Doing the Power Cord Thing

Why on earth would I want to stop doing DIY? That IS my audio hobby.


Best,
E

Sorry Builder3 I may have misunderstood.


I'm going to leave everything in place for a while, for now I have other priorities and I'd like to spend less time on my hands and knees crawling around the stereo racks. :)


Best,

E

The thread where @builder3 reveals:

• He is afraid of having nice tools
• Has no fun

I am saving the factory coord for when I go back to Class D. 😀

If anyone wants to see or build the same power cord I made, please see here:

https://inatinear.blogspot.com/2019/04/mistress-lillys-new-shoes.html

@builder3

I have tried everything BUT that cord. :)  As I wrote, I tried something far worse, a PC, 16 gauge cord, thin as a pencil. Seemed OK. Hard to justify $100 I spent building mine on sonic merits.

It looks really nice though! :)


Best,
E

They enjoy the sweet hell of their creation and there’s no one gonna tell them any different.  Enjoy!

Well, it is true that the particular wire I am using is notoriously brittle. Doing your own reliability and quality engineering is part of DIY. Brother let me tell you about the steam powered rocket ship I'm trying to build ... :D


Truth is when it comes to IC's I gave up on them. I have a box full of WW Eclipse 6, and compared ot them, the pure silver, balanced and shielded is either good enough for me or I'm not bothering.  I have about 4 pairs of IC's I've built, and unfortunately all the other's are far longer, hence the switch.


When it comes to speaker cables, I realized after doing some single blind testing that the cables I liked were actually making things worse. I was trading a lot of mid-treble energy for imaging.


As for the power cable, I don't know if it sounds exactly like a commercial cable, because so far I really can't hear a significant difference from it to 16 gauge plain black. I'm not made of cash, so instead of others suggesting I buy off the shelf cables it would be nice if others built these cables instead. :)


Of course, it is about time for my hearing to deteriorate as well, so we can make that argument, in which case I think what's important is that I not buy stuff I can't hear a benefit from.

What I don't think @millercarbon will ever quite understand is that he will never have more fun spending money as I have building stuff.


This is after all a hobby, not a vocation. :D
Best,
E

No, what's convinced me about what expensive gear buyers can hear is from personal observations in the stores.

Kind of on a related note, I was trying to clean up my cabling, and I have several lengths and kinds of balanced IC’s, most of which I made from DH Labs pure silver wires.

I wanted to go from a 2m pair to 1m, of the same kind. When I did, the left side was just a little low. Probably less than 2 dB. I replaced them with a pair of WW Eclipse 7 Gold I wasn’t using which were the right length. I had gotten frustrated with the huge connector sizes in a previous cabinet, which led me to DIY a lot of my cables.

Anyway, the WW 7 fixed the problem, I clearly have a fault in the DIY cables.

My point is, honestly based on buyers I have seen at stores sellers convince to spend $2k on a power cord, 95% of them would never have noticed this.

In my experience, it's impossible to make categorical statements about whether a DIY build can compete with a manufacturer's finished cable.

I think making categorical claims is, in general, foolhardy. Especially based on small, or single samples. I'm only working through what I can, and having fun with tools while I go along.

Finished adding red TechFlex and black adhesive lined shrink wrap today. Also took apart the female section. The Connex connector is super nice, and the individual prongs come out super easy.


I was a little worried that during conductivity testing before I had loosened them up, so I took the opportunity to tighten them again. Made a little difference on insertion. That hard rhodium plating is super smooth though, so it always feels a little too easy, or maybe the spring force is reduced due to the hardness?


In any event, the cable is reassembled, re-routed and reinserted. This would have been much much easier if I had done this all before hand though.

So far, I've heard apologists and personal attacks.


Either I haven't built a cable using good enough parts, or I haven't gone through the appropriate rituals (stretching, cryogenic treatment, etc).


No one considers that maybe whatever these cables need to fix my environment doesn't need it fixed. :D

I've never heard a $2000 power cord that I know of. You brought it up. The most expensive one I've ever heard is the one I just bought that was about $500.

I did. What is your point? Here is one but not the only example:

https://www.thecableco.com/cardas_audio.html?cat=85

I understand putting your own stuff together solely for the experience.

I didn't say it was the only reason. I said it wasn't a cost saving one.

But it's more than a little disingenuous to then compare it to something that's 20 times the money, and imply that they're somehow the same.

That logic fails since there's absolutely no requirement for a product value to match it's asking price.


By the way, the point of this thread was really for me to talk about building my own cable and whether or not I can hear a meaningful difference given that this is a genuine audiophile build and the previous cable was probably from a PC.


If there are cables you feel are worth their price, feel free to share your experience. Just don't expect me to have the same.

I bought the 507 because I could hear the value.


I have yet to hear $2,000 worth of value in a power cord.


The con men and the conned.


Also, I never built the cable components purely because I wanted to save $16. I bought it for fun. :)

Just got a shipment from Parts Express to help me clean up my cable. Shrink wrap, Techflex and some tools.


It won't change the sound, but it will improve the color scheme and make me feel a little better about the look.

:)

when looking to buy a power cord for say a amp, how do you know which one to get ?  

 does a company make a power cord to sound a certain way ?

Buy nothing you can't hear value in yourself.


The claim is that power cords can make all sorts of audible effects come out, almost none of which I have experienced. My current thinking on power cables and conditioners is here:

https://inatinear.blogspot.com/2019/04/power-management-for-frugal-audiophiles.html

I think, if you can hear audio cables, their effect is best when power is worst, so my advice is in general to get a good conditioner, and modest power cables.

You can’t judge a book by looking at the cover. The secrets are hidden.

You can buy different materials to use, including silver content or even silver cables. Cold welding is actually just the industry standard for how you make cables in bulk.


Interestingly enough, all those you listed are as far as I know, nearly completely impossible to measure at this point in time:

1. cryogenic treatment
2. control of directionality
3. cold welded connectors
4. continuous cast copper and long grain copper
5. silver added to connectors
6. gold added to the silver
7. Highly polished conductors

So for the DIYer, unobtanium. An exclusive feature you cannot make yourself. Cool, does it do anything?


Maybe resistance would be an effect of the cold weld and cable content but we are in the range of milli and micro Ohms.

Of the types of things I would have listed as being measurable and having a possible impact are:

1. Cable geometry
2. Shielding
3. Ferrites or other filtering components used in the construction.

It is my theory, that the most effect people hear is when they are not using an adequate conditioner.

To clarify, I meant that there was savings in two ways:

1 - Not buying a ridiculously over priced power cable
2 - Building your own.

Could I replicate the unobtanium claimed by these exotic makers ? No. Do I need them? No.


Best,
E

Nope.

Plenty of $2,000 power cables out there.

Midareff1,


Were your tests straight to the wall, or after a conditioner?

Best,
E

There IS no ’saving money’ making them yourself. Just a different sound, maybe.

When you are not buying $2,000 power cables, but DIY'ing for $100, you are saving money. :)

But you are right in that it is difficult to take a DH Labs cable and make the exact same cable they do for less. However, buying Connex (Parts Connexion) connectors you can actually save a little, plus the ability to make custom lengths can be really convenient.

Hi Willie :

I have those Panamax units too. If you ever get a chance to, try the Furman units.

They actually filter noise down to 3 kHz and are some of the few that do. I've opened them up, they are built like a high current low pass filter.

This may have something to do with why I'm not hearing much of a benefit in my apartment. :)


Whole house surge protectors are nice to have. ;)

Well, no way to actually know without measuring. :) And AFAIK, you can be both.

I run a Furman Elite 15i, so there's a lot of cruft it should take out first for me.

Hi williewonka
Seems like your solution is high inductance and high capacitance.

Do you have a power conditioner? What kind? Do you notice the cable has more of a difference vs. the wall than the conditioner?


Best,

E

hey pcc67 - That is exactly what I used.

Best,

E

hi @ppc67 - My cable wasn't a good one? $100 DIY (on sale so original would be higher).


Here's the issue : Assuming power cables "work", they are going to be very noise and device dependent. It is possible that my amp's power supply is so good that I'll not hear a difference. How much money until I convince myself I can hear better?


If any power cables work, you'd think that going from a random personal computer cable to a shielded one from a decent brand would make a significant difference.


What if I spend $1,500 and can't hear a difference?? I don't think anyone's going to be happy.


I'm instead considering getting a PC scope so I can measure and talk about the noise coming out of the wall and the power conditioner, and amp.  I think this will be a better spend of my money and effort. :)


Best,

E

So, lets see, either I didn't follow the rituals needed to magically activate the cables, or I'm using parts and methods so far beneath good sounding power cables that I'll never get close to decent performance?


Are those really my only two choices?

Hey pcc67 -


I seriously wonder if sometimes these gadget cables aren’t made the entirely wrong way. I mean, to transmit MORE noise.


Ideally we want 60 Hz and nothing else. Copper does great. Using Litz or fancy conductors, etc is the opposite of what I want my power cables to do, and yet, a lot of what I read are like this. Building power cables like high bandwidth interconnects is the wrong approach, but that's what sells.


Maybe you got cables which helped transmit, or were more susceptible to EMI/RFI ?

Hi pcc67 - Unobtanium.

The claim of exclusivity in the copper, insulation, construction methods.

Interesting you heard a difference and didn't like them, what cables were they?

How about eliminating the plug, and just put in a junction box.

Apartment dweller here,and on top of that, I use a Furman between all  my devices and the wall. I'm on the fourth floor. There are so many power cables and junctions between my living room and the transformer it's not even funny.


I'm also not a believer in having a wide-band AC path to the transformer. I want a very narrow band transmission system. So, I will always use a conditioner like Furman which have incredibly low resistance at 60 Hz and very high resistance at 3 kHz. No use for Litz cables for me!

Be interesting to hear your thoughts after more break in and comparison to another PC.  BTW, what PCs were you using before?

@soix

The black ones. Except when I was using the white ones.
if you're not sensing much benefit with the DHL cables, why not just order some "better" cables and see if they're any better? 
Well, first, PC is having a sale, these are ridiculously cheap right now, about $50 / matched pair so I'd rather just make a new set, but then, honestly, I'm not an actual power cord believer so $100 into this experiment may be as far as I go.

My favorite part is the way it went from "not sure I hear anything" to "enhanced tube like liquidity and delicacy" in just one sentence. Addresses bias, humbly expresses self-doubt, and declares victory all at once. Sweet!

@millercarbon

I was auditioning for a future post at a gear rag, or maybe CNN analyst. :)

My point was kind of rolled into this. I can push myself to ascribing some sort of benefit even if none may actually exist. I had fun making this cable up. The part quality is really nice, and I got the high satisfaction of building it myself. Is it working? I don't know. Was it worth $100 plus tools to make this? I feel so, even if just for myself.

Best,

E

Happy to announce that the tools arrived on time today, and I was able to assemble the components. Installing a power cord is never just installing a power cord. You find all sorts of other things to fix up while you go along. In this case I re-routed the cable, making an optimal L shape between my Furman Elite conditioner and integrated. I found the USB cable which connects all of my music to the DAC was intertwined with power and network and signal cables, so this gave me the chance to clean that all up.


I'm not sure I hear anything, but if I do, I would say, enhanced tube like liquidity and delicacy for flutes and violins, darker deeper sound stage and faster energy when needed.


Am I making it up? Was the benefit actually from the power cord and not from re-routing the cables? I'm not sure I am glad I got to work on a project again though. :) For about $100 it's a pretty good deal.


I will say the cable construction is really nice. The outer jacket is super resilient and flexible. Clearly very protective and capable of taking a serious beating. The three main conductors are padded with what feels like cotton yarn. The male connector was tight, and the female slid in as if oiled. 

Hi @lak
I posted the parts I am using, including the cord, in my first post. It's DH Labs shielded, 14 gauge, and 6' (2 meters) worth of it.  Total parts cost is around $100. Pretty close to what DH labs sells off the shelf, finished cables of the same type.

All I can tell you about the current cord is that it is black.  :D


Best,
E

Hi @Jim204 !
Thanks. To be honest, I am not a big believer in the extremes people here will go to in order to get clean power, especially with power cords.


I know the cable will be pretty, but I have no expectation at all it will improve things.

On the other hand, I do have all sorts of video, network and USB cables in my entertainment center, so I can see the shielding reducing the EMI/RFI.

Hi @lak 
I had to go look, I never took it out of the box. It comes with a standard looking 14 gauge, 2 pin cable. That's a little interesting, meaning the unit is double insulated, and does not legally require a ground, and therefore, no ground loops!

I will be using a 3 pin to 3 pin set up. The Luxman won't connect the ground, but since this is a shielded cable that benefit will still apply.

So the Connex connectors weigh a combined total of a little over a pound!


Honestly, yes, you can brag about it, but is this really good design? It's significantly more stress on most outlets than they were designed for.


The DH Labs cable is very thick, but remarkably flexible. The printing is nothing to write home about, I've seen plenty of fake cables on Ebay with lettering as good.