Explain to me the importance of a quality power cable (if any)

[Black Stuart]

Hi Bigshot,
some will listen, some won't. As I plan to build an alt/energy home I thought that as I will not be connected to any mains grid - end of problem but I've been assured by pros who know on another forum, that, even using a pure sine wave converter I will never get absolutely 'pure' juice. Certainly using solar/wind/water produced 'juice' will make a huge difference.

Filters - I made some and though they can make a real difference for video etc. I just found they 'muddied' the sound so removed them.

I do think that well designed PSUs WILL make a difference and that is where money can be usefully spent.

Stuart

[markl]

I would be suspect of anyone who recommended an expensive power cable to me. Even assuming they mean well, it shows a lack of understanding of simple physics that might indicate that they don't know what they're talking about in other areas as well.

I'd be suspect of anyone with an opinion on anything he's never heard. It;s the First Rule of Head-Fi. You risk looking like this:

"Grados suck!"

"Oh yeah, which models have you heard?"

"Erm, none, but I mean they're so *ugly* and I don't like the people who like them, they have Kooties...."

[Solude]

Power cords absolutely do make a difference. Call it shielding, geometry, materials whatever it is... I'm just glad the cord I settled on is cheap ~$5 14AWG shielded and readily available.

Other quite a bit more expensive cords also made a difference just not all positive in my rig so the $350+ was hard to swallow. But they did make a difference.

For filtering, less is best. I like the Monster 1000 series for no nonsense minimalist filtering and isolation. Anything more and it chokes the gear. What I'd really like is a power bar like the Hammond or PS Audio without filtering but with surge protection. No one seems to make that. You want surge you get filtering, no filtering well no surge.

Touching base on a few other claims... Romex is actually very fine power cable. If you cut open some audiophile retardly difficult to flex cable you'll find Romex in a new dielectric. Actually one of the more effective DIY cords is a Romex braid.

For the physics and electrical gurus in house, I'm going to go out on a limb here and say you're likely bachelors of X and not PhDs active in the field of conductor development. Might be wrong but generally the my textbook says types are students which makes them at best someone with the potential to know more than the jist of it someday. Today though, all you know is the bare bones minimum they tell you so that the world makes sense

[threEchelon]

I'd go for a volex 17604. It's like what's in your walls, 14AWG wire.

[hembergler]

Without power conditioning, I don't see how a power cord can make a difference. There are hundreds of miles of plain copper wire in your house and suspended between telephone poles. Changing the last 3' of that wire to something more expensive is not going to do anything.

Now, if you do have a power conditioner, I can see a power cord making a very, very, slight difference due to the guage of the wire and the shielding. Whether it is audible is up for debate.

[some young guy]

power cables can make a huge difference in a system. the better the resolution of your system, the more you'll hear. i've spent hours listening to different a/c cables in my set-up, with and without a conditioner and in my personal experience, they defenately make a difference. it's not always a good difference mind you... but after actually hearing a couple dozen cables for myself, that's my opinion.

[Patrick82]

Originally Posted by hembergler

Without power conditioning, I don't see how a power cord can make a difference. There are hundreds of miles of plain copper wire in your house and suspended between telephone poles. Changing the last 3' of that wire to something more expensive is not going to do anything.

Now, if you do have a power conditioner, I can see a power cord making a very, very, slight difference due to the guage of the wire and the shielding. Whether it is audible is up for debate.

I thought power cords didn't matter without power conditioning until I tried for myself.


xStream Statement has shielding and background was much blacker with it, but music was very slow.

Valhalla had background noise but sounded MUCH faster with almost the same body as Statement.

Vishnu sounded thinner with even more background noise, the fatter Valhalla hides detail and gives colored dynamics, I have modded it and 1 conductor Valhalla sounds more transparent than Vishnu (1 conductor), because of Dual Micro Mono-Filaments instead of Single. But I only compared using a Power Plant.

Stock cable sounded very harsh, edgy and fatiguing. Nordost cables sounded VERY smooth and had the same detail as stock. Statement had worst detail of all, but also the blackest background because of filtering.


Using an Ultimate Outlet makes the background a little blacker. Using a Power Plant gives a MUCH blacker background, and further demagnetizing the system improves it even more. Nordost cables are a match made in heaven with a Power Plant!

[Aman]

Notice: Do not take a word that Patrick82 says with more than a grain of salt. He makes ridiculous claims advocating for extremely expensive products, with absolutely no factual claim, stance, or backup. When he "objectively" listens to thousand-dollar cables, he simply MAKES UP sound characteristics. He has no basis to his ideas. He believes prodcts such as the Mighty Pebbles, a $100 "tweak" which you place on top of your audio gear, that supposedly makes the system sound much better, makes a huge difference. I remember a thread where he didn't like the sound of his system, so instead of doing away with the parts which may have made his system sound worse (how could it sound bad? look at his system's specs!), he just got rid of his music and bought new CDs that sounded "better". This guy is the pinnacle of audiophiles who only love the equipment, and not the music. I have never seen a single post by him in the Music section of these forums. I am not saying that cables of any kind don't make a difference, but this guy is not the one to trust if you want a valid reason why they do.

Do not take this the wrong way, man, but I would consider you 'mentally ill' if I didn't know any better. Your opinions are dangerous, as they lead people to spending ridiculous amounts of money on useless crap.

[Sleestack]

The mind is capable of just about anything, so if you have the money to burn, by all means go and buy some expensive power cords and let your perceptions direct you to sonic bliss. I bought dozens of $100 power cords from Cobalt, but my reasons were purely aesthetic. On the other hand, if you are on a budget, I highly advise you to spend your money elsewhere first. Furthermore, if you are hearing huge sonic differences between power cords I'd make sure to check the power supplies in your gear or your power source and make sure you don't have any issues.

[roadtonowhere08]

Do you people realize that for the price of these much vaunted Nordost power cables, I could buy four (4) Klipsch RF-83 speakers which are my dream speakers. Now, does anyone want to guess which is a better value?

There is a point where this hobby turns into a sickness, and unfortunately some do not know this. All of this talk about cables that are more expensive than most headphones, really kinda sickens me. There is nothing healthy about these discussions.

Patrick82: you seem like a very nice person, but seriously, do you really believe everything you say or does Nordost not have a return policy?

What happened to enjoying the music?