Dragon Cables
Black Dragon AES Digital Cable
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Black Dragon AES Digital Cable
Black Dragon AES Digital Cable for all of your high-end audio digital applications. After many customer requests, we have developed this cable for your balanced digital applications. It features true 110 ohm characteristics, several XLR connector options, Silver Plated Copper conductors, and a fantastic sound!
Quality You Can Trust
Most stock cables are made of poor, ultra-thin conductors with poor geometries, rubber jackets, and other issues that can limit the performance of your equipment.
Dragon Cables are handcrafted from quality materials in Moon Audio's headquarters in Cary, North Carolina. All of our cables are created with ultra-pure, single-crystal silver and copper strands and engineered to provide the cleanest, most musical presentation. Our wire is void of impurities and crystalline boundaries, leaving nothing between you and your music.
Black Dragon Sound Signature
The Black Dragon is warm and smooth with a musical presentation. Copper strands enhance the body, shape, and immediacy of the music. The detail and expansiveness of the Black Dragon make it a flexible fit where a broad range of musical genres are played. It can also improve bass frequencies on bass-light headphones.
The smooth, musical quality makes it a perfect fit for headphones that tend to sound a bit edgy or bright. Despite its warmth, the Black Dragon does not have a laid-back, lush sound. It is much closer to neutral, making it a very natural-sounding cable.
For more information on finding your signature sound, visit our Sound Signature Guide.
Cable Design
The Black Dragon AES EBU Digital Cable is a 110-ohm digital transmission cable. Some uses are to connect a CD Transport or computer's Pro Audio Card, like a Lynx, to an outboard digital-to-analog converter. Our AES/EBU cable utilizes 2 silver-plated copper conductors with a Teflon jacket. It has both an aluminum foil shield as well as a 100% coverage braided shield.
AES Digital
AES/EBU interfaces utilize a symmetrical connection, most often with transformer isolation and an output impedance of 110 ohms. The signal level of this interface is higher than in the consumer SPDIF (3...10 volts). Because AES/EBU digital audio signals are transmitted at high frequencies (around 6MHz), they need to be handled differently from standard analog audio lines. Commonly, analog balanced cabling has various impedance ratings (typically 30 to 90 ohms) and exhibits poor digital transmission performance. The result is signal dropout and reduced cable lengths due to severe impedance mismatching (VSWR) between AES/EBU 110 ohm equipment. AES/EBU signal transmission works for a few tens of meters with a good cable. So while it is not recommended to use the analog equivalent in digital transmission, it is possible to use a 110ohm cable in both analog and digital operation. While we are promoting this cable for Digital purposes, you can also use it in an Analog system.
RCA and SPDIF: Bridging the Gap
It is not recommended to use a 110ohm digital cable with RCAs for an SPDIF connection and vice versa with the 75ohm SPDIF. The SPDIF cable only has 2 conductors and thus can not be used with XLRs. To make the conversion, you need a Transformer to prevent issues with Jitter and Digital Errors. We recommend the Canare 75ohm to 110ohm BNC to XLR adapter.
Furutech FP-601M (R) - Male Rhodium XLR
Furutech FP-602F (R) - Female Rhodium XLR
Furutech FP-701M (G) - Male Gold XLR
Furutech FP-702F (G) - Female Gold XLR
DB-26 digital 26-pin connector
| Parameter | Specification |
|---|---|
| Physical Specifications | |
| Product Dimensions / Weight |
122mm / 4.80” (H) x 444mm / 17.48” (W) x 356mm / 14.02” (D) Allow extra depth for cable connectors 14 kg / 30.86 lbs |
| Finish | Black or silver painted machined aluminium with crystal LED display |
| Audio Specifications | |
| Digital-to-Analogue Conversion | dCS Ring DAC and Digital Processing Platform on flex-rigid PCB |
| Upsampling | Multi-stage DXD with switchable DSD (DSD, DSDx2) |
| Filters |
PCM mode: Up to 6 filters per sample rate (trade-off between image rejection and transient response) DSD mode: 4 filters + Filter 5 for improved transient response |
| Crossfeed Settings |
Standard crossfeed dCS Expanse 1 (E1) dCS Expanse 2 (E2) |
| MQA |
Full decoding and rendering of MQA data from Network and USB2 inputs. Final rendering of unfolded MQA data only from other inputs. |
| Technical Specifications | |
| Electronics | StreamUnlimited Stream800 |
| Automatic voltage switching | Yes |
| Digital Inputs |
2 x AES/EBU on 3-pin XLR, 44.1–192 kS/s (dual AES up to 384 kS/s) 1 x S/PDIF BNC Coax, 44.1–192 kS/s 1 x S/PDIF RCA, 44.1–192 kS/s 1 x Toslink Optical, 44.1–96 kS/s 1 x USB Type B, 44.1–384 kS/s PCM and DSD, DSDx2 Async Mode 1 x USB Type A for mass storage devices |
| Word Clock I/O |
2 x Word Clock Inputs on 75 Ω BNC connectors (TTL sensitive) 1 x Word Clock Output on 1 x BNC connector (TTL compatible, output in Master mode) |
| Software Updates | Downloaded via dCS Mosaic Control app |
| Local Control |
dCS Mosaic Control app for unit configuration and playback RS232 interface (via 3rd party automation) Optional dCS Universal Remote available |
| Residual Noise (6V output) | Better than –113 dB0, 20 Hz - 20 kHz unweighted |
| Spurious Responses | Better than –105 dB0, 20 Hz – 20 kHz |
| L-R Crosstalk | Better than –115 dB0, 20 Hz – 20 kHz |
- RBRobert B.Verified BuyerRated 5 out of 5 stars1 year agoCables
High quality Moon audio is a pleasure to work with and provide advice prior to purchase. Mark and Jose great talk to
- DLDaniel L.Verified BuyerRated 5 out of 5 stars2 years agoGreat Sound
Used this to connect Dutch & Dutch 8c speakers, they work beautifully and sound great. Big fan of Black Cables, have several now in my systems. Highly recommended.
- LWLes W.Verified BuyerRated 5 out of 5 stars4 years agoOrganic sounding
The black dragon AES cable brought a warmth to my system. Removed the edge of digital sound. Recommend
- BUBirkan U.Verified BuyerRated 5 out of 5 stars4 years agoSounds Great
It feels very high quality
- CLChris L.Verified BuyerRated 5 out of 5 stars5 years agoAES Digital Cable
Very good experience. A well-built and great sounding cable