@rareace,Why "unfortunate"? You made a decision - be happy and enjoy it. If you think your ears are not good enough to differentiate cables, that is fine. Life is not about what cables or components you purchase after reading reviews.
Just invest in more music and enjoy that.
As for which of the 2 Inakustik products made a bigger improvement - that is super difficult to answer because both upgrades made a significant improvement in my system. I started with the power conditioner and that raised the bar so high, it was like someone took a rug that was covering the speakers. With the cables the sound stage went from big to humongous, clarity improved even more and both ends of the sound spectrum opened up like never before. Hope this helps.
As for which of the 2 Inakustik products made a bigger improvement - that is super difficult to answer because both upgrades made a significant improvement in my system. I started with the power conditioner and that raised the bar so high, it was like someone took a rug that was covering the speakers. With the cables the sound stage went from big to humongous, clarity improved even more and both ends of the sound spectrum opened up like never before. Hope this helps.