How come a power cable changes the sound?

Apologies Waldhorner. I am getting really tired and testy of the "I cannot hear it, so you must be deluded" brigade, that demand scientific proof from a chat forum. We have had a barage of this negativism in recent weeks and I have stupidly (whoops, must apologise to myself now) entered the fray to try and beat it into retreat. It is a pox on this forum. If you don't hear it, then fine, say so and your opinion is recorded. Let others express theirs. If everyones' opinion here had to be accompanied by scientific proof we would get NOWHERE - like this post is going nowhere and the several others of its kind elsewhere in Audiogon. You have evry right to choose whose opinions to guide you - that is most of what I see such forums as this providing. You may claim that you are merely asking for an explanation, but the real message in the negativists' posts is that those that hear differences [that they do not hear] are deluded, and that without scientific proof, should be ignored. And by the way, if it affects my enjoyment of the music, then to all intents and purposes it is "there" - being existentialist about it is meaningless. Waldhorner, if someone manages to develop a convincing explanation as to how a power cable can change the sound, what will this do for you? Will you suddenly let yourself hear the difference? Or will your experience predominate? In which case, what good is the explanation? If the explanation has nothing to do with the differences in sound that I (and others) hear, what good is it? The existence of an explanation does not necessarily help.

Get real !! I built a number of Do it Yourself power cords, and other audio cables with Belden cable and Pass & Seymour, Hubble, etc combinations. And I must say, the results are not good. My motto is that I spent this much money (+40K) on my audio equipment, I am not taking any short cuts on do it yourself stuff. There is a reason why that Belden cable is $.50 a foot, because it's Crap. Let the pros build the cables and same as the other categories. We can also build $10K speakers and amplifiers for about $1000, but guess what it will not sound as good. You are kidding yourself if you think all power cords are created the same and sound the same. If that was the case why don't we build our house too ourselves, it may cost only $20K in material for a 200K retail. I am a realist and sick and tired of the so called Mythology. Go for it all you McGyver's wanna be !!

I agree with Timber, it is impossible to build decent power cords with Belden or any other cheap faximile. I've tried myself! I've spent more on special wire, (a whole roll of Nippon), trying to 'better' the professionals. Just so you know, Nippon 14 gauge costs around $5.50 per foot. Imagine 14 runs at 10 feet each for speaker cables. That's $770.00 per side BEFORE termination, shielding, and heat shrink! (And they sounded like hell) Not as bad as cheap Belden or cheap ass solid core, but it wasn't anywhere close to the 'better' manufactured cables. Sorry, don't hate me because I purchase REAL cables. I'm not about to lose the information lost without them. I have too much invested!

Redkiwi:Thank you. Perhaps we should both apologize. If there becomes convincing proof, I would want to, no, have to, find a tangible way for me to accept it. For if the change is in fact real, then it should also be apparent under controlled conditions. These ubiquitous discussions concerning subjective/objective views at times must be considered, for some, a matter of faith. Since faith is belief absent evidence. When I reference evidence in support of these positions, I cite experience which also involves the hearing process. By no means do all components sound the same (but under identical conditions, many will) and many heard subtleties are real.And certainly, no two disparate systems will sound the same. We're having difficulty in areas in which science and some experience conflicts with other experience sans hard evidence. Through the years there have been many controlled tests of questionable claims. Every one I'm aware of has failed to coroborate. If you know of one of record. Please tell me. Proving a null hypothesis can be difficult. So, if the positive cannot be proven, there is no need to prove the null. If you doubted a claim which I had made, I would hope to demonstrate its validity to you with evidence and would understand (truly) a reluctance to simply take my word. Unfortunately, we probably are not neighbors. So all we have is words.

Sorry, I have been in the islands again and the internet is not so good there. The philosophy I have developed (through trial and error) is probably still very flawed - but is I think different from yours Waldhorner. But as with any other philosophical differences it is futile to expect to win such an argument (which I am guilty of in this case). I think I understand where you are coming from Waldhorner, and I find it very interesting to understand how things work too (ie. how come different power cables sound different). In fact I spend a lot of time finding out how things (and people) work. But I believe that following that kind of path exclusively, and deducing knowledge from it is very limiting, and inducing knowledge from it is very dangerous, when persuing this audiphile quest we share. I bristle when I see/hear people say "I don't hear a difference so the rest of you are deluded", and I bristle when I see/hear "Science [as understood by me] does not support your opinion so your opinion is wrong", and I bristle when I see/hear people say "Until you provide irrefutable evidence to support your opinion then I dismiss your opinion". Why do I bristle so? Because I find it closes down possibilities, and that in this hobby at least, exploring possibilities has often rendered discoveries before people have proven their cause. I remember a debate I had with another Audiogon poster about a particular cable that I expressed a liking for (in this case Wireworld Gold Eclipse I think) - principally because of its neutrality. The other poster argued it could not be a good cable because all strands were coated with a lacquer and lacquer is a poor dialectric, and furthermore all strands were of the same diameter - and therefore Cardas Golden Cross had to be a better cable since the strands were of varying thicknesses and were not individually coated. Apologies to that other poster if my description of their point is unfair, but I use it to illustrate that even though knowing about dialectrics and resonances due to strand thickness is really interesting, one cannot induce knowledge from it in the way this other poster attempted to. And it seems so unnecessary too (unless you are a cable designer) since trying the two cables in one's system is not that difficult to achieve. I find the nay-saying about differences to be unhelpful. I find the free expression of one's experiences and opinions to be what is great about Audiogon. We are all free to judge the credibility of individual posters - but condemning them for lack of scientific proof will discourage a free and open discourse.