How Big of a Difference?

If the power cord is doing some other stuff like filtering noise, then I could understand that as a goal.

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Now you understand why different construction techniques are really important.

From the receptacle back is one issue. From the plug on is another. I use conditioners/regulators/maintainers. Nothing fancy BUT, the reaction time to spikes and low voltage is VERY quick. That is what I use it for.

PC Power Cables (not CORDS) are the first AC cabling you have a say so over. Before that you have to meet code.

IF a 1000 dollar component needed a 3000.00 PC to sound good it's not because of the cable, it's because of a crap power supply design. It's just that simple.

OCC is a process. I'm sure there are degrees of the OCC process that change the outcome of the product. It has nothing to do with the coppers signature as much as what is or is NOT around the conductor. LIKE other conductors and the effect of or lack of effect from the dielectric, and protective armor.

In my setup, cabling can account for a 2% change in the signature. It's so slight now, I have to really pay attention. 

Heavy copper and bass go together. It needs to be good heavy copper with excellent armor.

Direct coupled. OFC, or OCC or super duper OCC, or whatever you dig up, I can't hear the difference to save my life. You know why? Because BASS likes BIG, FAT copper cabling. Period. Put all the lipstick you want on that pig it's still just a pig.

BTW the ears are holding up just fine, too. I still check against my little reference system. MX110z, and MC225. What kind of cabling do you think it uses, and have for 20+ years? Solid core # 14 romex copper (stripped the outer armor) a black and a red wire twisted and put in 1/2" silicone tube. 5.00 dollars US total.. LOL 

You can put any cable you want there it will not sound better than that. It may sound different but not better. I have some 75 year old multistrand pure silver PTFE US army/air corp surplus cabling, it took 10 year to break that in, I thought it was junk then I noticed something. 1000 hours.. I gave up on that cabling 10 time at least..

Shielding, is a cable SQ killer. I use as little as possible. I'm a pretty analog guy whenever possible.. :-)

I like weaves, ribbons, and the helix designs as well. I've yet to hear better, I'm at a whoppin' 50-150.00 per cable pair 3 meters or under. Cotton and silk air tubes are nice too.. I don't solder stuff if I can help. Cold weld, copper or clad screws.. no solder. Maybe a very light tinning, maybe! Its lead, and tin and 4% silver, it's crap.
Mechanically join and secure wire and bind it with a solder lock.

I went from a 200.00 usd Cat 5 cable to 22.00 Cat 8 and was blown away.. :-)

Time to feed the chickens..

@holmz let’s start with

About 11-12% of the time the mains voltage is too low to pulse any current into the power supply (Assuming that the rail is at ~28V).

The only point in time where electrical energy does NOT flow is at that point in time when the voltage passes from the +ve cycle to the -ve cycle - the rest of the time there is energy transfer

If it all happened in the blink of an eye, then how is it the tube monoblocks ran for many seconds (!10 Seconds) when the power switch was shut off?

My guess would be that tube monoblocks "store" a LOT of energy in the form of

• electrical energy in the large transformers and capacitors used in tube designs
• residual heat energy in the heaters of the tubes allowing sound to be heard even after the power was turned off

The resistance of copper and silver is pretty close to zero, and the speed of the electric field is pretty fast.

It’s not about resistance - it’s all about Valence electrons and the speed at which the valence electrons in a metal react in order to transfer electrical energy

Valence electrons in Silver move much more freely than they do in copper - this is conductivity

It take far less energy to make the valence electrons move between atoms and therefore the dynamic performance of silver wire is faster than copper.

then how does 3 feet of silver result in anything more dynamic happening?

As I said in a previous post - at each "connection point" (i.e. a plug) the only electrical attribute present is Voltage.so the energy that "flows" through an attached cable is dependent on the properties of the cable that the energy is about to flow through

• conductivity of the metal (e,g, silver) used in the conductors allows the valence electrons to react more quickly resulting in a cable that is able to provide better dynamic perofrmance.

If the power cord is doing some other stuff like filtering noise, then I could understand that as a goal.

A good power cable

• does NOT interfere with (or filter) the transfer of the electrical energy,
• it also does not introduce noise into that cables by using
  • a geometry that mitigates the creation of induced noise between conductors
  • an insulation that that has a low dielectric constant
    • which reduces the amount of noise created in the cables due to the charging and recharging of the insulation surrounding each condcutor.

Here are three sites that may explain things better.

https://www.psaudio.com/article/cables-time-is-of-the-essence-part-1/
https://www.psaudio.com/article/cables-time-is-of-the-essence-part-2/
https://www.psaudio.com/article/cables-time-is-of-the-essence-part-3/

Hope that helps - Steve

All I know for sure is that the specs which are rated in terms of “per foot” or “per meter”, seem to favour using monoblocks close to the speaker. So close that the speaker cables never get to the floor, always seems to work for me.

The only point in time where electrical energy does NOT flow is at that point in time when the voltage passes from the +ve cycle to the -ve cycle - the rest of the time there is energy transfer

I think that the input voltage needs to higher than the rail voltage (and maybe a diode drop of two extra… 

So it is like 10 degrees either side of the zero crossing where that voltage is not enough to flow into the power supply.

@holmz re:

All I know for sure is that the specs which are rated in terms of “per foot” or “per meter”, seem to favour using monoblocks close to the speaker.

That is certainly correct for cables that use more commonly adopted cable geometries and insulations

• because the amount of noise created within the cable itself is lowest when the speaker cables are short

However - with speaker cables that use cable geometries and insulations that mitigate noise - e.g.In-Akustik

• the length of a speaker cables becomes much less of an issue

Regards - Steve

Someone mentioned above, Canare 411S star quad wire. I have found that this is the best low price cable for the money! Buy the cable in bulk and buy good quality spades if they fit your system, or buy banana if you need too.

The best  high end speaker cable/interconnects for money is Analysis Plus.

I have been doing this for a long time and have a very good resolving system.