Outlet shoot out

Over the holiday I backtracked a bit in order to make a comparison. Without going all the way back to the stock outlet & 20A Hubbel, I did temporarily reinstall the Leviton 20A industrial outlet that I had been using previously to the Wattgate (also made by Leviton). After listening for awhile (I didn't previously recall there being such a huge difference between the two) the difference is even bigger than I had remembered.
Basically the Wattgate is just *so* much quieter: with better definition & separation between musical instruments & without the low level grunge & glare that almost sounded like enhanced HF detail (until I got used to not hearing that). However the most noticable & readily apparent difference is in bass authority: the Wattagate outlet really provides more slam, dynamics, even overall PRaT is much improved.
Yes $150 sounds like a lot for an outlet, but it's a cheap improvement sounding more on the level of a major component upgrade. Get a hold of one of these by all means - very highly recommended.

Now my next question regarding outlets.
What happens if I change the outlets in my Chang Lightspeed line conditioners?
Presently appears that they have Hubbel hospital outlets from the factory; after the Wattagate experience I'd be tempted to find out, but I'd need five @ $149; at list that's $750!

Maybe the Purist's etc would make more sense there, at least economically if not sonically?
Only one way to find out for sure - now where's my screwdriver?

It is such a pain in the ass to break in outlets I haven't repeated the tests I made fifteen years ago with everything available then. Back then the Eagle spec grade made for True Value hardware and now out of print was by far the best sounding out there followed by the Pass & Seymour 5242-I.....ACME brought out the silver plated 5242-I and that was a breath of fresh air as it brought the focus back like the old out of print Eagles after a very long and nasty break-in.......I do have a customer who went to the trouble of breaking in some std ACMEs, Cryoed ACMEs and the fancy Jena and liked all of them better than the old Eagles he had in the wall....He liked the Jena best followed by the Cryoed ACMEs....Have another customer who liked the Cryoed ACMEs better than the Jena so there is nothing really definitive in the way of information out there....Lots of folks don't like silver in the AC and I think they need to rethink this a bit as virtually all switches in the signal path of their preamps are silver plated brass....I go with what works here and like the ACMEs myself, but need to do some work on this one of these days.....The good part of this debate is that none of the fancier outlets are expensive so all you lose is some time during the month long break-in these all seem to need....

I have both ACMEs (4) and FIM 880s (4). I'm using the FIMs to run my two channel setup, and the ACMEs for my HT. The racks are co-located so it has been easy to compare the sound of the two outlets. The FIMs in my experience took nearly 5 weeks to run in, and from my point of view did not bloom harmonically and develop of good sense of PRaT until the ~4th week.

The differences between the two outlets is quite audible, although I can't adequately describe the differences for others to make a decision based on the usual disclaimers. I could live with either one. Having said that, I prefer the FIM over the ACME for the following reasons:

- More resolute and deeper bass
- Blacker, quieter background
- Details are more palpable
- Slightly larger soundstage
- Better sense of control
- Slightly richer, warmer, although every bit as extended as the ACME

One area where the ACME excels is midrange coherence. Bass and treble blend more seamlessly. The ACMEs are well run in, so perhaps the FIMs will get better in this respect over time.

Tom, your comments beg the question; if you are using these 2 outlets (Acme and FIM) in different rooms with different gear and different software, how are you able to assign the characteristics so specifically to the outlets?

i don't use either (i use Jena Labs) but was just curious.

Hey Tom, gots too much thump in the FIMs? That is the problem I hear with most all the outlets out there where the thump and the squawk don't match up.....Guess that is why I like the ACMEs as much as I do....Enjoy...