Why Power Cables Affect Sound

@mrdecibel : " I will avoid and ignore them whenever I can"

That seems disproportionate to the issue at hand. Someone who will never believe in the benefits of power cords may share other mutual beliefs and experiences and may also have something valuable to contribute.

And that also speaks to the brand "naysayer". As well as my question about $22,000 power cords (nonoise). Which, by the way, is not a straw man argument at all. The point I'm trying to make is that there comes a point at which all of us will become naysayers. And while $22,000 is an extreme example, a $500 power cord sounds pretty extreme to the person who looks at the beefy power cord that came with his Mark Levinson amp....at no additional cost.

 And that is not to mention that we could be having this same conversation about little blue decals that we stick behind curtains and pictures on our walls that improve the SQ of our system. I'm sure there is some 'science' behind these as well. I'm sure we would have fervent debate about the nature of that science that would yield no consensus. And there would also be people who say that they can here the difference and that they are reliable in their observations. 

Also, I appreciate your references for affordable aftermarket cords. I will look into them but if you've followed my leap into hi-fi you also know I'm a cheap bast@rd. Heck, my DAC only costs $110. But I will tell you, last night I almost got up and put in a cheap power  cord to my amp. The only thing that stopped me is how much trouble it is. The amp weighs 95 pounds and is on a component stand that can't be moved without pulling the amp all the way out....not to mention the tangle of cords to sort through.

However, I am building built-ins soon and it all has to come out. I'll either do the test then or maybe even try a cord you recommend. I'm not sure that the cheap cord vs OEM cord is a god test. Naysayer that I am I fully believe that a cord with insufficient current flow could affect how an amp operates.

Finally (I'm sure no one has read this far), I do not know who assembled my system; the original owner or an expert adviser. Could have been either. The cousin in question dives real deep into stuff so I would not have put it past him to have done the legwork. 

Good point from the op about how careful a listener is the person responding?           
I listen to music all the time... Yet I KNOW for a fact when I am sitting in front of the system listening while online, my attention to the music is sharply curtailed. Yes it is on, I can hear melodies, notes, the basic plot.., but the fine details... no. I am not paying enough attention, my attention is seriously divided.           
Plus having to be in the mood to totally devote full attention to the music. Then having a good memory of what the piece sounded like in the past. Otherwise there is no 'comparison'. just what it sounds like now.

@ mkgus OP

This may help you to better understand "the why do".
https://www.gcaudio.com/tips-tricks/why-power-cables-make-a-difference/
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@mkgus,

I think nonoise is getting upset with you because you are denying his very reality without having any experience with it via sitting in a arm chair 500 miles away removed from his situation and then going on to cite how fallable the mind is: it’s borderline insulting.

No mature, reasonable person should find facts insulting. Including facts about being human.

Ever seen optical illusions? They show us ways in which our perception can be fooled. Are you, or nonoise, "insulted" by being shown how such perception is fallible? Would it make sense to be "insulted" when being shown a fact about human perception?

Scientists often use double-blind studies. I’ve mentioned before: my son is involved in a double blind study for an allergy treatment. Both my son and the doctor were "blinded" to whether my son was receiving a placebo or the actual drug. Why? Because it’s so well known how human bias works in confounding the results. If the experimenters know which people are on the real drug, they can subtly influence the outcome of the results in ways they aren’t even themselves aware of. We know simply giving someone a fake pill can produce perceptions of results if people think it may be something that affects their system. In fact, as is often the case, in this study some people had what they took to be allergic reactions to the placebo....which is why double-blinding is used to reduce the "noise" of bias effects in the results.

Now, this is simply based on what we know about human bias and perception. Should the doctors have felt insulted to be blinded during the research? Of course not; they are mature adults and simply understand they are fallible in ways that they ought to control for.Should we have been scandalized to have been blinded to whether we were on the placebo or real drug as in "How DARE you think I can’t KNOW whether this drug is working or not. Don’t you TRUST ME?"

Of course not. We’d be bad subjects to be so irrational.

And yet, if you simply remind some audiophiles that we are all human, and we know that humans have biases that can confound our inferences, then they feel scandalized, insulted. It’s not even saying their perception and results ARE in error. It’s only to suggest that, given the facts of bias effects, that it COULD POSSIBLY be in error. And even the suggestion their perception COULD POSSIBLY be in error is seen as an occasion for being insulted, and hurling back insults.  Against all scientific evidence to the contrary, apparently these audiophiles can be confident they are never in error and no perceptual biases are operating.

Do you see the problem here at all?


I have been very careful to say, explicitly, that I’m not claiming from my own results "AC cables make no sonic difference" and I have NEVER claimed that nonoise or you or anyone else DID NOT hear a REAL sonic difference. I have only raised the issue of how difficult it can be to get the bottom of many of the more audiophile/tweaky claims due to the bias effects we all suffer from. And given this, it’s reasonable to ask "how do we deal with trying to untangle real audible differences from imagined audible differences?"

Why can’t a mature, calm conversation be had about this? There is no reason whatsoever to take such questions as insults.


BTW, as to how I listen to my system: I listen from my sweet spot, often lights out, truly involved in the music and sound quality. I’m as obsessive as any audiophile in that regard.
Cheers.