Tellurium Q Statement II coming soon on www.audiohum.com

Tellurium Q Origins

Many customers have asked how Tellurium Q® came about and how the British cable manufacturer is operating to make its cables perform so differently from what is currently available on the market. Tellurium Q® has had some trouble nailing down details about the performance of their products because there are trade secrets and production methodologies that they definitely don't want to share with their competitors. Sometimes, as manufacturers, they are too cautious and this causes some problems for reviewers and their distributors to explain the advantages of their products, and especially to demonstrate with specific data those differences in the sound performance of their cables compared to those of their competitors.

What is the main argument for cable distributors, a hook, a reason to listen when there are so many companies claiming important things? Why should people believe that Tellurium Q® has a genuinely different approach? Yes, an end customer can appreciate the difference within seconds of listening to their reference tracks using their equipment with Tellurium Q® cables, but the big problem is giving people a reason to want to listen to the cable. In the UK, this is less of an issue, as more and more high-end users are giving feedback to their friends (known as word-of-mouth) and industry professionals are doing comparative reviews that pique the curiosity of users around the world.

However, what are the origins of the brand, how did Tellurium Q® come about and what has been your experience to be able to develop all your products?

Geoff Merrigan's official position at Tellurium Q® is CEO; however, what most people don't know is that his original background was in industrial chemistry (materials, etc.) and he has maintained his passion for science and learning through a series of activities that have given Tellurium Q its unique approach.

An interest in learning, learning more and more about sound was what led him, together with Simon Lomax, a sound engineer, to develop a music learning system where students learned to play musical instruments at an extraordinary speed (see for yourself at musicskills.co.uk). This project also paved the way for a novel approach to audio cable development, although Geoff didn't know it at the time.

In the early days of Tellurium Q®, Geoff developed many of the prototypes himself, building a considerable number of cables in the hands of customers. This experience, coupled with his knowledge of materials science, allowed him to acquire an extensive mental database and therefore the ability to visualise simulations of various materials, configurations and how they were likely to behave. A great advantage for the design of physical cables.

Geoff Merrigan about Tellurium Q Statement II

"Tellurium Q® is often asked what do we do that makes our cables perform so well? The simple and unsatisfying answer is that we do a lot of little things together that mount up to be very important in terms of the final performance. People assume that to get the best performance the “fastest” conductor – pure silver of something even better has to be used. Which is also one of the reasons for the pointless chasing of nines as I call it i.e. copper to 99.9999999% purity as if that is the single most important factor for a cable!

Surprisingly, to get a more “natural” sound, it is not just about merely conduction. This is the reason, any conductor from any cable manufacturer on this planet will act as an electronic filter and by that I mean that the various frequencies relative to one another get shifted with each material they pass through and are also affected by insulators, geometries, shielding etc.. The interesting thing is that materials affect ranges of frequencies in dissimilar amounts. It really is a finely tuned balancing act.

This is the model that we use, a way of thinking about cable development. In a Bell labs report from way back in 1930 they found that transient phase distortion affected the “naturalness” of voices. Of course there are many things that contribute to the fact that Statement cables are winning so many awards and firsts. But this “naturalness” is one of the prime factors that we listen for in the final production ready cable.

This testing process is more iterative than people would imagine. Even down to the solder that we use. Not standard by any means for the audio industry and we have tried numerous mixes and diverse percentages of silver in the solder but at the end of our testing and development we find we have a solder with no silver whatsoever (no lead either).

The connectors may look relatively ordinary but have multiple layers of plating and not always the material you would expect. There is even more detail and precision within the plating process itself, because we specify the thickness of the plating and what has to be in the plating bath and what should not be.

These are just a couple of tiny details that make up just one small part of one cable. The detail, precision and care is the same for the rest of the products. And each little step needs a controlled listening and testing against other options which is immensely time consuming but hopefully the results speak for themselves.

From what we have learnt, especially in the last few years, we have been able to bring you the Statement cables. They are the Tellurium Q® Statement of the performance that we think is currently possible.

We hope that you enjoy your system more with your Statement cables."

Geoff Merrigan.

Audiohum about Tellurium Q Statement II

“My full Statement II cabling (AES-EBU + XLR + Loudspeaker) has been running continuously since it was installed last Friday. The system has been running continuously (day and night) the TQ System Enhancement Disc… except while I’ve been hearing… I guess about 68 hours of TQ CD.

The first, second and third day, sound was harsh compared to old Statement, and the detail was annoying with most of the recordings. Today things has changed… sound is more sweet (or right). Of course it still need some time to be ready, but now the treble has improved a lot from day one.

Fresh from the shelf, STII has much more detail, from top to bottom and much better bass. Dynamics are in a new level… I couldn’t believe this dynamic if I wasn’t hearing. The very best from start: DYNAMICS. The best: BASS. From the beginning you can hear a huge amount of detail that wasn’t there with old Statement… much more detail in all the frequencies. The tonal beauty and density of Statement is there, not very different here, so the cable is extremely natural sounding tonally speaking, but now everything is more real due to the extreme improvement in dynamics and detail.

I remember what happened when Silver Diamond came after Black Diamond… when Statement came after Silver Diamond. I remember you told me something like “Silver Diamond was the cable we wanted to do but wasn’t sure that it could be done”… I feel like I’m in a déjà vu…

It’s very clear that Statement II is MUCH BETTER than Statement. Once again you did it. Congratulations.”

Francisco Moya.

Tellurium Q Statement II coming soon on www.audiohum.com