Audiophile Priorities and Recent Topics

@danager  

I've had mixed success with replacing stock AC cords.  It had zero impact on my old Pass XA30.8 (even using a Purist Audio) but had a very notable improvement on my Sugden A21SE (I'm using an Audio Envy - under $200).

Installing a dedicated AC line was definitely a cost effective improvement for me as well - for ~$250 it was great to get that line isolated for audio gear.

What has yours' and others' experiences been?

I was blown away. I have heard a difference form a stock cord to just one very high end power cord. On an highly optimized system and the difference was substantial.

In addition my power cord theory was at least supported by the same author

" From the perspective of your audio components, the AC cord isn’t the last few feet of a transmission system, but the first few feet. The AC cord is directly connected to the primary windings in the power transformer of your audio component"

That’s the only thing that could make sense to me is that the power cord is an extension of the component not simply an "extension cord".

Also mentioned in the chapter was replacing all the cords as every component adds its own interference and you might not get the affect with only changing one.

My experience with replacing cords was positive but I only have two components an integrated amp and a DAC. The other side of that is I I’m really cheap (I mean really cheap). I purchased two Chinese power cords that were cheaper than buying the plugs and building them myself. What was important to me was wire gauge. The cords are rated at 10AWG. If I’d seen the 8AWG cables prior to that I probably would paid more for the extra conductivity.

Again my thoughts on cables were supported by the author for better plugs and increased wire gauge.
" Good AC power-cord design minimizes the noise coupling between components described earlier, and ensures maximum instantaneous current delivery."

The cheapo 10AWG Amazon cables seem to make playback quieter and increased bass response. I’m not able to rewire my house but I’m currently using my sons power conditioner which may or may not have improved the sound but it gave me more plugs for all the other stuff and didn’t degrade the sound.

The cheapo that I am I trying to find a used medical grade power conditioner with enough amps to support my equipment. It’s out there in my price range hunting is the fun part.

I agree with your concept of sound per dollar. Is my system perfect? Nope never will be. For the money I have invested (not counting the myriad of amps, speakers and stuff to get here) is there another system that can touch it? I really don’t know don’t care. By doing a lot of research, listening to a lot of stuff doing a huge amount of comparison,  for the first time in the 40 odd years I’ve been working with stereo I’m happy with the sound. With that foundation I can now work on tweaks.

I apologize for the novel but hopefully ... what was your question again?

Thanks for sharing your experiences @danager... exactly the type of input I'm so curious about.  The roles and impacts of tweaks relative to entire system/room.  

With that foundation I can now work on tweaks.

I totally agree with this.  Get everything else optimized and then see what you can do to tweak out the remaining goodness - if available.

The last tweak that I made that really felt like it moved the needle was using isolation transformers ahead of my amps.  Really effectively lowered the noise floor and didn't sound like it was choking the dynamics like other conditioners. It worked better than AQ Niagara and PS Audio regenerators.  I'm using the Equi=Core combined with the Deep=Core.  Makes the biggest difference with my tube amps...yet still notable with SS.  On other components I can't really tell any incremental gains.  I would say my overall sound quality moved up by at least 5% with this tweak so it was worthwhile. 

I'd say for me that amp/speaker synergy is 65%+ of achieving the sound experience I'm looking for with at least 20% remaining in room acoustics/treatment/speaker positioning.  Any remaining ~15% is a combo of tube rolling/isolation & vibration control/cables/isolation transformers.  And yes, sound per dollar is exactly right.

Dana you should bring one of your cheapo PC over to compare with some of my old ones. Probably not that far apart on price but a lot better on performance I bet. If nothing else it will be useful to demonstrate the irrelevance of gauge. Amps has nothing to do with it. Both the ones you heard demo'd were the same gauge, the same amp rating, the same everything. Just not the same sound. Even the connectors cannot be judged that way. The ones you heard, the builder tried much more expensive connectors and didn't use them. They look real nice, they sure seem superior on paper. Only problem, they don't sound as good.  

This is the crux of the whole thing. More or less a total waste of time to talk about "tweaks" as the word can mean anything. Leads to colossally wrong conclusions.  

The biggest difference I can see so far is when people who know tweaks work, when they talk about tweaks they mean the ones that work. When someone wants to disparage tweaks or diminish their value they talk about obvious total garbage.    

Harley said "many" tweaks are garbage- and then gave as an example a few tweaks that are total garbage. There really is no argument or dispute here. The question is what about the ones that are not only not garbage, but that work and work well?   

A little apples to apples honesty will go a long ways here. 

@Miller

I'm an IT guy and couldn't for life of me figure out where I could plug my computer into your system???

Power Cable... I get it.

I could compare my cheapo cable to a stock one.  The better test would be for you and wife to come to coast and compare them here

You're invited.