Another unconventional power cord test?

"finding a pc to maximize the potential of the component and your speakers is rough. "

PCs/any general purpose home computer or laptop are good at storing and sending data, but are inherently noisy. Best to isolate them from gear that produces HiFi sound. USe ona separate circuit, physically isolated from hifi gear, and connect wirelessly using Wifi to a network player that IS designed to connect to a stereo and deliver high quality sound. This is the only safe bet! Mating computers and hifi gear is alsways risky business otherwise. You might get lucky, but why take the chance? Isolation from sources of noise is always a good thing with good hifi gear. No different here, just a lot of potential problems.

I know you're giving Robpriore good advice Mapman. I've also known I needed a dedicated line for digital for a long time. Just haven't made that move. I must get a separate circuit installed for my Macbook Pro and cdp's. But, I finally got a vintage turntable delivered today (Sansui SR-222). First turntable I've owned since 1979!

You're right John, this can be frustrating! What's even more puzzling is the fact that if I don't like the sound I'll reboot my computer and refresh the room correction software and the sound is better. So weird, and almost silly. I typically make that part of the experience: reboot and relaunch correction software each time I engage in a listening session. Better safe than sorry.

In terms of isolating the PC, plugging the power cord into a different circuit is totally necessary. Getting it to run on battery is even better, not very convenient though.

I don't typically buy in to very expensive cables but I did buy a Wireworld Ultraviolet for my usb to Dac connection. I am not spending $1000 for the Light Harmonic USB cable, even if it does make your morning coffee!

I've taken it a few steps further by incorporating a USB to SPDIF converter that supplies power to the converter with a battery. So i've completely isolated the sensitive clocks in the converter from computer noise.

Taken together it sounds great. Now, i mentioned room correction software - i'm using the ARC system 2 - and the difference is astounding. I can't listen anymore unless the software is engaged. Had I known this in the past I would have hung on to my old Adcom amps and most of my other components since the room correction makes the MOST difference I've ever heard in one component. I've verified all this with many test subjects. Nobody can hear a powercord difference, everyone can hear room correction difference. And ARC 2 is cheaper than a single high end powercord - at least it was!

I use Jriver 16 - too scared to update since everything works now, no point in ruining that! But I have the software load 10 seconds of data into RAM - prebuffer - to add stability to the data output. I have no idea what difference this makes to the big picture but prebuffering prevents any issues related to the computer itself taking resources away from streaming that data. Even though I'm using the preferred asynchronous USB protocol it makes sense to prebuffer.

I’ve had the problems in even believing in the theory that PCs do make a difference. Then I’ve tried to build one,and it sounded way better then 2$/piece power cords I’ve had until then.
Tried a better version, it was even better sounding. Built a few versions, improved the design, and got the idea of "what changes and improves the sound in a which way"...
Now I’m on the end of a journey, using only OCC copper and best quality connectors.
The change in my system is dramatic, also in my office system.

Filtering and blocking noise from one device to another is done by few power conditioners, most just hook the sockets in parallel, a design choice but IME not a good one. Audience adept Response have all filters in each socket just to avoid electrosmog pollution.

As for good sound from PC, there are tons of advice on CA. Free and certainly worth a look is the Fidelizer tool. IME, best bang for the buck is to have first a good USB bridge between PC and DAC, Supra (hand made) USB cables are great value/money, power supply of your DAC is crucial, there are plenty LPS around to feed the little monster. USB noise harvesters et al can help. The UpTone Regen is a must for mid-fi DAC and up.

Back to PC, best bang/buck is a dedicated line, then comes the AC wall sockets. Evaluating PC can be addictive and one has to be careful not to end up with more worth in cabling than gear so a regular sanity check helps. For my second system, I was not aware that I drifted up to nearly 60% for power conditioning and all cabling in terms of total value of the system until I did a tally and keep now everything in a spreadsheet per doctor's orders.