Psychicanimal, thanks for recommending the Absolute power cord, which for $50 I ordered on faith.
Of my half dozen moderately priced PCs, the BMI Eel has been best in my system; haven't heard the Whale. But over the weekend I bought a used Sony SCD-777ES player and my Eel, which I brought along, was to my ears bested on the seller's system only by his more expensive Electraglide Fatboy.
Any other experiences with these and other PCs?
While it's only been a few days, I'm completely happy with the 777's SACD playback. For CD playback, I'm using an outboard Monarchy DAC but the 777 alone is very close. The only negative thing so far isn't the 777's long loading time but a 12 db or so drop in output compared to my Theta/Monarchy combo.