X Marks the Spot: Hi-Fi World Reviews Chord's Rumour X
Posted by The Sound Organisation on Jan 22nd 2020
The Rumour X speaker cable from the Chord Company had a terrific year. First, Hi-Fi Choice reviewed the Rumour X and recommended the speaker cable. Then What Hi-Fi? gave the Rumour X a 5-Star review before awarding it the Best Speaker Cable of 2019. Chord's Rumour X also received gold at the 2019 SVI Trade Awards.
The Rumour X cable is The Chord Company's latest iteration of the popular Rumour speaker cable. For the Rumour X, Chord swapped out the PTFE insulation for the advanced XLPE. Inspired by Chord's work developing the Taylon® dialectric, the XLPE, or Cross Linked Polyethylene, material offers noticeable and measurable improvement over the former PTFE insulation. This substantive upgrade in audio quality combined with the use of the new ChordOhmic terminations warranted an entirely new name, leading to the Rumour X.
Jon Myles at Hi-Fi World also got the opportunity to try out Chord's Rumour X speaker cable. Initially, Myles was frankly surprised by the affordable price of less than $25 a meter for these cables. With speaker cables going for hundreds in the the hi-fi world, a quality product going for this price can pique the interest of everyone from hi-fi newbies to veteran audio engineers. Myles was also impressed with the appearance of the ChordOhmic plugs combined with the unobtrusive and rather narrow diameter. Of course, the most important part of his review was the sound quality offered by the Rumour X cables:
"While the RumourX may look rather slim its sound is anything but. In true Chord fashion this cable has a crisp, sprightly and dynamic sound to it, with good punch in the lower registers. Nothing is over-emphasised: everything is laid out with aplomb."