It is interesting that when any of the contributors here describes to a particular cable a specific sonic quality, attribute, or characteristic there is general affirmation, agreement and consensus as to the nature of the cable, lending further evidence, documentation, and credence to the simple facts, truth, and reality that cables do indeed sound different from each other depending on the characteristics of the music reproduction system within which they are installed.
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.
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.
- ...
- 845 posts total
pkvintage"What happens when you plug an expensuve power chord into a cheap power bar that is plugged into a $1.00 wall socket?" What happens when you put bicycle tires on a Ferrari? What happens when you try to run Photoshop on Windows 3 with 3 megs of RAM? What happens if you try to stream hi-res using a dial-up connection? |
pkvintage39 posts12-24-2018 10:52amYou may/will still hear a difference from your system. If the power cord is designed to be connected to a piece of digital equipment like a CDP, Dac, or CD transport the chances are greater of hearing the difference, jmho. As for improving the parts of the AC power delivery system it’s all cumulative. The branch circuit wiring, there in, a dedicated branch circuit. The type of wiring used and the wiring method used in installing the branch circuit wiring. Quality of wall receptacle used. You don’t need to spend big bucks on an audio grade outlet to hear an improvement over a cheap residential grade outlet. Even the receptacle cover plate can make a difference. . |
- 845 posts total