Blind Power Cord Test & results

...not even taking into effect what powering off does to solid state and tube gear for the first few minutes...

That *could* be a major compromise in a cord testing situation... unless one listened for a while to each sample under test.

Jayarr said:

the way to test A vs. B is to try to detect differences

I agree insofar as this would be a FIRST objective. Ultimately, a testing would (should) lead to choice since, at the end of the day, a) it's a market & b) we invest in (meaningful?) "improvements" -- or not at all!
HOWEVER, cords seem extremely difficult to test with the "quick succession testing method". You have to power down, change (some PS's will lose juice in the process), power back up and listen immediately -- in order to power down again, etc, etc. I'm not sure there is time enough for the "repowered up" system to reach sufficient operating/ resolution status to easily gauge differences -- or none...

Having said that, I had ONE such successful experience. I use TWO amps and happened to change cord on ONE of the two. On power up, the amp played lower (amplitude) than before. Did it again, same thing. Kept the amp powered up for ~15mins with the cord under test -- no cigar.

In a very interesting post above, Donbellphd notes:

Is this thread about auditory perception or religion? I get the impression it's about religion... (...)

Somewhere in-between, I'd say, and closer to religion: music is an emotional experience and the equip attached to its reproduction seems to borrow from that emotionality... hence a partial (at least) explanation of

...the inability to follow a logical line of reasoning

. As such it could be termed

an anomaly (REPRESENTATIVE) of our population

. There must be similar anomalies representative of other populations -- music maybe (as in, which is the best performance of Mahler2 and why).
Other than that, I also agree that some of the things tossed around make little sense including, sometimes, blurb tossed around by manufacturers of reproduction equip.
At the end of the day, most of us don't know much about circuit design and loudspeaker modelling -- nor should we. Add to that the bickering between engineers who DO know about these subjects which seems to add to the population's confusion...
Cheers