Power Cord Revelation

Here's a little story of mine. I had used Virtual Dynamics Power 3 for several years. I am open minded, and willing to accept what I hear. And I do hear differences various interconnects and speaker cables. But I haven't really heard difference in power cords yet. The only reason I was using VD cord was because I got a good deal, and thought it wouldn't hurt the sound. The main drawback using VD cable was the weight and stiffness of the cable prevents good contact on the wall. When I moved into my current home early this year, I did not use VD cable because the location of the component made it impossible to use such a stiff cable. I didn't think I was missing anything without VD cable then.

A few weeks ago I rearranged the components, and decided to put back VD power cord. My friends and I listened to music for a while, and thought the sound got better. It has gotten decidedly more open, transparent, and clear with VD power cord. We then switched the cords back and forth to confirm that the power cord really caused the change in sound. And then we thought it would be fun to switch the power cords in DBT environment. So we did. We took out a blindfold, and did several iteration of the same music that we thought clearly showed the different power cords while the listener was blind folded. Unfortunately, we all failed to identify the cord in DBT environment.

We were all in shock afterwards. Then we did more iteration of power cord switching without blind folds, and I was not really sure that the sound really changed with VD cord any more. I then sold my VD cord next week to raise funds for something else..

We can draw our own conclusions on this story. Wearing my "skeptic hat", one thing I have realized was that placebo effect, and the power of the brain can really influence our perception. Playing the same music on the same day using the same equipment can yield drastically different impressions. First we all thought the sound was different and better with different power cords. After the DBT "incident" I wasn't sure if I heard the difference again.

Another thing that I would like to add, now wearing my "open minded" hat, DBT is very hard to conduct, and the result really does not prove one thing or the other. There is a nice story of JA from stereophile about conducting DBT on two amps, which pretty much concludes that the results of DBT is inconclusive. I would agree with him. With blind folded, and under the pressure to "guess" the correct answer, I got somewhat nervous and really could not concentrate in listening. Also we did it as a fun, not as a serious experiment.

I remain open minded, and do not want to dismiss the power cord theory. In fact I happened to have just acquired three VH audio power cords a couple of weeks ago, two flavor 4 and one flavor 1 for my Shunyata Hydra, EAD PM2000, and CAL front end. The hope was to "open up" frequency extremes and remove veiling on my newly acquired EAD amp. Flavor 4 for CAL was a bonus, just in case the new set of power cords really does wonders to the sound. It's been burning in for a couple of weeks now. So far I can't say that the new set of power cords improved the sound drastically. But it's still too early to draw any conclusion. Stay tuned.

Jylee - Interesting story. I guess the thing that makes me a believer is I've been piecing my audio system together for the past five years. I've done this in a very logical way, starting at the source and moving downstream. Over the years my ability to hear small changes has gotten much better. Some of the tweaks have had minimal impact on the sound. I've learned not to expect much change, just fine tuning and subtleties. Sometimes the change is so subtle that I question whether it even exists.

My guess is that tweaks and system changes can be synergistically applied and may have an exponentially cumulative effect. In other words, you may have a "bottle neck" somewhere that is inhibiting the audio system. Once the kink in the system is addressed, other tweaks may reach their full potential. This could explain why one single change (power cord) can transform the sound of the entire system.

Is there any scientific merit to my assumption?

jylee, consider yourself lucky that you do not have to spend money on power cords!!!! Thats what makes this hobby so fun/frustrating. There is no formula or right or wrong. For me, I was not a power cord believer until recently. From my experiences, power cords make the biggest difference on the source, but I think this is dependent on the source. In my system, power cords made a big difference on my Esoteric cdp. I have found power cords to make less of am impact on my Pass amps. I will audition the SR Precision Ref and Hologram A on my amps though just to verify that I do not hear much if any difference. The same with my previous preamp, Audio Research Ref 3. The stock cords sounded best.

But as mootsdude pointed all, power cords (and everything in this hobby) is dependent on synergy as well as a myriad of other factors and variables. If the right mix of variables allows power cords to make a positive difference great. If not, consider yourself lucky!

Tboooe, you sold your ARC Ref 3? Was it the looks that bothered you? What are you planning to use now?

Cheers,
John

I just put the new bpt L10 --has new oyaide plugs with the same material as my ri oyaide outlets --20a ded line into furman ref 15 IT--took the old L10 and put it on my sub --bass has tightened and bass speed on the sub is better and now is more seemless with my stats-- the first L10 I put on the furman was nothing short of spectacular --great bargain--fast and dynamic --have them on my stats and cdp--will eventually put them on my other furman and amps