July 2024

Siltech Launches Master Crown Cables
New flagship from Holland's premiere cable manufacturer.
Launch Event Coverage By Greg Weaver

  Siltech recently launched a new, flagship series of audio cables called Master Crown. As with everything they do, the launch would be a first-class event. With the help of US Siltech distributor, Monarch Systems, based in Englewood, CO, a press event was held Friday, June 20th to introduce and demonstrate the advantages of this new product to the audio press.

Monarch Systems was founded by two audio industry veterans, Jon Baker and Rich Maez, and with the assistance of their Marketing Manager, Jaclyn Schnirring, they played host to seven members of the press in a spacious, beautiful home in the gated community of Las Campanas, to the west of the heart of old Santa Fe, at a location they call La Casita. We were also honored to be joined by Siltech's own engaging, conversant, and well-informed Gaby Rynveld, who led much of the day's ceremonies.

La Casita

The event was loosely structured into three segments. The first was an open and informational discussion about the products, with Gabi presenting several newly produced videos, the second was a video conference with Siltech's technical director and driving force, Edwin Rynveld, from Siltech's headquarters in Holland, and the third was a listening / open discussion session. Each session was broken up with a short break, filled with a remarkable selection of hors d'oeuvres, beverages, and shared camaraderie among all the attendees.

The system set up in the great room, provided for our listening, was as follows:

Streamer-D/A Converter - Boulder 2120 - $65,000

Linestage - Boulder 3010 - $164,000

Amplification - Boulder 2160 Stereo - $71,000

Loudspeakers - YG Acoustics Sonja 3.3 Loudspeakers - $146,800/pair

Siltech Loom Detail:
Master Crown 2M interconnect XLR>XLR (prototype) $114,000

Double Crown 2.5M loudspeaker cable - $43,960

Master Crown 2.5 M loudspeaker (prototype) $150,900

Double Crown 2M network cable - $6,850

Double Crown 2M power cable - $15,300

Triple Crown 1.5M power cable - $19,800

Master Crown 2M power cable (prototype) - $51,800

Equipment Support:
Franc Audio Accessories Wood Block Equipment 2x2 Rack (matte Italian walnut) - $9,300

Franc Audio Accessories Wood Block Preamplifier Platform (matte Italian walnut) - $1,975

Franc Audio Accessories Wood Block + Carbon Amplifier Stand (high-gloss Palisander Rio) - $2,800

The Setup At La Casita

I was there representing Enjoy the Music.com, and the other attendees included my previous Editor, Robert Harley, as well as both Associate Editor Neil Gader and Senior writer, Jacob Heilbrunn, all of The Absolute Sound. Also in attendance were Stereophile's Brian Damkroger, Soundstage!'s Jason Thorpe, and The Audio Beat's Dennis Davis. Two other writers were invited but were unable to attend.

Those of you who tend to lurk about, or inhabit, the hyper-audio scene will likely be familiar with Holland's luxury audio cable manufacturer, Siltech, based in Elst, in the Dutch province of Gelderland. For those who are not, their remarkable story exemplifies just what sets them apart from their competitors. From its humble beginnings in 1983, when it was just two music students (Hans and Michel) building their own designs for a few friends to enjoy, it has grown into one of the most respected, top-tier audio manufacturers in our industry.

Siltech's Technical Director, Edwin Rynveld

Siltech's core mission began a marked change in direction when Edwin Rynveld acquired the company in 1992. An accomplished electronics engineer with experience working with powerhouse corporations like Phillips and Exxon, as the company's new lead and technical director, he realigned Siltech's priorities, bolstering their commitment to research and development, as well as making better use of advanced measurement techniques. Bringing his more complete and comprehensive understanding of the broad, existing hi-fi market, along with his familiarity with the limitations of existing electronics and loudspeakers, Siltech was poised to make its mark on our industry.

Further change came when Gabi Rynveld, Edwin's wife and a prodigal concert pianist who has performed around the globe from the age of nine years old, joined the team, and soon founded a second brand, Crystal Cable, in 2004.

Gabi Rynveld

In 2022, Edwin founded the International Audio Holding group to help champion and incubate promising audio brands and drive innovation in the audio industry, integrating his native brands Siltech and Crystal Cable, with yet another recently acquired cable company, HMS Elektronik, founded in 1975 in Leverkusen, Germany. I'll leave it to you to do a deeper dive into Siltech's fascinating story.

By this point, you may not be surprised to learn that Siltech has one of the finest R&D and production facilities available, staffed with 85 employees, and using some of the most advanced techniques and measurement systems available. Yet one of their biggest strengths, in my eyes, at least, and possibly in part due to Gabi's involvement, is that they are driven to understand the relationship between objective measurement and the empirical listening experience.

Discussing The Advances To The Master Crown Series

One of the event highlights came during our video conference with Edwin from Holland. During that conference, he related the details of recent testing using a range of five different qualities of bows, ranging from hundreds to many thousands of dollars each. During the play testing, both audio recordings of their sonics and detailed measurements were made coincidently. By interpolating an experienced chordophone musician's feedback on the resultant sonic envelope that each different bow rendered under playback with the objective measurements they had taken, they had taken a significant step toward advancing the correlation and understanding of the use of measurement to move closer to the sound of the live performance.

The Entryway Into La Casita – Prepped For The Event

To accomplish such exemplary results, Siltech has to manage every aspect of the process, combining manufacturing, warehousing, product design, and development, alongside research laboratories and dedicated listening facilities, using advanced computer-aided design packages, including finite element analysis and powerful software modeling of static and dynamic analysis, all in-house in their own factory. The accuracy that such processes demand, the ultra-tight tolerances within which they must work, including the forensic attention to detail required, are only possible thanks to their dedicated staff and production facility.

Before the introduction of Master Crown, Siltech offered five tiers of cables, including their Explorer, Classic Legend, Ruby Crown, Royal Crown, and previous flagship, Royal Triple Crown series. The new Master Crown line pushes the metallurgy of the conductors, as well as their geometry, insulation, and termination methods.

The Boulder 2120 And Power Supplies

This latest series of products brings their 10th generation of silver metallurgy, a proprietary Silver-Gold alloy, the S10 Monocrystal Silver cable. Here, gold is used to fill tiny gaps inside the silver's crystal structure, gaps which if left unaddressed, contribute micro distortions of the signal.

Where the Royal Triple Crown cables have an arrangement of up to six cores, Master Crown uses up to twelve cores (application dependent) of this more pliant and supple S10 alloy. They claim that the Silver-Gold alloy also exhibits positive aging, that electrically, the wires continue to improve over time, even when not playing music, much along the lines of that of fine wines improving with aging.

The Boulder 3010 Linestage

They also include an advance on Siltech's Balanced Ground Principle, a unique cable winding geometry that significantly contributes to its exceptionally low noise floor. Their analysis of the design shows that this allows the cables to reveal signals down to an astonishing eight trillionths of a watt (0.000000000000008 watt)!

The Master Crown's conductor and insulator construction employs both their Current Shield Distortion and Magnetic Field Distortion Reduction technologies, said to substantially reduce the effects of magnetic field distortion, allowing them to achieve incredible clarity in the critical vocal range.

Master Crown interconnects employ an advanced shielding switch, allowing you to choose between directional grounding or lifting the shield connection entirely, depending on your system requirements and surroundings.

The Boulder 2160 Stereo Amplifier

Along with the six ultra-thick S10 monocrystal silver conductors in their perfectly symmetric hexagon construction, the S10 monocrystal-silver spades on Master Crown speaker cables are gold-plated with direct plasma-plating, providing even greater resistance to deterioration over time, as well as additional depth and body to the sound.

The Master Crown power cables use an unprecedented combination of eighteen conductors, employing both the newly developed S10 monocrystal silver and their previous G9 silver-gold alloy, in a configuration developed with the use of advanced software like COMSOL Multiphysics, to allay the audible effects of magnetic leakages and peak current distortions. These distortions are said to manifest in particular frequency ranges by inducing small distortions that, while unrelated directly to music, affect all connected electronics and other nearby cables, primarily interconnects. The use of special grounding, and of pure silver contacts on the power connector, is said to further help eliminate harshness.

Make no mistake, this level of commitment to research and development, design and its implementation, and perfected execution comes at considerable cost. As an example, at the one-and-a-half meter lengths, an interconnect set sells for $91,000, and a power cable sells for $37,000. A two-and-a-half meter set of speaker cables goes for $150,800! While this pricing will clearly limit the number of music lovers who will be able to own these exceptional products, I must admit to both my sense of wonder and admiration that a manufacturer as accomplished as Siltech is willing to demonstrate such dedication, devotion, and fanatic attention to detail and execution, in pursuit of advancing the state-of-the-art of connectology. Such monumental and bold strides not only bring excellence to the hyper-audio community today but have the potential to ultimately contribute to the improved performance of cables of all price points in years ahead.

So, how do they perform? Sadly, I am unable to give you any kind of definitive informed opinion on the sound of these exceptionally advanced designs. Though final production samples had been shipped well ahead of this event, a mishap with DHL left them sitting for days, stranded in a grounded DHL transport. While Gabi had the foresight to pack a few final prototypes in her luggage, which we could photograph and have tactile interaction with, and were put into play during much of our listening, we never got to hear any of the final production models.

Gabi "Modeling" The New Master Crown AC Prototype

To that end, over our group dinner at Casa Chimayo after the event, I was very happy to be assured by Rich Maez that, as review samples should become available, representatives from this remarkable new line will find their way into my midwestern Audio Oasis for my evaluation. Given my previous handful of experiences with the top-flight Siltech looms, in particular, the Royal Crown or Royal Triple Crown series, I would expect to be treated to an exhilarating level of performance, including rich, vibrant, faithful tonality, engaging texture, with a corporal rendering of instrumental body and bloom, with exceptional resolution and resultant transparency to the upstream sources. More as that unfolds!

My sincerest thanks to the entire Monarch Systems team, Jon, Rich, and Jaclyn, and especially to Gabi, for their selfless hospitality and the willingness to spend their time and attention with us on this extraordinary product launch event.

Siltech Master Crown Page - SiltechCables.com/master-crown/

Video By Greg Weaver

Be sure to check out Enjoy the Music.com's Senior Editor Greg Weaver's excellent the audio analyst YouTube channel.

Company Information
Siltech B.V.
Edisonweg 8
6662 NW Elst
The Netherlands

Website: SiltechCables.com

Monarch Systems
16 Inverness Place E, Building B
Englewood, CO 80112

Voice: (720) 399-0072
E-mail: info@monarch-systems.com 
Website: Monarch-Systems.com