mains cables - i want to believe!

I'm surprised at the negative comments about power cables .....get the right on fitted to your cdp or amp.....can be a revalation.

of course there are one that won't suit you system ....maybe the people who are casting doubts just have not tried the right ones yet .

start with a diy recipe if you have any doubt ..that way the cost can be kept very low ...or try a number of dealers and get a selection to swap in and out over a weekend.
 
I've used RA yello and classic, Merlin black widow (I think) and Audusa cables and all made a difference to the sound.

Worthwhile addition to my system, without a doubt.
 
zanash said:
or try a number of dealers and get a selection to swap in and out over a weekend.
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..that would be my suggestion.

you don't want dealers 'toe tapping', auto suggestion, sales techniques and patter or unfamiliar kit.

try a good selection, and buy the one you like, or just use your standard stock cables if you don't feel an improvement is there which is comparable to the cost.

I'm all for home demo's.

Id ignore any positive, or negative comments on cables and make your own mind up.

Whether my own cables are made from some grass-stained 10 year old flex I got from my flymo, or whether I paid £300 each for the cables in my system is irrelevant to your trial..
 
Matt

I run a small audio cable business in Dublin and make power chords using 12awg Silver Plated Military Spec Wire hardwired to a Silver Fused MK Plug and finished off with a Wattgate 320IEC.

See Photo

Power%20Chord.JPG


I am happy for you to audition the cable for a couple of weeks to see if it works well in your system and worth the £50.00 cost price, which you don't pay upfront, only if you keep the cable.

Let me know if you are interested?

Regards.

Andy
 
mentalmax said:
Please post your experiences - my basic question i guess is - is it worth it?
matt
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MY opnion on this would be ,yes.

Not to contradict Tony but I beleive this IS buying music....in that you should be able to hear more resolution , instruments, dynamics etc....(thats my experience).

AS has already ben said the only person who can REALLY answer this si your self....tyr to get a cable to try......and settle the debate for yourself. ;)







David
 
my opinion is also no.

buy alcohol, and a mountain bike. and some music. guitars are fun too. chatting up ladies is also a worthwhile pursuit.
 
im not convinced

lets look at it a different way,
your supply comes from a sub station in "whatever" cable the electric company supplied "whenever".

it then runs through a fuse/meter/ pme etc.

then it runs around the house in 2.5mm mains copper solid core (as does everything else in the house).


then from the plug socket on the wall it runs through an expensive mains lead, into another fuse/ protection circuit, into a transformer with several turns of some more "whatever" wire, out of the transformer via a bit of crap milti strand copper wire and eventually into your equipment.

now, working on percentages alone i cant see the point even a little bit. more a case of the mind making the difference in quality to justify the cost of the insanity we all suffer from time to time.

just my opinion of course ;)
 
Some interesting views, mine are that despite having started with a Russ Andrews yello, then adding an RA Classik with a wattgate plug, then a KK Mercury, then a Zion from Shadow Audio (about £100?) i could not detect a difference, now, in the cables defence it may be that my mains are good enough to start with, and that no mains lead could improve on it, i dont know, but i could hear a difference when i used either a £300 Musicworks megablock, and a £40 Maplin Tacima. The Tacima is still in the system as it was not far short of the performance of the MWMB.
Now you may wonder why i didnt stop at the RA Yello if it made no difference, truth is i thought going up the price scale would make a difference...........
 
DavidF said:
MY opnion on this would be ,yes.

Not to contradict Tony but I beleive this IS buying music....in that you should be able to hear more resolution , instruments, dynamics etc....(thats my experience).
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Yup, I have to agree with that.

I currently favour Krystal Kables' now defunct Titan cords, with a Music Works mains block.

I have tried several others - KK Mercury (too bright), Siltech SPO-18M (dull, slow & boring), Russ Andrews Reference (?) (a bit slow and smoothed over), Synergistics Research (pretty good, but not as good as KK Titan), TCI Superconductor (pretty good, but sl. poor rez)

All a matter of taste of course, & ymmv, but to my ears they all sound different.
 
The only stuff I've heard that I genuinly believed made a significant difference was from Coherent systems. It ain't cheap, but does do the job very well.
 
As mentioned earlier I feel the whole mains issue is system dependent - some benefits are readily heard on one system would not be detectable on another. Coherent systems? - I've tried their loudspeaker cable and it is absolutely first class. Sadly I've not tried their mains products but I'd imagine similar care and research has gone into these and that the leads will do "exactly what it says on the tin".
 
mains cables can.. and DO make a difference.

you must remember that many are configured to act as a kind of passive filtration for RFI That already exists in the signal. RFI is often sent back to earth by the sheilding employed in many mains cables, plus good contacts seem to make a huge difference.

I recal an article from chord who said that over the entire chain of mains from power station to your kit, the point of greatest resistance, was the 3 pin mains plug that goes into a wall.. Therefore good silver plated plugs can help to lower this resistence and get a good supply of mains into your system. Certainly ive heard more improvements from changing to wattgate IEC 320's than i have from any cable used. I plan to change the basic plastic IEC's on my russ andrews yello's for some silver plated wattgates.

However, these differences are all subtle compared to what i experienced with mains filtration, I didnt beleive they could make a huge difference myself, and then i borrowed an isotek Orion. Having tried it in a few systems now, i can say that there wasnt one that wasnt positively improved by running from the orion.

The presence of a recording jumped up a notch, things became faster, cleaner, more musical and generally just more enjoyable. Take it out, and it was like the music has suddenly been slowed down, everything became dull and lac lustre.

I remember a similar demonstration at a recent bakeoff... a system comprising Cyrus dacXP and monoblocks into monitor audio studio 20SE's... all sounded just fine, nothing seemed tobe missing. Then it was plugged into an isotek Sigmas.... Once again, the performance improved in every single way imagineable. Bass was deeper and tighter, treble smoother cleaner and more open, midrange more projected and far better imaged. Everything about the sound was now better.

The mains cables used beyond the filter seem to make less difference, hence i just stick with the yello's. I am now a convert and no longer a naysayer on the whole mains debate

Get yourself a cheap filter and some basic cables, Throw a few wattgates on them from ebay (about £15 each) and you will be laughing.
 
I can concur - there is a variable effects I have tried a lot. The largest change was to a friends Audionote Meshu.We put a very thick £145 Hitachi mains lead in to replace a Russ Andrews reference, it changed a bloaty into a supermodel.

It was an astonishing thing to hear and was the difference you might expect from completely changing the type of valve circuit - My friend bought the cable on the spot.
 
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dreftar said:
My opinion is, if any real gains are made by mains cabling then the manufacturers would sell their equipment with them as standard and advertise the fact. If the differences are very apparent then equipment would sell better if equipped with quality mains cabling.
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Most manufacturers do not supply upgraded mains cables probably because as it add additional costs -and results are variable -These variables include A/ the quality of your own mains B/The susceptablity of your equipment C/ the suceptability of your ears. D/ the quality of your hifi setup

Some manufactures do sell upgrades along with products though -eg Russ Andrews. It fair to say he has a good reputation in many circles. I remember several Hifi shows where the later magazine reports mentioned that the sound in the Russ Andrews room was one of the best in the show.

Additionally mains accessories also win awards in magazines and many enthusiasts including many in this forum swear by specialist mains cable. Many a sceptic has been turned by having the differences demonstrated by a home trials I was.
 
shrink said:
mains cables can.. and DO make a difference.

you must remember that many are configured to act as a kind of passive filtration for RFI That already exists in the signal. RFI is often sent back to earth by the sheilding employed in many mains cables, plus good contacts seem to make a huge difference.

I recal an article from chord who said that over the entire chain of mains from power station to your kit, the point of greatest resistance, was the 3 pin mains plug that goes into a wall.. Therefore good silver plated plugs can help to lower this resistence and get a good supply of mains into your system. Certainly ive heard more improvements from changing to wattgate IEC 320's than i have from any cable used. I plan to change the basic plastic IEC's on my russ andrews yello's for some silver plated wattgates.

However, these differences are all subtle compared to what i experienced with mains filtration, I didnt beleive they could make a huge difference myself, and then i borrowed an isotek Orion. Having tried it in a few systems now, i can say that there wasnt one that wasnt positively improved by running from the orion.

Get yourself a cheap filter and some basic cables, Throw a few wattgates on them from ebay (about £15 each) and you will be laughing.
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I can't think of any that act as an RFI filter, no matter what the construction type is. I have never subscribed to airborne RFI entering a hi-fi system except via a sensitive phono stage or via dodgy interconnects.

The weakest link throughout the entire chain from power station to your hi-fi components is the fuses, followed by the metallurgy and/or gauge of wire, then by the integrity of the connections including the plugs and sockets. It's the total loop resistance of the chain right through the circuit that's important.

My experiences with mains conditioners including the Isoteks has been that they can indeed suppress background noise but as a penalty they compress the dynamics in the process, which isn't a worthwhile trade-off for me personally. The cheaper ones are worse still. As for buying a cheap filter, some basic cables and some Wattgates thrown onto them isn't a cause for laughing, it's a serious waste of money IMVHO
 
what I would like to clarify is how much of a difference they make when you have a isotek sigmas fitted. I know shrink feels they are not that effective if you have mains conditioning and wondered what others feel.
 

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