Which power cord to upgrade first?


I am just starting to explore the world of PC upgrades, and am wondering what a typical upgrade strategy would be. Which cable upgrade would have the biggest impact: my digital source or my receiver? Should I eventually do both?
murz
Tvad is dead on; power cords would be diminishing returns at the point you are at. Definitely save for component upgrades - much bigger bang for buck over time.
Obviously, my system is a little far from high-end, so perhaps a PC upgrade will have little impact at this point?
MurzĀ  (Threads)

You nailed it, Murz. There's nothing wrong with the gear you presently own, but IMO upgraded power cords are not going to give you the best bang for your buck. Perhaps put those dollars into a better source. If you like the Denon, then watch the Audiogon listings for Exemplar Audio modified Denon DVD machines, including the Denon 2900. Just one thought. There are many ways to spend bucks in this hobby, but fancy wire won't pay dividends until the rest of your system is raised a level.
Thanks for everyone's thoughts. My system consists of:

Denon DVD2200 (DVD, CD/SACD)
NAD T763
Spendor S5e
I am running direct 5.1 from the Denon with Audio Note AN-S silver interconnects
Speaker cable is Luminous Renaissance

Obviously, my system is a little far from high-end, so perhaps a PC upgrade will have little impact at this point?
I would agree with the earlier post of having a dedicated line first, then outlets, and then power cords.

I did it that way, and the dedicated circuits were the most dramatic improvement of anything.

I have a dedicated 20A circuit for my amps and one for my front end.
Tvad, your suggestion comes right on time. I need a cheap cord now while I am waiting for my Audience cords to arrive. I have all the stock cords burried somewhere in the closet and I'm too lazy to dig in there for them.
I may consider the Volex.
I always put the PC on the cdp first....amp thereafter but amp pc effect was subtle and the cdp was not.

Larry
04-14-06: Audphile1
Tvad, $5 cord? that's cool, but I said "basically". And the
better power cord in your case was the $5 cord for that particular
component
Exactly. I wanted to edit my
statement to reflect this, but alas I was too late.

I'm with you on the point of synergy. If you read some of my past posts
you will see that I mention synergy time and time again, which is why
experimentation with placement of power cords and other tweaks is so
important. Believe me, my power cords have been shifted in every
conceivable way, and they now rest in their most optimal locations...and
all are better than stock cords.

Pick up a Volex from Carleton-Bates.com and try one. There are many
here who are trying them, and several have been converted!

(BTW, I want to give credit to Dusty Vawter of CI Audio, who introduced
me to Volex cords many months ago.)
Tvad, $5 cord? that's cool, but I said "basically". And the better power cord in your case was the $5 cord for that particular component.
It's a combination of things. Not necessarily one upgraded cord is going to make a huge improvement. Have you thought about what the rest of the power cords in your system are doing? Is it possible that all the other cords there in your system did more harm than good in the combination with your pre-amp and then you drop this el-cheapo cord that in the context of another system would probably sound like crap. And all of a sudden things come to life?
I appreciate what you're saying, but the most important thing is system synergy. You achieved it with the addition of that $5 cord. Congrats. :)
My experience: The source. I use Harmonix Studio Masters. Dedicated line and power conditioner, as well. All for the source. peace, warren :)
None,

1. add a dedicated line first.

2. Upgrade the electrical outlet.

3. Now upgrade your power cord.
04-14-06: Audphile1
Basically any component should benefit from better power cord.
Not necessarily true in my experience. I own several upmarket power cords including Purist Dominus and Elrod EPS 3, and I have tried a dozen others. On my $5000 Lamm LL2 Deluxe preamp, the best sounding power cord I have tried is a $5 Volex 17604.
If all your gear uses the same power cord you could just keep swapping until you found the best place for it. Or buy two different cables and do the same.
It might depend on the relative quality of your components. For
example, if you own a Rotel CD player, and an Ayre amplifier, you might
hear greater benefits when changing the amplifier's power cord and vice
versa due to the better power supply and topology of the higher level
component.

As synergy is the key, and as there is no right answer, experimentaion is
important, and if you have one higher grade component than the others,
I'd suggest starting the experiment there.

What components do you have?
Basically any component should benefit from better power cord. The question is - Is the rest of your system good enough to realize the change?
Upgrade power cords(although not all of them) do improve the sound, but the improvement is much smaller than what you would get from IC or speaker cable upgrade.

I think in your case(with a receiver) it's the source that should benefit from a better power cord.
One power cord that I found to work equally good and make a noticable improvement for both digital and analog components is Audience powerChord. It is unshielded, but an excellent cord for either source or the amp. Good luck.
In my system,the source (CD player) cord upgrade had the greatest improvement.
The power amp and preamp cord improvements were subtle, the CD players improved cord was substantial. From what I read, the CD player can 'broadcast' digital noise through the power cord corrupting the other components. The improved cord keeps the digital noise from polluting the rest of the chain, along with the the improved power delivery.

CD player = Musical Fidelity A5 with JPS labs digital AC
Preamp = Adcom GTP750 with VHAudio flavor 2.
Amp = Conrad Johnson MF2250 with VHAudio flavor 3.
I've never heard a bigger difference than when changing the PC on the source, much more so than the amps in my experience. Obviously, others have heard greater shifts elsewhere. As Wellfed suggests, buy used and experiment.
Amplifier OR amplifier AND power conditioner (if you're using a power conditioner.) These two cords should be no less than 10AWG wire size. A floating shield (connected at the AC plug end only) is a nice option, but most modern equipment has internal RFI/EMI filtering.

Front end stuff can use smaller gauge PCs, but no less than 14 AWG.
Exception: DACs seem to benefit from larger conductor sizes like 10 AWG. They're not power-hungry devices, so I don't know why this is, it just is.

Any device that has digital circuitry of any kind (DACS, CDT, CDP, HT processors, etc) should definitely have a shielded power cord, and preferably use a circuit that is separate from other (non-digital) front end stuff (tuner, tape, preamp, phono preamp, etc.)
I don't think there is a "right" answer. In my case I find it to be on the DAC and preamp. My advice would be to buy used and experiment.
Your amplification typically will see the biggest improvement in a power cord upgrade. I would recommend giving Frank at Signal Cable a call and discuss your situation with him. You can try his cords for 30 days with a nice return policy.