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The Truth About Power Cords and there "Real" Price to Performance

This is a journey through real life experiences from you to everyone that cares to educate themselves. I must admit that I was not a believer in power cords and how they affect sound in your system. I from the camp that believed that the speaker provided 75% of the sound signature then your source then components but never the power cord. Until that magic day I along with another highly acclaimed AudioGoner who I will keep anatomist ran through a few cables in quite a few different systems and was "WOWED" at what I heard. That being said cable I know that I am not the only believer and that is why there are so many power cord/cable companies out there that range from $50 to 20-30 thousand dollars and above. So I like most of you have to scratch my head and ask where do I begin what brand and product and what should i really pay for it?

The purpose of this discussion to get some honest feed back on Price to Performance from you the end user to us here in the community.

Please fire away!


 


128x128blumartini
audiozenology
362 posts
 
Can't say you want low loss high frequency dielectrics in one sentence and then low frequency wire in the next. One would almost think people are just guessing and speaking in conjecture.
audiozenology
362 posts
 
And if Romex is great, it is almost like OFC, single crystal, OCC, silver, etc. does not matter.
delkal
110 posts
 
One thing to remember about power cords is that they only have to transmit one frequency (60 Hz).  Everything else is noise.    Many manufacturers have descriptions of their power cords that sound like what you need with interconnects and speaker cables for audio.    That just makes me laugh.
audiozenology
362 posts
 
delkal,

That is not true. If all they did was transmit 60Hz, then linear power supplies would not work. There is considerably energy above 60Hz.

The limitation in frequency response will be the transformer primarily.
mitch2
3,734 posts
 
"it is almost like OFC, single crystal, OCC, silver, etc. does not matter"
Do those really matter....for a power cord?
The factors I listed were wire gauge, noise-cancelling geometry, shielding, and adequate plugs/iec. I would amend that and add a good wall outlet that tightly grips the plug.
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