Effects Of Power Cords On Electrostatic Speakers

@hsbrock 

There are dozens of variables involved in audiophile cable construction. Companies like Cardas, Transparent, Nordost, etc. have decades of research and development into making the very best. 
 

Because there are so many variables, almost anything you can think of has been tried. Copper: solid, highly pure, single crystal, many small conductors, different sized, single solid wire, square, spiral wound, parallel. Then dielectric types and geometries, ribbons… then there are silver coated copper… and all silver with all the differences I mentioned. There are hundreds of dielectrics available and used. So, major companies put methodical evaluation of design,  materials and construction.

But systems are all different. I bought really high quality wires on my early systems and they sounded terrible because they were so good at transmitting the signal… and the signal from my components was really bright… copper cables that attenuated the signal sounded better. So, this leaves lots of room for folks introducing cables that don’t sound fantastic except under certain circumstances. The confusion allows lots of opportunities since anyone can make cables cheaply.

Look at the Cardas site. It is a reputable company that bases its products on high quality copper and geometery. Their low end products are tuned to typical low end component problems (harsh sound)… and they become “clearer” and more transparent as they go up in range. Their color glossies do a great job of showing the kind of thought that goes into their cables. I have a very good system, I use Transparent, and an AudioQuest power cord for my amp. Lots of auditioning got me here. 

@hsbrock

Glad I could say something helpful.

Let me add some detail. The time I had to go out and find warmer cable was when I had AMT and ribbon speakers. They were too, well let’s say, too good, in the upper frequencies. They reproduced the deficiencies in high frequencies of my components really well, producing a very fatiguing and unpleasant experience. I would not worry about loosing that “transparency”. This is why cables and interconnects need to be chosen last. You need your final system…. With all your components that sound absolutely spectacular. Then, you start looking for wire.

I spent well over thirty years with planar speakers (electrostatic, AMT, and ribbon). The magic comes from great midrange and really great high frequency response… the same thing that super tweeters do. It is the harmonics above what you can hear that affects what you can hear. This can be magical, if not quite real. I gave up on them and went to traditional dynamic speakers. I am not suggesting you do this. But, don’t worry about losing the transparency. Get your components perfect… then go looking for wire.

@hsbrock

Yes you want to listen to the speaker before buying, even if it means getting on a plane. If you love the sound, take careful not of what is feeding them.

Different speaker designs… particularly categories have strengths and weaknesses. We as enthusiasts have values and a history of listening to music and systems.

When you get in to the high end there are certain things that attract you. Typically details and slam… then you learn about sound stage and transparency, then imaging and microdetails and finally rhythm and pace. It is really easy to go around chasing the next thing you have learned about and loose site of the music.

It becomes an analitical activity to get a little better detail, or imaging… etc. planar do some amazing stuff. But they are a huge amount of work getting around their shortcomings and requirements. For instance most planar need optimization to tolerances of 1/8 “ in all three dimensions. But there is no formula… this can take months or even longer of moving them around. The support electronics must exactly be optimized for the job. Very high quality because planar are revealing, massive power, very nature The source must be really natural sounding. Room require to can be very critical.

For me, after decades of upgrades with planar. I got season tickets to the symphony. Which I have had now for ten years. I quickly realized that my fantastic system did an outstanding job of reproducing the venue and mastering qualities. But after 45 minutes of listening to my system i got bored. I was fascinated by its technical prownes and not by being pulled into the music. This is when I turned away and started to look for a really musical system.

I upgraded virtually everything. Moved to dynamic speakers (there is more than one reason most all speaks are dynamic, one is, in general they can be made to get more of the total picture correct). Changed all of my electronics… I no longer put lots of money into massive power but to highly musical. My system now sounds like my trips to the symphony. I listen three hours a day and have to drag myself away from it. Long journey. Happy to talk more about it.

@terry9 

thank you for your kind words

I think this is why auditioning is really important.
 

There are many spectacular sounding planar systems out there.

I remember listening to a set of ESS AMT 1D’s and having tears come to my eyes. But in my current system, they would be intolerable. Their lack of coherence across the audio spectrum was far too great, as well as many other shortcomings. So a lot of the stuff has to do with where are in your journey. Auditioning is really important.

Different audiophiles have different end points.

@hsbrock

Yes, seamless integration across the audio spectrum. The character of the ribbons or ATM is completely different from a dynamic woofer. One of the reasons big Maggie’s are attractive (with massive power amps). You get the same character of sound across the audio spectrum. I never could hear the difference in character of the drivers on my ESS AMT 1D’s, until I could. Then I happily moved on.. and up… typically most of us increase our investment over time… and each level up has less overall weaknesses and more strengths (provided you choose wisely).

So many aspects of audio are unimportant until you hear them… then you just cannot un-hear them.