“Electrical noise is everywhere,” writes Neil Gader in his recent ‘Short Takes Equipment Report’ for US audio magazine The Absolute Sound, “and it bombards our electronics.” Fortunately, Japanese cable and accessories experts Furutech are ever on the case, with a raft of proprietary solutions – and they work!  

The noise bombardment in question extends to the back-panel inputs and outputs of all manner of electronics, so Furutech “takes the idea of plugging these I/Os in a whole new direction with its NCF Clear Line optimizer end caps,” writes Gader. They’re “handsome” and “heroically built, with a heavy dollop of Furutech’s NCF (Nano Crystal Formula) anti-static damping material”.

Furutech’s Clear Line range was first launched in 2020 with the NCF Clear Line AC optimizer, a compact device designed to instantly enhance the quality of your system’s power supply. This was subsequently followed by the NCF Clear Line-RCA and -XLR, two passive signal line optimizers designed to hone in on the quality of your system’s signal line.

These smart little devices are small enough to hold in your hand and couldn’t be easier to use. Simply plug them into any spare output or input terminal of your equipment – whether an amplifier, DAC, CD/DVD/SACD player, etc.

You can opt to use a single unit, or double up with two – for example one per channel in the case of truly dual mono equipment – for even greater improvements.

“Damn! It was like giving the soundstage a good sweeping – or taking a dust cloth to a surface and revealing more of the true finish beneath a fine layer of grime,” writes Gader as he puts them to the test.

These optimisers made “an improvement that I did not anticipate. In audio, as in life, it’s the little, sometimes stranger things that matter.”

You can read the full review of Furutech’s NCF signal line optimizers in the December issue of The Absolute Sound.

Find out more at www.furutech.com and track down your nearest dealer via UK distributor www.soundfowndations.co.uk