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Cardas Audio's Clear Beyond is the company's flagship interconnect. Cardas says it brings noteworthy gains in spatial imaging, dynamics and low-frequency impact over the Clear. The Cardas musicality stays. Each cable is made to order and hand terminated in Bandon, Oregon, by Cardas's senior technicians.
Other length & termination options are available. Call us to discuss your needs.
The conductors are Cardas Grade 1 copper, 99.9999% pure, drawn to strands between 47 AWG and 39 AWG and built as Litz wire. Each is a Matched Propagation conductor on a Kevlar core, with strand sizes stepped in Golden Ratio proportions. Four conductors run at 26.5 AWG.
The four conductors sit in a star-quad, each inside an anti-static LDPE air tube. Carbon-impregnated PTFE tape binds them. A second ring of PTFE air tubes, scaled 1.618 times larger than the core tubes, holds the composite shield of tinned copper and magnet wire away from the signal.
Each conductor wears an ultra-thin extruded PTFE jacket, and an ultra-soft TPR jacket finishes the cable. All of that adds up to an outside diameter of 0.511 inches, or 13 mm. It is the largest in the Cardas interconnect line. Cardas says no Cardas interconnect is as demanding to build. So it is made in small quantities.
Clear Beyond ends in the Cardas CG XLR, the company's reference cable-mount XLR. It is a three-piece threaded design in high-copper, non-magnetic brass, with silver contacts under a rhodium flash. A fourth solder pin bonds the shell to the body, and a red or black O-ring marks the channel. Cardas redesigned it to take the Beyond's 13 mm body.
Herb Reichert, in Stereophile's Gramophone Dreams column on August 11, 2022, wrote that with the Clear Beyond "the apparent volume of the recording venue expanded dramatically."
Alan Sircom, reviewing for hi-fi+ on July 31, 2017, found that "Beyond is exceptionally good at those 'inter-transient silences'." He closed with "Very highly recommended!"
It is a Stereophile Recommended Component in the 2025 and 2026 editions, and a hi-fi+ Editor's Choice for 2024.
Run the Clear Beyond from a balanced XLR output on your DAC, streamer, CD player or phono stage to a balanced XLR input on your preamp or amplifier. Keep left to left and right to right. Line up the pins and push until the latch clicks. Press the latch tab to release the plug.
Then leave it alone. Cardas says its cables settle with use, so plug in and listen.
Measure the route the cable will really take between your components, around shelves and behind the rack. Then add a little slack. As audio legend George Cardas puts it, "A cable that's just long enough usually turns out to be just not long enough." Keep the left and right cables the same length. We recommend a matched pair.
Balanced XLR works when both components have XLR jacks, and we recommend using XLRs whenever they do. If one component has only RCA jacks, use an RCA cable instead of an adapter. You only get the possible benefits of a balanced output with a pure XLR-to-XLR connection.
If your amplifier and speakers sit far from your source, we recommend a long interconnect over a long speaker cable. A really long interconnect affects system performance less than a really long speaker cable.
An interconnect often stays in a system for years, so it is easy to overlook. Look again when something else changes: a new DAC, streamer or phono stage, a better amplifier, or a move to components with balanced XLR jacks.
An interconnect is one link in the chain. It usually joins these categories.
Cardas's reference cable-mount XLR. A three-piece threaded brass body, silver contacts under a rhodium flash, a fourth solder pin to bond the shell, and a red or black O-ring to mark the channel.
Two rings of air tubes and the composite shield take room. Cardas says the shielding and air-tube suspension are what bring the body to 0.511 inches.
The balanced version needs none. Cardas redesigned the CG XLR to take the Clear Beyond's 13 mm body, so the cable ends in the plug alone.
Cardas says at most 200 hours, and usually half that. Its advice is simple: "Plug them in, leave them plugged in, and enjoy your life."
A lifetime warranty. Every Litz strand is sealed in enamel, so the copper does not oxidize. Cardas says that is why its cables last.
Audio Advisor's tour of the Cardas factory in Bandon, where the Clear Beyond is built and terminated.
Audio Advisor walks through Cardas cable construction, from Litz strands to hand-soldered plugs.
The most popular configurations are shown on this page. If your system requires a different length or termination, call our audio experts. We’ll help you choose the right configuration and arrange a custom cable for your system.
Want to learn more about interconnects, reference systems, or RCA versus XLR? Visit our Learning Center for guides, tips, and expert advice.
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