I'd be interested as well to hear whether anyone's actually used the Axis with Isebell(in)a and what the impressions are.
Yippiaiyee..here's one ready to confess 
I ordered CryoParts custom cable almost once I got my Mac and Isabella w/ Isabellina. Fully broken in CryoParts bettered standard usb, more natural sounding and removed some edge and glare if there was some. On a negative side it also made the sound a bit opague.
After having discussion with Lee and having read some customer comments, I think I should give it a try to the Locus Design Axis usb cable although I thought the product is way too expensive 
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Now, to make long story short, after listening it for some 100 hours in my system, it has convinced me that the upgrade was well worth it. Who would have believed it? I was quite skeptical. Resolution increased tremendously and it has given Isabellina the ability to really open up and sing. If you have vinyl front end, you know what happens when you add a better cartridge or better phono stage. The improvement isn't marginal, imo.
I hope you'll get a chance to audition the Axis.
Hope this helps,
Jouni
Hi Jouni, I hate to burst your bubble but,,,, hell who am I kidding, I love to burst your bubble
but as much of an improvement the Axis is giving your over the standard Cryoparts cable, the Nucleus wil take you that much further with it's carbon base construction, allowing for extended high frequency clarity and a much tighter bass being it's much touted attributes. It's sorta hard to imagine I know as the Axis is a damn good USB cable which I thought couldn't get any better myself. To Lee's credit, he warned me numerous times that the Nucleus was a dangerous cable , both cuz of it's price and of one's inability to want to return it after demo'ing it.
The whole frequency range with the Nucleus cable gets a veil lifted from it and it extends far in both directions from the midrange.
Kitten, the Isabella's DAC has it's own DC voltage but your computer isn't run by battery, is it? Well that's where your signal's coming from, The computer's your source and that's the signal being transferred by the USB cable. I have no doubt tho that the Isabella is a step ahead of an AC powered DAC tho.
Even tho I've never used an Isabella, I have compared power supply's with my Trends USB transport, power from the computer, an optional battery pak, a Channel Island VDC-SB power supply and I know all too well about how clean power improves the performanace of a USB cable. But I did these comparisons with a Kimber USB cable, only then first came the Axis, then the Nucleus, with both cables totally redefining my computer audio system. As Jouni will attest to, your shouldn't underestimate the improvements from these expensive USB cables as you'd be doing your Isebella a disservice IMHO.
Vinnie, I hope I haven't overstepped my boundries by talking about USB cables from another company in your Circle but this is a subject I feel strongly about and I do feel that the higher quality a USB cable is, the better your Isabella will perform as Jouni has comfirmed for me. Thanks jouni for coming
out of the closet. Cheers,
Robin
edit: Sigfreed, I hear what you're asking and Lee recommended that while I was demo'ing the Nucleus, I try using the Axis with my external hard drive (backup only) as he personally does what you're doing from his laptop while using an external hard drive library but in my system, neither the Axis or the Nucleus would even allow the hard drive to connect to my HTPC. Lee couldn't understand it himself but that's the way it is with my system. From what Lee was saying tho, the Axis/Nucleus USB cable from his laptop to his external hard drive makes a really big difference.
