ITM-IKKOFFL Upgraded Cables

I just thought about there being a major absence of anime girl illustrations thus far, knowing IKKO's tendency on this matter. As it turns out, the ITM-IKKOFFL name might be hard to pronounce and easily forgotten, but the product box addresses things by having a color illustration involving the female human variety. To be fair to IKKO, it is not just another princess theme, so we'll let it slide. We see a flatter box for this optional set of upgraded cables. IKKO's one of several audio companies that has seen the market for upgrade cables growing, especially for headphones and earphones, so we see it now partake in the same for its new line of DACs and amplifiers!

Unlike the ITM01, this cable set includes all three combinations going from the magnetic connector: USB Type-A, USB Type-C, and Lightning. The back of the box also indicates the model name may be Arc FFL010, so if you see this phrasing used elsewhere, know that it is the same product. Open the box from the bottom or top for access to a thick foam sheet with cutouts and a cardboard layer on top. This is inline with the design language IKKO has used for its IEMs I have reviewed and identifies the three cables just in case you were not sure. The two shorter cables on the sides also have a plastic pull tab to help lift them up, which is handy given they are tightly packed in there.


Upgraded headphone and earphone cables typically advertise higher purity conductors, "better" insulating materials in terms of skin effects, whether or not you accept them, and generally offer aesthetics that tend to be more pleasant than the typical stock cables. Build quality is also on the higher side, and other factors are also to be considered, including ease of use, microphonics, and comfort in use. Given these are part of an accepted market already and the basic point is electrical conduction, I suppose doing the same for other cables down the line makes similar sense. IKKO's upgraded cable set is similar in design and color scheme to the CTU1 upgraded cable that came with the OH1s we saw before, albeit this time with sleeving all around rather than having the individual braids showing as-is. The cables of this set are of similar length as the stock ITM01 cables—12.5 cm for the shorter ones intended for mobile use and 1.5 m for the longer Type-A cable that is more of a desktop queen.


Actual connectors on either end are the same as on the stock cable, although you of course don't have to choose between getting a Type-C or Lightning version with this set. The differences are purely in the wiring and insulation, with IKKO using a four-strand, 12-core single crystal copper silver-plated wire which is "woven through a special weaving technique." The individual strands get an insulating sleeve, and the cable as a whole gets a second fiber sleeving on top. This does result in increased durability compared to the stock wire while being slightly thinner, but with a smaller bending radius, too. IKKO rates cable impedance at 0.011 Ω, and there are claims of a 480 Mbps transmission rate, but I am not going to get into a discussion on whether upgraded cables make any difference for data transmission rates.