I'm with cornfed; the whole wire and power cord thing is the most shameless ripoff in all of the High End. Yes, good wire makes an improvement, but not a huge one, and the cost structure is so obscene it makes me sick. If you knew the markup on most brands of cable and cords, you'd feel like punching the next guy that has the gall to try and sell you this stuff at near-retail. Yes, I used to own pricey wire and I have an expensive system that can reveal wire differences. It doesn't mean I have to buy into this swindle though. But ultimately it's your money and your value system, if expensive wire works for you psycho-acoustically or psycho-somatically, than go for it. Me, I'm back to nice but sanely-priced wire from now on. And no more "magic cords" filled with nonsense and galling hyperbole. Hey, who wants to buy a $2000 power cord--it'll make all the difference in your system, I promise!! Yikes......
Cable Costs Relative to System
Since making a spread sheet with my audio system prices, I have been thinking(shocked) about my total investment in cables. My total system retails at $67,000 (Digital and analog front ends included). I purchased all of it here on Audiogon so my investment is about 50%. Of that I have about 10% invested in interconnects and cables and another 10% in Power Cables (Shunyata Hydra included). That's $13,000 worth of wire. I'm starting to question whether it might be more effective to put some of this budget into acitve components. It would take forever to listen to all possible combinations, but would like to hear others experiences with relatively high end systems and cable selection. It would seem to me that the point of diminishing returns would be reached sooner with cables than with speakers and amps. Do most of you follow the 10% "rule" for cabling? How do PCs fit into this rule? Are there any super bargain cables capable of keeping up with highly resolving electronics?