Why Power Cables Affect Sound


I just bought a new CD player and was underwhelmed with it compared to my cheaper, lower quality CD player. That’s when it hit me that my cheaper CD player is using an upgraded power cable. When I put an upgraded power cable on my new CD player, the sound was instantly transformed: the treble was tamed, the music was more dynamic and lifelike, and overall more musical. 

This got me thinking as to how in the world a power cable can affect sound. I want to hear all of your ideas. Here’s one of my ideas:

I have heard from many sources that a good power cable is made of multiple gauge conductors from large gauge to small gauge. The electrons in a power cable are like a train with each electron acting as a train car. When a treble note is played, for example, the small gauge wires can react quickly because that “train” has much less mass than a large gauge conductor. If you only had one large gauge conductor, you would need to accelerate a very large train for a small, quick treble note, and this leads to poor dynamics. A similar analogy might be water in a pipe. A small pipe can react much quicker to higher frequencies than a large pipe due to the decreased mass/momentum of the water in the pipe. 

That’s one of my ideas. Now I want to hear your thoughts and have a general discussion of why power cables matter. 

If you don’t think power cables matter at all, please refrain from derailing the conversation with antagonism. There a time and place for that but not in this thread please. 
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Showing 13 responses by kosst_amojan

You should call and complain about those highly capacitive squirrels running about on the power lines too. 
@geoffkait 

Sorry, but the electrons are moving and it's not accurate to say that their agregate motion equals null motion. Photons are the force carrier that move them and that's extremely important, but the motion of the electrons is what's really going on on. All one needs to do is understand how a BJT transistor works. The mechanism of their operation is the physical motion of electrons between differently doped regions. A P doped regions doesn't have photon holes. It has electron holes. The physics of a transistor are dictated by the motion of electrons. 
@geoffkait

Yeah, it is. The same phenomenon that give rise to inductance, capacitance, and resistance in a transistor are the same as those in a wire.
@geoffkait 

Artificial atoms? What are you talking about? Do you even know how a semiconductor works? The motion of the electrons is what gives rise to the emission of photons. It's how metal conducts and it's how every active electronic device functions! Just give up on your silly photons!
@geoffkait 

Good. So you agree that the electrons are moving and photons are the byproduct like I said. 
@geoffkait 

You're nuts. Electrons aren't force carriers. Everybody knows that's what photons are. Nobody in history every cut a copper wire to find light spewing out. You get sparks, made of electrons. Duh. 
@geoffkait 

Well there's a non sequitur failure of reason. I don't even know how to comprehend that nonsense. 
Shielding? The 50 miles of transmission line to your house have no shielding either. 
Uh.... Why not buy or build something with competent filtering? IEC modules come in all sizes with varying quality of filters and the best ones are a hell of a lot cheaper and more effective than these cables. 
@mrdecibel 

I certainly would. I had no problem admitting I really liked the LaScala I heard. 

I've tried different power cables laying around. Nothing special, just power cables with different builds. It made no difference at all. 

I don't understand why I'm the only one who thinks technical claims should be substantiated with technical proof. 


1988Eldorado,

I’m totally on board with you. This stuff makes NO technical sense, and no matter how much you try to tell people that there’s something seriously wrong with their gear if a breaker box makes a difference, they’ll swear that REALLY good gear SHOULD be prone to the most minor disturbances in mains power delivery. 
@atmasphere 

So it only makes a difference if I drive my amp to the physical limits of it's power supply, which nobody ever actually does?