Help Me Explain Power Cables to my Guitar Friends

Hey Crazy4blues An interesting situation that you have. My suggestion when one of these musicians says that they must see scope measurements, I'd throw them a fast ball smack damb directly back at them. Ask them why the "H" do they use a TUBE based amp when a SOLID STATE amp likely measures better.

Furthermore, most well-built solid state and tube amps will measure quite well in terms of the standard measurements used to rate amplifiers. As that is the case, why would a musician 99 times out of 100 use the tube amp over the solid state amp? Hell, with the solid stater there are no tubes to fail, they cost less, etc.

As an aside, I've nerver heard of a musician with much understanding of an oscilliscope. Given that a musician wants to use a 'scope to verify that one cord cannot be better than another, I'd be very curious what specifically they wish to observe on a 'scope that provides a definitive answer.

Tubes108 - If you ask the question and the guitar guys are on the ball, they will probably note (pun intended) that high magnitude second order harmonics are similar to reverb, and probably similar to room reflections in indoor listening environments.

If the power supply and power cord in your friends guitar amplifier is appropriately designed and sized then I am afraid your friends are most probably right.

Cool thread. It is pretty funny as I would think your friends would be open to to this. I play the guitar (or at least I try to) but I have two friends in a band who are very serious about their "tone" as it makes them unique sounding.

They have actually re-wired a lot of their gear with Audience and Audioquest wire, and done other improvments. They also insist on running choice NOS tubes in their amps.

I recently saw DADA live in Falls Church, VA and I have never heard a Fender Strat sound like Mike Gurley's.It was absolutely amazing! I talked to a friend of mine who has actually played with him and he as gone to great extremes (Nos Tubes, Re-Wiring, Effects) to get that sound. Not to mention, he will not share his setup with anyone.

Even Audience now offers guitar cables which I have yet to try but they are now on their website. I guess it depends on being open minded and willing to experiment..

Chris

Thanks for the responses, all! Here's the rub with the guitar guys: Many of them are just plain prejudice when it comes to audiphilia. Unfortuantely, it's just an attitude problem. What's surprising is how vitriolic the responses are to a suggestion of, say, a power cord for an amp. They just dismiss it as nonsense! It's sad, but more than just a few guitar guys can really be a bunch of flat-earthers. Oh well . . . For the record, I'm playing a Dr Z Maz 18 Jr, which is basically the audiophile version of a guitar amp. I play G&L ASATs mostly.