The Great Cryo'd Outlet Test

Zaikesman, So if anyone hears an improvement from a cryo treated out let in your opinion they are deluded and foolish? But if a guy tube rolls for weeks that's science. Oh brother! Wow. I bet it would take several years of A/B comparisons to determine which of two pairs of IC cables "sounds better". I'm just glad you seem to enjoy your system. It shocks me that you own a tube amp at all. Are you sure that it sounds better than your old amp? It could all be in your head? But of course you did an A/B.

Four days of burn in on a fridge is probably the problem. I have installed cryo treated Hubbell 8300's from Alan Kafton(which are plated) that were burned in on a Audio Dahrma in the systems of two freinds. There is no tizzyness, the space opens up,the bass goes deeper, the highs are more extended, and the dynamics improve.All this happens right away and just gets better over the next day or two. This again, is repalcing contractor grade outlets that cost 68 cents. (I know "it's not scientific")

Burn in of a cryod outlet takes time. As I mentioned before the top half of my Porter Port wasn't used for an extended period of time(the jumpers are not broken and my front end has been run off the bottom half for at least a year and a half with both the CD player and the pre left on). Mine was "cooked" on an Audio Dharma which I think is the way to go. I plugged the front end into the top half and it sounded very bright(tizzy?) and the bass was a bit wooly. This is what these things sound like when they need more burn in. If these outlets have sat around for an extended period of time they need a real burn in again to be "scientific". You do believe in burn in Zaike? You can't A/B that though. Have fun tube rolling. Science......Maxgain walks away shaking his head.

Well, at least everyone has been honest!

As Zaikesman has pointed out, there are lots of variables here and both "tests" (as well as everything I have done) may not be particularly scientific.

So do the results so far invalidate my (or other peoples' positive) experiences? Not in my opinion, I'm quite comfortable with what I have found and what I hear (whether it be psychological or not!).

But this excercise clearly does show (at least in my opinion) something that I wrote here a few years ago in my review of the World Power receptacle. And that is that if you are using multiple receptacles within a system, while a sonic change may be detected, it is difficult to really ascertain the true character of any receptacle. Also, any of the experimentation I have done involved living with the same receptacle throughout the system (wall and line conditioner-so at that time it was 3 receptacles, all identical) for a few months and then inserting new receptacles. For me, it was much easier to hear differences with my system in this situation as you listened to the same system (and music) for a long period of time before making a change. In my experience, under these circumstances, changes for good or bad are pretty clearly audible. Just a couple of thoughts, whether they be scientific or not. As I've said to Zaikesman before, even if he does replace his receptacle at the wall he is only part of the way there, as he isn't going to really be able to make a judgement until he replaces the recepacles in his line conditioner as well. And that is more work than most people want to do.

Hdm,
So true...at least a few of us are happy with cryo'd outlets :-))!
Best regards...

Hey Hdm, my experience was positive too! Just ask me. :)

Several things that cross my mind regarding the test:

1. Although highly, highly unlikely, as I recall, Hdm stated earlier that he was quite certain which outlet he marked, but still not 100% certain that he marked the right one. I'm sure he did, but there's still the remote 0.1 percent chance he did not.

2. I did not give the second outlet more than about 14 hours of burn-in. I suppose it's remotely possible that something could have changed had I left the second outlet burning in for another day or so. I could still try this, but if I were to and then did hear a difference, nobody would believe me anyway, so I probably will not do so.

3. Perhaps in my case or in any case, it just might have been a better or perhaps easier test had the outlets been the non-nickel plated versions.

4. About a month ago, (one week after upgrading to my cryo'ed IEC connector) I received my newer versions of Foundation Research LC-1 and LC-2 in-line passive power conditioners. The older versions were rated by Marty DeWulf in Bound for Sound last August as the best he's heard and he purchased the review samples for his big rig. These latest versions are multiples of 2 or even perhaps 3 times the sonic benefits of the previous version DeWulf reviewed. I mention this only because somebody above just posted something about some line conditioners possibly having an affect on the outlets.

As the reader can see I'm really reaching here to save face.

Nevertheless, I recently ordered some additional cryo-treated IECs, plugs, and outlets (all the non-plated type) because of the sonic benefits I received from the one IEC connector (when I was not anticipating any benefits). And those should arrive in a week or so.

Interesting and yet humbling test.

-IMO

Stehno: Glad you had fun. I originally wrote my review here of the World Power in July/02. Prior to that I experimented with different receptacles for about 12 months. In a "mix and match" (different receptacles running at the same time in the same system) situation, I actually made what I now consider to be erroneous conclusions. There was a time (in the mix and match phase) where I considered the Arrow Hart to be a better receptacle than the Hubbell 8200/8300 series (I didn't have any experience at that time with the Hubbell 5262/5362). Only when I ran the same receptacle everywhere did I realize that the Hubbell was better. The interactions will blur your results and have you scratching your head. It's easy to make mistakes or come to the wrong conclusion without consistency throughout the system.

Keep us posted on your new acquisitions. I have a new Furetech iec inlet arriving shortly and am going to have it cryoed before I pop it into my line conditioner. I'm confident it will do good things, as I've had very good luck with cryo (all of my cabling and CD's have been done), but the Furetech on its own should be a pretty major sonic improvement over the nickel plated standard fare that's in the conditioner now.