Expensive vs. Moderately Priced.

[Blake]

Good luck with that!

 

 

I'm not quite sure I understand your comment- "good luck" with what?

[gmgraves]

You can make a physical case for anything really.......proof is another matter entirely. Yes, the composition, gauge, shielding of a cable produce a measurable difference with the content of electrical current. How those changes propagate through a piece of gear and ultimately become audible has yet to be explained....no less proven. IMO and IME, the values of changes quoted (capacitance, inductance, resistance) are simply far to small to have any real influence on the operation of the circuit. If we simply examine a passive speaker's crossover network, you'll find real world examples of how much variance is needed to effect a measurable change, not to mention audibility.

 

Clean, stable current and sound connections with enough wire to support the load is all that is needed. Sorry.

 

Just wondering of there were any audiophile grade circuit breakers or panels out there for purchase?

 

 

+1

 

And I believe there are "audiophile-grade" circuit breakers. After all, in the world of charlatan audio (how about THAT for a new audio magazine title: Charlatan Audio, the magazine for audio irrationalists), any product that you can talk the gullible into buying at an exorbitant price is untapped marketing territory! Just find a supplier of hospital or lab grade circuit breakers, re-brand them and sell them for hundreds of dollars each (after buying them for 1/10th the selling price) and you've made yourself a quick fortune.

[gmgraves]

It's current George. Fuses go open on an overcurrent versus a time period.

 

 

You're joking! And here, all this time I thought it was P_(Watts) = I_(Amps) X V_(volts). You learn something new every day, don't you?

[gmgraves]

I'm not quite sure I understand your comment- "good luck" with what?

 

I believe that he meant that the info you asked for will likely not be forthcoming, because it doesn't exist.

[sandyk]

any product that you can talk the gullible into buying at an exorbitant price is untapped marketing territory!

 

How about Charlatan Auto, the magazine for auto irrationalists? That applies equally to the automobile industry where you are a reviewer.

Chuck in an inbuilt refrigerated wine cooler and other bling and they will sell like hot cakes.

It smacks of a bit of hypocrisy to me.

[Paul R]

You're joking! And here, all this time I thought it was P_(Watts) = I_(Amps) X V_(volts). You learn something new every day, don't you?

 

Did it hurt much?

[gmgraves]

Did it hurt much?

 

Always!

[gmgraves]

How about Charlatan Auto, the magazine for auto irrationalists? That applies equally to the automobile industry where you are a reviewer.

Chuck in an inbuilt refrigerated wine cooler and other bling and they will sell like hot cakes.

It smacks of a bit of hypocrisy to me.

 

You don't know what you are talking about, my friend. Yes, I am car reviewer and the editor of a car magazine, but I don't review dubious products like "Fire Injector" spark plugs, fuel injection "turbolizers", "gas misers", STP, Marvel Mystery Oil and other automotive mouse-milk equivalents of audiophile snake-oil. I also review for an audio magazine and you won't find me reviewing $4000 Nordost interconnects, $7000 MIT speaker cables, fat power cords from Shunyata "Research", myrtle wood blocks from Cardas, magic digital clocks, outlet covers, speaker cable elevators, green CD pens or a thousand other nonsensical audio products either.

[sandyk]

You don't know what you are talking about, my friend. Yes, I am car reviewer and the editor of a car magazine, but I don't review dubious products like "Fire Injector" spark plugs, fuel injection "turbolizers", "gas misers", STP, Marvel Mystery Oil and other automotive mouse-milk equivalents of audiophile snake-oil. I also review for an audio magazine and you won't find me reviewing $4000 Nordost interconnects, $7000 MIT speaker cables, fat power cords from Shunyata "Research", myrtle wood blocks from Cardas, magic digital clocks, outlet covers, speaker cable elevators, green CD pens or a thousand other nonsensical audio products either.

 

Why doesn't that surprise me ? You have already made your mind up about what are dubious products without even trying them. It's obvious to many here that whatever you personally don't believe in is snake oil.

Unlike you, although I may find some claims to sound a little far fetched, I don't dismiss outright, reports about them from others, especially when a lot of people are saying similar.

[elcorso]

Regarding dampening power cords and dampening transformers:

 

By experience I like "lightweight" power cords, then no shielding and paper filled ones, #14 is OK for me. Resonances from your music playing in your music room get in the power cord and then in the transformer (even if damped), of course I like better an also damped transformer. I also try not to mimic any common antenna length, 6' (183 cms.) is OK for me. This cords are the contrary of sophisticated and pricy ones. I "discovered" this by chance.

 

Fuses get old with time and fail, mainly the slow blow type. I had some failure with this fuses, but very few. Mainly on tube power amps.

 

My 2 cents,

 

Roch

[gmgraves]

Why doesn't that surprise me ? You have already made your mind up about what are dubious products without even trying them. It's obvious to many here that whatever you personally don't believe in is snake oil.

Unlike you, although I may find some claims to sound a little far fetched, I don't dismiss outright, reports about them from others, especially when a lot of people are saying similar.

 

What makes you think that I haven't tried any of them? I've certainly never said anything like that. And by the way, do you have to stick your hand in a fire in order to ascertain it's hot? Some things are so nonsensical that one doesn't need to try them to know that they are mouse-milk. You are grasping at straws, sir.

[sandyk]

What makes you think that I haven't tried any of them? I've certainly never said anything like that. And by the way, do you have to stick your hand in a fire in order to ascertain it's hot? Some things are so nonsensical that one doesn't need to try them to know that they are mouse-milk. You are grasping at straws, sir.

 

You really don't have a clue about many of those things reported by many C.A. members to make a difference. You even disparaged Speaker Cable Lifts. I guess that it never entered your head that lifting them well above mains cables may have been a good idea ?

RF and other rubbish can get into an amplifier via it's speaker leads then into the NFB network. A classic example of that is where people living not that distant from analogue TV stations often got hum ("Frame buzz") that varied with the brightness of the picture on the TV station that was causing the problem. The cure in that case was to wind a few turns of the speaker cables through a large toroid as used by Radio Amateurs.

Just because you can't directly associate garbage getting in to speakers leads with audible problems , doesn't mean that it isn't having a degrading effect on SQ..

[gmgraves]

You really don't have a clue about many of those things reported by many C.A. members to make a difference. You even disparaged Speaker Cable Lifts. I guess that it never entered your head that lifting them well above mains cables may have been a good idea?

 

Why might it be a good idea? Why would you think they were in the proximity of mains cables, or that moving them a couple of inches up, away from the main cables would be any better than just leaving them on the floor, but moving them further away from the mains cables laterally, would result in any difference? Please, explain to me the electrical theory behind cable lifts (remember, we're talking 20-20KHz here, not microwave frequencies). Then after you explain the physics to me, then go on and tell me exactly how they alter the sound; I.E. what do they do?

 

RF and other rubbish can get into an amplifier via it's speaker leads then into the NFB network.

 

Oh really? and where might this "RF and other rubbish" be seen on the waveform, and more importantly, how does it affect the sound? Prove to me that this is a real problem and a marketing solution in search of a problem.

 

 

A classic example of that is where people living not that distant from analogue TV stations often got hum ("Frame buzz") that varied with the brightness of the picture on the TV station that was causing the problem. The cure in that case was to wind a few turns of the speaker cables through a large toroid as used by Radio Amateurs.

Just because you can't directly associate garbage getting in to speakers leads with audible problems , doesn't mean that it isn't having a degrading effect on SQ..

 

 

It doesn't mean that it is either, or that there is any garbage of that type around to get into the speaker leads either. Now, how, pray tell, does raising speaker cables using cable lifts address this "problem"?

 

And you're wrong, I have used cable lifts (well, inverted ceramic coffee cups, actually, but since, except for the cable sling on the top of each one, that's what "Cable Elevators" are. There certainly wouldn't be any difference (except the US$20 ea. that the "Cable Elevators" cost vs the $0.00 cost of the coffee cups) between the cups and the cable lifts physically, now would there? a group of us did an ad-hoc blind test with them too. No difference was noted by anybody in the room between cables off the floor and cables on the floor. I think one can take this mess out of the oven, it's done!

 

Sandyk, you're probably a really nice guy, but you seem awfully gullible to pseudoscience to me. Of course, I could be wrong and you could be just a naturally contentious personality.

[sandyk]

you seem awfully gullible to pseudoscience to me. Of course, I could be wrong and you could be just a naturally contentious personality.

No, actually I am not awfully gullible to pseudoscience, and many of my views are more in line with those of mayhem13 and a few others, except in areas where I have had confirmation from other highly qualified people. I just get heartily sick of closed minded sceptics telling everybody they are gullible idiots, who throw away their hard earned money to snake oil merchants, and present a few possibilities as to why some may hear these things. I have had first hand experience of frame buzz getting into an amplifier from a nearby TV station's transmitter via the speakers leads, and a cure that was documented elsewhere that I tried with good results.

 

Stereo. Long speaker wires can act like an antenna to pick up RF and feed it into the output of the amplifier.

The amplifier's feedback circuit allows the RF to reach the input where it is rectified, amplified and then heard in the speaker.

The solution is to use beads on the speaker wires just as they leave the amplifier. RF can enter the stereo system through the power cord.

Use a split bead or a toroid on the cord just as it enters the stereo.

 

 

http://www.antennex.com/shack/Dec99/beads.htm

 

The quote above isn't from where I found the original fix.

[sandyk]

Additional to post above.

 

http://audiosystemsgroup.com/SAC0305Ferrites.pdf

 

Eliminating interference in stereo or audio equipment | ACMA

[gmgraves]

No, actually I am not awfully gullible to pseudoscience, and many of my views are more in line with those of mayhem13 and a few others, except in areas where I have had confirmation from other highly qualified people. I just get heartily sick of closed minded sceptics telling everybody they are gullible idiots, who throw away their hard earned money to snake oil merchants, and present a few possibilities as to why some may hear these things. I have had first hand experience of frame buzz getting into an amplifier from a nearby TV station's transmitter via the speakers leads, and a cure that was documented elsewhere that I tried with good results.

 

 

 

RFI - Tip Sheet

 

The quote above isn't from where I found the original fix.

 

 

OK, you had a specific problem that had a real fix, I.E. to add some inductance to your speaker circuit. That's a perfectly reasonable result. Real high frequencies are blocked by high amounts of inductance. That's known. One of the big problems computer makers had when CPUs started running in the gigahertz range was that what was a right-angle trace on a circuit board at 25 MHz, became a huge inductor at 1 Gig, so new ways of laying circuit boards out had to found. A 50/60 Hz power transformer in a component lets very little line noise through because the line noise is extremely high frequency compared to the mains, and the iron + windings in the transformer, being designed for maximum efficiency at 50/60 Hz, essentially blocks the higher RF and interference frequencies. So, I know that you are right on that account. But, on the other hand, and perhaps you can enlighten me, I don't see what this has to do with speaker cable lifts. You certainly don't need them in order to place a couple of coils in your speaker cables. But aside from that, the RF problem is not something everyone has, very few people actually live that close to a powerful broadcasting station. If you do, then obviously you have to take extraordinary measures to eliminate the problem.

 

And as for your statement "I just get heartily sick of closed minded sceptics telling everybody they are gullible idiots, who throw away their hard earned money to snake oil merchants..", may I suggest that if you don't want to see opinions that differ from yours, Don't go where they might be found. And I take a little umbrage at your suggestion that I might have called you a gullible idiot, I've never called anybody here an idiot. The word I used is "ignorant" which means having no knowledge of the subject at hand. There are many things that I am ignorant of. It would be an incredibly arrogant person who did not acknowledge that there are many subjects about which they are ignorant. It doesn't mean that one is an idiot because one doesn't understand the physics behind audio and electronics, it means that one is ignorant of these things; no more, no less. I, for instance, am ignorant of quantum physics. I'm not afraid to say it. I've never studied it, don't remember enough college calculus to fathom it now, and frankly, I'm not really sufficiently motivated by the subject to try to learn. That most audiophiles don't understand the electronics, physics, or acoustics to know what's real and what's pure charlatanism, doesn't make them stupid or even idiots, but it does preclude them from making rational judgement calls about the worth of these "tweak" products. I've said this before: I'm not belittling audiophiles, I'm belittling the shady companies that pray on audiophiles.

[sandyk]

may I suggest that if you don't want to see opinions that differ from yours, Don't go where they might be found.

 

You've got to be joking ! These kinds of posts pop up everywhere from the usual suspects.

 

I've said this before: I'm not belittling audiophiles, I'm belittling the shady companies that pray on audiophiles.

 

Really ? Then stop treating the majority of C.A. readers as brainless idiots/ignorant people being led like lambs to the slaughter.

In case you haven't noticed, the mains supplies these days are heavily polluted due the proliferation of switch mode powered devices, and even the huge amounts of radiated rubbish from many modern LED lighting solutions. Try looking at the mains supply in many homes where they have several computers operating at the same time.

[Paul R]

What has anything you two are saying got to do with the topic of this thread? Please put your egos back in their boxes and stop this stupid feud.

 

-Paul

[sandyk]

The topic of this thread is power cords. Many people are using expensive power cords to try and clean up noise in the power going to various components.

I would have thought that further separation between mains leads and loudspeaker leads, as well as between power leads and interconnects is a legitimate alternative to trying to improve the last 2 metres of a mains power supply ?

A high quality mains filter, or even isolation transformers are further alternatives to boutique mains leads.The best method is likely to be to improve the interface between the mains cable and the transformer itself.

[Alf]

I join the ranks of the skeptics who think that boutique power cords are built with a sizable quantity of snake oil... as well as I believe that most (if not all) hardware manufacturers know their business and are conscentious enough to sell their components with a power cord that will NOT degrade the performance of their products

 

Alf

[One and a half]

I join the ranks of the skeptics who think that boutique power cords are built with a sizable quantity of snake oil... as well as I believe that most (if not all) hardware manufacturers know their business and are conscentious enough to sell their components with a power cord that will NOT degrade the performance of their products

 

Alf

 

In your perception, which brands of power cords do you hold as delivering snake oil. Not trying to nitpick, but to gauge how (in)effective a marketing perception can overshadow an otherwise good engineering concept.

 

Is it the price, at what point of price versus possible values of improvement does the pain set in, and when does the price or concept be scoffed at and dismissed?

 

 

My preference is, if you're spending several thousand on a power cable, then money should be directed at other methods of cleaning up mains AC first.

[Alf]

In your perception, which brands of power cords do you hold as delivering snake oil. Not trying to nitpick, but to gauge how (in)effective a marketing perception can overshadow an otherwise good engineering concept.

 

"In my perception" as you say I do not see a reason for boutique power cords to exist... I have to repeat that I believe that quality components manufacturers know if a good engineering concept is there, and are conscentious enough to sell their components with a power cord that will NOT degrade the performance of their products, even more so as a good power cord will NOT cost them hundreds of dollars (let me not comment about thousand dollars power cords)

 

Is it the price, at what point of price versus possible values of improvement does the pain set in, and when does the price or concept be scoffed at and dismissed?

 

The pain does not set in at any price point because I'm not replacing the supplied power cords for the above mentioned reasons.

 

My preference is, if you're spending several thousand on a power cable, then money should be directed at other methods of cleaning up mains AC first.

 

This preference of yours sounds very reasonable to me

 

Alf

[mayhem13]

In your perception, which brands of power cords do you hold as delivering snake oil..

 

ANY mfgr that sells a power cord which claims an audible improvement is snake oil. Price simply determines just how poisonous the oil is.

[4est]

Of course you do as you see fit, but this is BS. First, no one is saying that supplied cords DEGRADE performance, but represent a base line that may or may not be superseded by the use of an additional filter(power cord) in some cases. If you have seen as many poorly constructed molded cords as I have, you would consider purchasing some after market hand assembled ones, or at least build your own with decent connectors. In my business' shop, we build our own unless it is for something simple like a light. The molded cords do not stand up well to daily use with higher loads and repeat use. They heat up more and suffer intermittent connections. Both sure signs of issues that may pertain to some sonic advantage for hand dressed screw terminal cabling.

 

Bear in mind that a $50 parts & labor hand made cord becomes $250 when bundled into a piece of equipment. Why intentionally force the extra cost when the consumer can choose? If a manufacturer really thought their cord was best, they would hard wire it the way they used to. One could almost make a case for the opposite in that by providing an IEC connector, they recognize that you may want to switch AC cables or that the supplied plug assembly sucks so bad that they did you a service by providing a easy way to replace it.

"In my perception" as you say I do not see a reason for boutique power cords to exist... I have to repeat that I believe that quality components manufacturers know if a good engineering concept is there, and are conscentious enough to sell their components with a power cord that will NOT degrade the performance of their products, even more so as a good power cord will NOT cost them hundreds of dollars (let me not comment about thousand dollars power cords)

 

The pain does not set in at any price point because I'm not replacing the supplied power cords for the above mentioned reasons.

Alf

[Alf]

Of course you do as you see fit, but this is BS.

 

Of course I do as I see fit and anybody can decide by himself what is BS.

 

Alf