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. 

Thank you @ghdprentice. This is the best explanation I’ve heard. I will certainly go to the Cardas site right now. This about transparency strikes me because I am planning on investing into a number of AMT-2560 (NEO-10) Planar Ribbon drivers, and so I want their transparency to come through. And I suppose that the same thing also applies to crossover networks - that they’ve also come a long ways since the 1960s when I last looked into them? So much has changed since then it is bewildering. What I got from the time I was a kid was to go with 10 gauge copper wire to avoid impedance, so I’ve just stuck with that ever since, but that was over 55 years ago.

@ricevs   Thank you for insulting me.  Of course I listen.

Listen, not imagine.

I wholeheartedly agree with audioman58, noodlyarm, bellemusique and quite a few others on these points: 1) while there are exceptions (and they are usually at the highest price points, because they have the profit-margin to do it), certainly for commercial speakers (and quite often audio equipment in general), the innards -- capacitors, resistors, wire, etc. -- is very often below par to achieve a cost/price point target. Major gains are possible by upgrading these. 2) cables -- power, speaker wire, interconnects do matter -- the degree can vary, and 3) you can indeed hear real differences. It is not expectation bias, at least in my experience. On average, I critically listen to music probably ~15-20 hrs/week on average, all genres (I do like to do other things, too), have done a lot of A/B testing (on a rare occasion or three even had friends make the changes while I left the room) and you can hear differences. My experience. If your mileage varies, so be it. Live and let live.

An always gratifying maintenance tweak for power cables - spray their blades once in awhile with Deoxit. On my Anticables all copper power cables this is mandatory for sound quality.