Interesting power cord test

[rickcr42]

Way too many variables man.

How is THAT for a short answer !

 

[Jorg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sovkiller I will give up after this point, but just for clarification, I'm confused now, you confused me....LOL...yes I'm blaming you now...LOL.... Will you keep your same opinion on the test, even when you know that all the A....D....A converters and all those listed above stuff and parts of a system by you, and equipment used was the same in all cases, for all cables, and just the cable in question was chaged??? In other words, yes we are using our system, the only we have and the only we will use with the cables, but our system is the same to hear all the tests they made, with their same equipment always with the same piece of music always, the only thing changed in all cases was the cable in question, the rest was always the same for all tests, and from the instrument to our ears........if there is any diference, in any case, will be only due to the cable....IMO of course....but IME it was any.....all sounded pretty similar to me, if not the same. Which will be the difference between this CD and any other CD to evaluate the cables, are not all CDs recorded in this similar way? Why then insist in calling one CD a reference CD or a master recording CD, if you never know the equipment they used, the cables they used, the equalization they used, etc....(same you were stating above right?) BTW they were not trying to sell any cable with the CD, indeed they even tested a monster cable, it is just a CD to show the differences between 15 cables of the market, including one of theirs, but they never stated this one of that is the best, just here is a CD with the differences in the cables, make your own conclusions....for this point of view IMO it is valid, for an exact evaluation of one particular cable of course it is not....

Hi Sov. In fact, that's an interesting test. It won't let you know how the cables will sound in your system, but it can show differences if they really are. It would be very interesting to grab the disk and to watch to it in SoundForge or another program with similar capabilities. That will show how much is the difference.

And after you saw the differences in SF, you could make another test: take two recordings, take the left channel from the first recording and make it the left channel of a new recording, take the left channel from the secon recording and make it the right channel of the new recording. The same with right channels. After that also left to left from the first and right to right from the second. And left to left from the second and right to right from the first.

My explanation is poor, but I hope you understand what I meant. It would be easier to find the difference that way without A/B.

 

[Sovkiller]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jorg Hi Sov. In fact, that's an interesting test. It won't let you know how the cables will sound in your system, but it can show differences if they really are. It would be very interesting to grab the disk and to watch to it in SoundForge or another program with similar capabilities. That will show how much is the difference. And after you saw the differences in SF, you could make another test: take two recordings, take the left channel from the first recording and make it the left channel of a new recording, take the left channel from the secon recording and make it the right channel of the new recording. The same with right channels. After that also left to left from the first and right to right from the second. And left to left from the second and right to right from the first. My explanation is poor, but I hope you understand what I meant. It would be easier to find the difference that way without A/B.

They are not offering the disk anymore in their website, if you want a copy to do those experiments let mek now....
PM me your address, I will mail you one copy....alongwiht other interesting tests and tone disks...

 

[cortez]

A little late as I have been a busy lately but anyway my two cents.


I have not heard all the cables out there(who has??), not even close but the cables I have heard had a very noticeable impact on the sound. Here are a few.

1.When I upgraded to the Cardas golden reference from radio shack gold IC, geez talk about a IC upgrade. The change in sound was very apparent, so much so that it took a while for me to get use to the new sound coming out of my rs1's. The Cardas was between my Rotel 991 and a ra-1. A few things that I noticed was that the soundstage increased a lot, darker background, more detail among other things. I would be surprised if somebody could not tell the difference between the cables blind.

2.When I upgraded the stock cord on my Audio Research CD3 with a Virtual Dynamics Nite. Again I noticed a obvious difference. Instruments were more separated, blacker background, more detail. While not as big a jump in sound quality as in the Cardas IC, it was pretty close.

3.When I got my mpx3 I used my stock AR CD3 cord on it while using the Nite on the cdp. The CD3 stock cord is thicker the the stock cord that ships with the mpx3. I am now trying a after market cord on the mpx3 that I seem to be liking a lot and will write up a more detailed report on it soon. I have it on loan from a local shop and want to try a few more to see which one I like the most. Once again the change in sound on my system was very obvious with the after market cable on the mpx3. One of the biggest changes is how much more it blackened the background, so much so that I would be surprised if I couldn't tell the cables apart blind on just this change.

4. At a local dealer listening to a speaker system he had a pair of single ended cables between the pre and the source and a pair of different IC's on the balanced end between the pre and the source. We started with the bal pair and after a few minutes he switch to the single ended pair on the pre and I noticed a big difference between the cables and like the SE pair better as they where better in the mids. We also played with a few other cables all of which I noticed a change in sound one way or another.

IC cables always made sense to me because of the fact that the audio signal passes through the cables between the source and the amp. But I was always skeptical of power cables until I heard the difference for myself. I don't know the science behind power cables and do not care, all I know is that the ones I have heard do make a nice change in sound for the better.

While the change in sound quality is not as big a upgrade as in a source or amp component upgrade I think is is big enough to invest in after market cables. In my opinion it is foolish to use a stock cable on a source like the Audio Research or on a amp like the mpx3 or better components because the right after market cable will let the pieces of audio gear really sing their best.

I have a hard time believing that people can't tell the difference between a stock cord and a better premium after market cable. Changes between a cable of the same price range will be a little trickier because the changes will be more subtle but between a stock and premium, it is just too obvious to me.

Things I have noticed that PC cords do.
1. Blacken the background
2. More precise imaging
3. Separates instruments and puts a space around them
Gives more of a being in the room feeling.
4. Sharper image which I'm sure helps 2 and 3
5. More detail
6. Extended top and bottom

In that order. With that said I do think that the PC cords and even IC's are very overpriced, I mean a $2500 cable, come on. But with the used market you can always score a killer deal with 50% or more off on cables.

Just my two cents

 

[doobooloo]

Could it be that headphone systems benefit more as it is much harder to discern elements such as a "black background" on speaker systems?

 

[rickcr42]

Quote:

Could it be that headphone systems benefit more as it is much harder to discern elements such as a "black background" on speaker systems?

headphones and high efficiency loudspeakers.Any system noise with a horn system will be magnified and the real test of such a system is how close can you get until you actually hear noise.If it means sticking your head in the horn before you hear any background noise you have the situation under control.Headphones are sensitive to noise due to the transducer/ear interface which is separated by inched and not feet.any noise has no where to hide and no ambient noise background to mask it.

 

[rickcr42]

Quote:

Could it be that headphone systems benefit more as it is much harder to discern elements such as a "black background" on speaker systems?

headphones and high efficiency loudspeakers.Any system noise with a horn system will be magnified and the real test of such a system is how close can you get until you actually hear noise.If it means sticking your head in the horn before you hear any background noise you have the situation under control.Headphones are sensitive to noise due to the transducer/ear interface which is separated by inches and not feet.Any noise has nowhere to hide and no ambient noise background to mask it.