for this particular earphone.
CONCLUDING REMARKS
The main characteristic of this cable is its pure silver conductive material at a relatively low price. Pure silver may have – but not always – favourable sonic effects on certain earphones. It is therefore good to have a pure silver cable in the toolbox, along with pure copper, occ copper, and silver-plated copper. With any given earphone, cable materials may make no difference at all or they make a big difference — but potential sonic improvements are mostly not correlated with price.
What makes no difference is price — and looks are not correlated with sonic quality either. Don’t get carried away by snake oil, buy responsibly, look for deals, and be aware that your earphone and “upgrade” cable don’t harmonize or that the cable is pure jewelry. And why not.
Until next time…keep on listening!
DISCLAIMER
The NiceHCK Litz 4N Pure Silver Cable was provided unsolicited by NiceHCK store – and I thank them for that.
Get it from NiceHCK Audio Store
Our generic standard disclaimer.
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