Power cable from wall socket to power strip

I believe all power cords matter and make a difference. Some components more than others.

Sure it matters.

First let me state that I am a SR fan. I know a couple of years ago, they made a "master" power cable (I forget what they called it exactly...) for precisely this purpose. 

it mattered on my BPT power conditioner when I went from their basic cord to their top of the line...

@jl35 

But the meaning with a power conditioner is to "clean the power". Right?
So how can the power cable to the conditioner matter? Or am I just stupid here?

I have no idea how. I’m not knowledgeable in such matters. And the cable was borrowed/returnable, so no ulterior motive to "pretend" I liked it. In fact I kind of didn’t want to like it so I wouldn’t "have" to buy it...but it made a nice improvement for minimal cost, especially considering I got most of my money back when I sold it...BPT isn’t around anymore, so cannot ask them...

From the wall socket to the power strip ( or any power conditioner )  ; I would think that the gauge of the cable has some importance .

10 gauge would be better than 14 gauge.

That cable is probably the most important cable. It feeds multiple components. As suggested, use a thicker gauge power cable and one that is designed to transfer the power cleanly.

ozzy

Yes. I would recommend a AudioQuest Hurricane, if that is in your budget.

My dealer friend had brought one over for my power amp. In about two seconds I was convinced… I had been audioning power cords for a year, and each, while having some positive attributes also attenuated some aspect. So I ordered one… a one meter. My friend said the two meters would be better… “you get more power conditioning with the extra length”. Well, I ended up with a one meter and a two meter. So I tried them over a week each. He was absolutely correct. The longer 2 meter was quieter and more detailed (yeah, those two are kind of the same thing). This is the way to look at them.

For the details of why. The founder of Shunyata has an article or video somewhere on his site that explains how looking at power like plumbing is wrong and explains how to look at it and why it works. Good explaination although I am a much bigger fan of Transparent, Cardas, and Audio Quest power cords.

   All I can say is it did for me. I use a Richard Gray power conditioner. I also replaced my outlets with 20 amp Hubble. I have a 15 to 20 amp plug adapter and tried all my extra power cords. I then purchased a Shunyata Venom HC 20 amp cord and it bested all my other cords. Please note that I have a modest system and I run low power tubes into high efficiency speakers. Considering most places have a 30 day return policy, give it a try. Happy Listening, Mike B. 

Everything matters.  Full stop.  Read reviews and pick a PC that exhibits the sound characteristics that would combine well for your system/tastes.  Buy used and you’ll save a bundle, and if you buy wisely you can turn around and sell it for little/no loss  if for some reason they don’t work out and just repeat the process til you find “the one.”
A couple other meaningful and cost-effective upgrades would be to pick up something like a used Audience AR1p power conditioner that come up used on hifishark every month or so for only around $250.  Using that to feed your Wiremold will effectively give your whole system very good power conditioning for a song (this is what I did BTW and also use a Wiremold power strip).  Last, upgrading the wall outlet can also make a nice improvement for relatively very little cost.  Here’s a good one to consider…

https://www.cruzefirstaudio.com/maestro/the-maestro-outlet

Hope this helps, and best of luck.

lots of misunderstanding in this area.  

1.  Power cannot be "cleaned".  it isn't just a nice sine wave with some noise the can be "filtered" out.  the sine wave coming into your house looks like crap.  Here is a link to a photo of a scope of the power coming into my house-chopped tops.  4+% thd.  https://photos.app.goo.gl/f3e4gqJ5m6QAqDLG8

2.  Power cables don't deal with noise.  Power cables deal with power.  Adequate power.  (I've given lots of other discussion before about the difference between nameplate power and short burst power transients to support base and dynamics so I won't go into that here).

3. You can't fix power downstream of a bad power component.   Put a resistor in a wire. you can't put an "unresistor" downstream of it.

4.  Power strips are almost always resistors.  The thermal breaker in their overload function is WORSE than a fuse and fuses are horrible for high quality sound.  Tiny wires inside.  Avoid.

Best of luck,

Jerry

Your power cable can't make up for inadequacies on the way to your devices. At best, you can minimize voltage drop without actually improving noise pickup, a balancing act.

The two rules I live by are to keep noisy things out of my clean power zone.  That is, after conditioning I avoid any cheap wall warts used for network devices especially but also sometimes streamers.

I also use shielded cables after the conditioner to minimize noise pick up caused by crossing paths with digital signals and/or noisy power supplies.

So, I focus on keeping the after conditioning power as clean as possible, but if the area around your equipment crosses digital (i.e. Ethernet) much I might put a shielded cable before it as well just to keep as much out.

I wrote more about my views here:

https://inatinear.blogspot.com/2019/04/power-management-for-frugal-audiophiles.html

A lot depends how good or bad your power strip is 

,with yours yes a moderate $2-300 power cord will make a improvement 

personally you need to spend around $3+ on up to truly get a line conditioner 

that truly makes a big noticeable difference .

yes the AC outlet and cables make a difference .

rule of thumb as I have stated many times ,having owned a Audio store 

onky 25% goes into the total of any product ,excluding cables , this includes all parts assembly and packaging ,the rest R&D overhead and marketing,markup

if you have a $1k conditioner maybe $200 went into it then packaging , bought in volume thsts why I state $3k on up is realistic if you want Good parts quality 

and a sizable improvement . Having been into modding Loudspeaker Xovers the biggest weak spot in most speakers, and electronics , the MFG have to make a decent profit or there is no reason to be in business,

cables can have markup up to 10x the investment in parts ,they can charge any price they choose per hr for their time that's why I look for quality and value with cables , No thanks on $3k power cords for me  !!

I just removed my isotek evo 3 polaris for a $75 hospital grade power strip and the faint hum in my subs disappeared.

The main reason I decided to get rid of it was the blades in the isotek inlets are crap - all the plugs were loose.

I'm ordering this to replace the power strip https://www.cullencable.com/gold-series-power-box-6-outlet-receptacle-strip/

You can probably get one made with a longer cable if 4ft isn't enough.

Go to the Nordost website. They have a presentation explaining what they believe is the order of importance of each cable in a system. The power cable out of the wall socket is number one, more important than connectors. I believe that was part of a demonstration they’ve done at audio shows. Hope this helps.

I have found that my sound is best from my superior cables being plugged into my components. I tried my best cable from the wall to distributor, but it did not work well. Currently, my wall to distributor is serviced by an adequate, but unspectacular cable. I think it would be good to upgrade the wall to distributor cable, but I am not certain if I would notice a large improvement. A little improvement would be nice, but I wouldn't expect anything dramatic at this point.

Go to the Nordost website. They have a presentation explaining what they believe is the order of importance of each cable in a system. 

Of course they do. It's called marketing. They are VERY good at it.

But the meaning with a power conditioner is to "clean the power". Right?
So how can the power cable to the conditioner matter? Or am I just stupid here?

No, you are not stupid, just logical. Why would a manufacturer not build a high quality conditioner with a high quality power cable that was matched and hardwired to the unit? No upsell opportunities. 

The Puritan Audio Labs Power Conditioner PSM156 comes with a good Puritan Classic power cord supplied in the box, BUT, almost every PSM156 we sell leaves with the Puritan Ultimate Power cable. It makes a very solid upgrade even better.

@macg19 

Of course they do. It's called marketing. They are VERY good at it.

How is it that SO many people don't grasp that? Are humans really that gullible?

You gave the answer yourself in the description of your situation. If you have not changed the wiring in the walls and up to the socket it’s normal copper wire ... how much difference do you think it makes if you extend that normal copper wire a couple of yards? Exactly ... none. If your expensive power cables from socket to equipment do magical things to the sound, than they will still do that.

You would be better making you own cable with Furutech NCF connectors and Furutech cable. I have been swapping cables and plugs for a while to get the sound the way i want it. The last change was a HiFi tuning fuse in the wall socket plug. And that made a difference. I would say that i have got it the way i want it now, but another swap around maybe even better. lol. Good luck.

@mrskeptic ​​​​​​+1! Clever marketing can sell ice cubes to Eskimos! The whole cable/wire/conditioner business is based upon flowery phrases and obfuscation to lure in the gullible! Audiophiles as a group are among the most gullible and susceptible to advertising/word-of-mouth marketing.

Nothing else sounds as good as those Furutech wall outlets!

I have had the same quandary. Yes it makes a HUGE difference, so much so I have an Entreg DIGITAL (not analogue) power cable from Furutec socket into my specialist made extension box so I feed off that result with the Digital sources fromyte extension box to the cpources which eac hone prefers different cables 

I purchased a used Cardas Nautilus Power Strip a few years ago. You can pick up a used one for under 1K if you’re patient. I use a heavy 10 awg Silnote reference power cable from a heavy duty Hubble receptacle to the power strip. Silnote installed a right angle plug for me to reduce wall clearance and fatigue on the cable. 

And here come the cable deniers, lol. Saving the world, mostly because they can't afford it. And if THEY can't afford it, it must not work.

So old. So obnoxious. 

I disconneted my conditioner because it is too noisy and it filters and modify the sound quality for the worst... There exist probably better than my Panamax.. I am plugged direct in the wall near the Main electrical panel... Can i improve it ? yes i could with a new wall socket perhaps but the sound quality is already staggering...

My amplifier dated back from 1987 and its power chord is the usual one for the time... I will not change it ...

I dont know if a conditioner will do better... The panamax had good reviews but when i go from speakers to headphone i heard clearly that it introduce noise and distortions...I disconnect it... my headphones are very sensible to the noise floor , i was in the obligation to change even my very good Sansui AU 7700 which i could not fault with my speakers...The Sansui alpha even own a "source direct" button bypassing the tonal controls and the useless circuits from the pre amp stage to the power amp stage.. for less noise... It work well...

I’m not an expert but this is what Cardas states on their website.

“The Nautilus features our own 4181US power outlets. Rhodium/Silver plated contact surfaces and excellent grip tension make both of these premium connectors ideal for audio applications. 

There are no current-limiting components in The Nautilus. This is as pure as power distribution gets. The hot & neutral lines are point-to-point wired with Cardas Solid Core 10 AWG copper. The star-ground system uses Cardas 11.5 AWG Multi-stranded Litz Conductor. Each outlet has the same RFI/EMI protection found in our flagship power cables. Each outlet in The Nautilus is equally capable of providing clean power and noise-free grounding to your audio system.” Hope this information is helpful.

     My first step (when addressing power to my system) was to replace the 14 AWG, that fed most of my upstairs rooms, with a 20A dedicated line (two twisted together, 10/2 runs of Romex*), on it's own breaker and the bus bar of the Main, with nothing but one side of the 230V, HVAC power on it (I got lucky, there).

                 The HVAC stays turned off, during listening sessions.

                      *My listening room's 120' from the mains box.

       Although I don't doubt that better outlets would improve things, somewhat: I used Hubbell, Extra Heavy Duty, Hospital Grade receptacles.

          That was almost 30 years ago and they still grip like a gorilla, so...

        An Audio Magic Stealth feeds everything but the Main Mono Amps and VPI SDS, in my actively bi-amped system.

         Though the purifier is there to do just that (purify), making it's job as easy as possible has been my goal in PC selection.

                                 From there, I'll hit the rewind.

                                     A rewind:

rodman99999 5,456 posts 03-31-2022 at 12:13am    @holmz-       Bear with me a minute, in my folly, far as a possibility on why a power cord might make a difference.       Based on some of the theories on how electricity works, simplified:       The conductor acts as a waveguide for the signal/voltage.       Within the conductor: when excited by an AC current, electrons oscillate, generating photons/electromagnetic waves that travel, always from the source, to the load.        Keep in mind: all signals (ie: music, AC) are sinusoidal  waves        Those photons/electromagnetic waves travel through and outside the dielectric, which (according to it's permittivity/Poynting vectors) will have various effects on those waves.    One of the most obvious, is the dielectric's effect on the speed of the signal.       The better designers of printed circuit boards, even take the above into account, when choosing materials for their products.        I posted a link on the first page, that included data on the manufacture of semiconductor chips and what was observed when materials were cryo'd, during process.     Short version: better contact/lowered resistance between layers.           Under the scanning microscope: much smoother surfaces observed.        I would hope, by now, it's a given that various cable constructions, twists, braids, etc, can make for a cleaner transmission of signals (ie: Litz, etc).                     Just seems to me (a hypothesis): given the above (some theories and some things established/measured/proven), it's not a big stretch to believe a power cord, built of the best conductor (Ohno CC silver), wrapped in a very low dielectric coefficient dielectric (ie: Teflon), cryo'd for the smoothest transfer of those photons/magnetic waves and twisted in some crazy way, might not smooth out some of perturbations/noise, from the crap an AC waveform had to go through, back to it's generator.  (run-on, much?)        I haven't tested this, actually comparing two circuits, but: it wouldn't surprise me, if a power supply that used a choke, would be less affected by a better power cord, as the former can eliminate a lot of the high freq garbage, etc, that's either created by, or makes it through all the big converting/filtering stuff, before.        Never thought about PCs before the good stuff hit the market, but: the Physics/QED made sense.             I tried 'em, I like 'em and the science makes my head feel better.                               Don't care WHAT it does to anyone else's!

rodman99999 5,456 posts 03-31-2022 at 12:27am         OH, and: it takes some time for the dielectric to form, take a charge, polarize, or however one chooses to define the process, when a dielectric is subjected to electromagnetic waves, which affects the Poynting vectors, measurably/predictably.               The lower the material’s dielectric constant: the longer that takes.                                                PC burn-in?    Maybe?

                                                    Happy listening! 

You can’t go wrong with Hubbell Hospital grade receptacles. They are built like a tank. Luckily, we have all 12 gauge Romex for every receptacle/circuit in our home with 20 amp breakers. Normally, you will find 15 amp receptacles on a 20 amp circuit. Since our media room is on its own circuit, I swapped our the outlet for my audio equipment and used a 20 amp Hubbell. The rest of the receptacles are standard 15 amp and only used for lamps. Using a Hubbell receptacle is an affordable option that should be considered when setting up your system. Just one person’s opinion.

@coralkong -

 'And here come the cable deniers, lol. Saving the world... '

 'So old. So obnoxious. '

        Candyman, Bloody Mary, Beetlejuice, and the local Cargo Cult... WELL: those last ones can't even wait for their names to be spoken three times any longer: CAN THEY(snicker)?

                                  Let 'em go build another runway!

                                              Happy listening!

A dealer friend on this forum is currently making custom power cables and sold one to me specifically for wall-to-conditioner which serves line preamp, DAC, streamer and subs. Current cable is 10 already AWG, but dealer says his will sound more open and give more convincing bass slam. Silver plated copper strands and rhodium connectors. Waiting for that to arrive today for trial. If it makes a noticeable difference, I will ask him to build another for wall-to-power amp.

I thought there was an easy answer to my question, silly me.

I figure the best way is to borrow some high end power cords and compare them with an ordinary power cord.

What sound characteristics/improvements are you looking for, and what sound characteristics are most important to you? You’ll get some good recommendations here if you share this critical info. Also, as I mentioned earlier, buying used can definitely be your best friend here, especially when it comes to cables.

@simna -

  "I figure the best way is to borrow some high end power cords and compare them with an ordinary power cord."

                                        Are you familiar with:

               https://www.thecableco.com/cable/index/borrowform

@simna-

                      What I would recommend, far as manufacturers:

https://www.thecableco.com/cables/power-cables.html?manufacturer=11

                                      and (sparse collection):

https://www.thecableco.com/cables/power-cables.html?manufacturer=71

OP… “I figure the best way is to borrow some high end power cords and compare them with an ordinary power cord.”.

Absolutely. There are few real shortcuts… other than pointing to a few that have proven really good on others folks systems.

jasonbourne71

334 posts

07-19-2023 at 04:42am 

Nothing else sounds as good as those Furutech wall outlets!
 

Agreed! +1 @jasonbourne71 

OP - the power cord to your power conditioner will make a difference. But the power cord for your amplifier will have a bigger impact especially if you’re still using stock cords.

@audphile1 

+1 … that is very likely.

Spend as much money as you possibly can on your power card.[

»Sell your mother but keep the money»--Groucho Marx 🤓

+1 on the Puritan products

I do not have the power conditioner but have recently upgraded to their Puritan Ultimate power cord on my PS Audio Power Plant with very favorable results

Here's the feedback that I sent the distributor after installing the Puritan Ultimate

Darin the XX cable is a beast and an engineering work of art

I asked a question which resulted in several new questions.

Is the sole purpose with high end cables to deliver the power as stable and clean as possible?
Is the sole purpose with a power conditioner to clean and deliver stable power?
If these two questions are anwerd with yes, then the first step has to be to buy a power conditioner.

But there are people that says that power conditioners drains the life out of the music. Why is that? What has gone wrong then?

Yes, I belive and I’ve heard a positive change in the sound when I have replaced the ordinary power cable that came with the device. But I have also heard bad change in the sound when I have replaced several ordinary power cables whith ”better cables”. Why is that?

How can the power cable from the wall outlet to a power conditioner have any importance?
The power has traveled through miles of ”ordinary cable” to my wall outlet, so how can this last bit to the power conditioner, that is supposed to clean the dirty power, have any impact on the sound?

I hope you understand what I’m trying to say and what I wonder. I know my English is not the best.

So then.....nothing anyone has written here really matters. WHY do cables matter is your real question.

Because they sound different, that’s why.

I would suggest you alter your "perceived understanding" on how electricity works.

Thank you for wasting all our time. Your English is fine. Your trolling is almost master-level. Have a nice day.

A simple experiment to understand why any external modification or perturbation or modification around an electrical field may matter and in some cases be audible as a kind of filters:

Put a 200 grams piece of quartz on your amplifier, then try with a piece of shungite of the same size... Go from one to the other and listen the difference ; it will be a slight degradation or an improvement , if it is neither of the two try and put them together,...

if your amplifier is on the warm side of thing , the quartz may help it..

If your amplifier is on the cold side the shungite may help it...

If your amp is more balanced the two together may also did something helpful...

In any case the goal is to hear a "change" for the worst or the better and then you will know how the world is not as described in your manuals ...

A varied mix of some minerals do marvel for my Sansui alpha who sound as a tube amplifier  to my ears : more fluid and no trace of dryness or shrill or anything making it a S.S. design ... the sound is meatier and i modify it at will... It is like using different cables to my ears...Usually i keep my recipe without changing it because there is more no need to balance it further ...

No sarcasms by empty head will be  needed when someone  dare to suggest a simple experiment a 4 years old can do... 😊

«How about a piece of quartz on my front head as a king ? » Groucho Marx 🤓

«Sound need a medium , the air, but sound is not the medium nor the mere waves in it; sound is a real event from the vibrating sound sources or near two sound sources with qualities, localization and duration; sounds are no more illusion than the rainbow, they reflect our own grasp of the sound source and the sound source effect on us» Anonymus philosopher

I start at the source and only use energy from very clean coal.  Diamonds are best but hard to source.  Then focus on cables from plant to substation. 

That provides an airy soundstage.