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Post by MikeMusic on Mar 30, 2015 12:44:51 GMT
After hearing Martin raving about his Coherent mains cables and being a cheapskate wherever possible I punted around for one cheap as I could.
Found a 4D on Wam for just under £300. List around £900 when bought he said. Worth a punt ? Yeh ok. You only live once. Fingers crossed.
Arrived and put to work against an Ultimate 2.6, stiffy. Pleasant surprise it out performed it so I was a happy bunny. Ultimate now feeds the Isis CD player and does a fine job.
Last week Tony and Martin were talking about demo cables Tony had. Martin suggested Tony contact me as I like good and great - at as low a price as possible please.
We spoke and Tony suggested I could try a 5D and a 6D. Both ex demo and therefore a lot less than list. Run in too !
Being quite close Tony kindly popped in to work to drop them off. Look much the same as each other and the 4D. Chunky but flexible.
Very busy at work (I am making time now that I don’t have) Quick try out on Friday night with favourite CD test track Mavis Staples - Eyes on the prize from We'll never turn back
4D in place and first try, Synergistic Research Red fuse in place Other half says that will be very difficult to beat. I agreed
“2nd” plugged in and music on Wow ! What is *that* ? Where is all that bass coming from ? – More detail too ?
“3rd” plugged in and music on Ah. Probably better than the 4D, but not as good as "2nd" I assume 2nd is the 6D and therefore 3rd is the 5D
6D in place until Sunday 6D and a previous test track favourite from a long time ago Ry Cooder's Soy Luz y Sombra from Chavez Ravine Wonderful track and on many previous upgrades we were amazed at the way the layers were peeled back to reveal more and more about the lead female vocalist and the backing vocals.
Minimal difference between the 3 cables. Er what ?! Am I imagining this ?
No it really was minimal........
Ok try Mavis again - Eyes on the prize on all three
4D - sounds good 5D - sounds better by a fair margin 6D - sounds better again by another margin
Next test was the SR Red in the 6D, unfortunately I lost a channel and spent too long before coming to the ultimate fix – turn it all off and on again – before we heard that.
Think it was better. Need more tests to find out if there are only a few tracks that work or the majority.
Prices from Tony. Look away now if you are scared
1.5m 5D. New £1650 Demo £800 2m 5D is £2200 the 6D in 2m is £3300. 1.6m demo for £1395
And they could be worth it
Some while ago I got hold of a Kimber Silver Reference for a nice low price. They retailed around £2500
These Coherent jobbies are in a different league
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Post by danielquinn on Mar 30, 2015 13:05:35 GMT
so to sum up .
you need more time to establish if a £3300 mains lead is better than a £300 . No need , that is good enough for any and all sane rational and level headed readers .
Thanks . Another product I can strike of my curiosity list .
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Post by pre65 on Mar 30, 2015 14:36:34 GMT
Must admit I'd need to think long and hard before even thinking of a mains cable costing £300.
Now I have no problems with
a) Those people who can afford to pay £300 - £3,000 for a mains lead.
b) Those people who have ears capable of hearing the differences.
I've always been of the opinion that good equipment should play different genres of music with equal capability. Those that say (as an example) my system is brilliant with jazz but not so on heavy classical would seem to have a "problem" somewhere.
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Post by Chris on Apr 2, 2015 17:50:09 GMT
Madness,utter madness. Your money your choice.
Just my opinion.
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Post by MartinT on Apr 2, 2015 18:52:51 GMT
The problem with threads like this, about power cables, is that they make such rich pickings for armchair critics. I've read all the various arguments and particularly love the old chestnut about the miles of transformer windings, pylons etc. between the power station and your house, how could a 1m cable possibly make any difference blah blah bloody blah!
Fill your boots. Only...
The difference can be very audible, reversible and repeatable. My introduction to a Coherent cable was in my own system. TonyC had brought one along. When we swapped my 2m main feed cable, an incredibly chunky Furukawa monster with 2.6mm cores, for a Coherent 6D (itself pretty thick but not nearly as stiff), we actually burst out laughing. It was our helpless reaction to hearing an outrageously obvious improvement. One I had not in the least been prepared for.
Now that I know power cables can make a difference, the issue becomes how to explain it, so I start down the various tracks of:
1. Power first. The signal that drives the speakers is modulated, rectified, smoothed, filtered mains. Power quality matters totally. 2. Mains-borne hash. It accounts for much performance degradation and could be the mechanism behind power cables sounding different. 3. LCR reactance mechanisms. 4. Contact quality issues.
In case I didn't already say it, the difference is audible so there is no need for me to further justify the purchase!
Some time ago I borrowed a Chord SPM-4000 power amplifier with a view to upgrading my SPM-1200E. The price difference was extremely substantial but the SQ difference was so tiny that I could hardly hear it (in hindsight, not surprising considering the already high level of performance the 1200E gives me). A 6D cable is one tenth the price and the SQ difference is notably and undeniably better. Which should I have chosen - the 'acceptable' amp upgrade that says money bought me something better, or the 'impossible' cable upgrade that gave me an improvement the next amp up the chain couldn't?
I have two runs of Coherent 6D, in the positions most in need: main feed to the regenerator and feed to the power amp. I have not regretted their cost one little bit.
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Post by Greg on Apr 2, 2015 19:35:58 GMT
Well, Martin, I have no challenge to your argument. If you can hear a difference/improvement and can personally justify the cost, so beit. For me and probably several others, the difficulty is the cost involved. I simply don't have the income to embrase such expensive products. Many years ago, having found a taste for high end sound, the only affordable way for me to do it was to go the DIY route, the beauty of which is that you can change the sound of your system to your preference by changing individual components within a system item to make sound progress.
In contrast to your approach, I spend little time considering the impact of mains cables. In terms of the market, I am a bit of a sceptic and happily use kettle leads for mains, having trialled some esoteric mains cables which made no difference to the sound of my system IMHO. Likewise I am a sceptic about interconnects and speaker cable. Certainly to point, a certain quality is required to obtain an optimum sound, and cheap give away cables are rubbish, but my best interconnects are home made at £12 per metre and my best speaker cables are made out of lowly CAT5 Ethernet cable. I have not found anything better.
My view remains that to keep it all affordable, basic cabling with reasonable quality cables (preferably home made) will always work well regardless of the kit they are connecting. To make the real difference and improvement to sound, you need to get inside the works of your source, amps and speakers etc. PSU's are very important and thereafter, general component choice of resistors and capacitors also has a massive influence. Of course, if you have built the amps or speakers from the outset, such a task is so much easier to apply.
If you are working with a limited budget, DIY negates the need to constantly box swap over the retailers counter which will always be a serious hit to the punters pocket.
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Post by pre65 on Apr 2, 2015 20:12:41 GMT
Well said Greg.
My thoughts exactly.
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Post by John on Apr 2, 2015 20:33:38 GMT
I think it is great that we have choices. For me cables make a difference but like Greg I had to go down a DIY route and been lucky to form some friendships with some great people (Vic and Steve) who have really helped me along my path
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Post by Sovereign on Apr 2, 2015 20:33:49 GMT
Well said Martin and Greg, I find I'm in all of the camps mentioned above. The only mains cables I have heard are a wide selection of Russ Andrews/Kimber and Mark Grant and all worked well. At the moment I am using home brew mains cables that are a result of me selling a lot of the kit I had at the time in order to justify the purchase of my power amp. When I stop building other stuff I plan to spend a bit of time building five high quality mains cables using a design that is not my own but given to me by a rather clever chap, watch this space.
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Post by MartinT on Apr 3, 2015 3:35:11 GMT
Even DIYers on a budget should try making up a power cable for experimentation, there are lots of options for cores, sleeving, braiding etc. out there. You may enjoy it and learn something, too.
The usual warning about working with mains applies, make sure you know what you're doing.
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Post by MikeMusic on Apr 3, 2015 11:20:58 GMT
Useful information for anyone who wants to extract more music from their system with the pocket
I tell it like I hear it.
Precis Big difference on one track Minimal difference on another, previously good for testing. Cost justification has to include this. Note I quoted both new and 2nd hand prices. £300 is 2nd hand. £3300 is new - not a figure I'm happy paying.
Forget what the item is Would you be happy paying £xx for a better sound ? If yes try it out if no don't bother
I have achieved a better sound from all upgrades in place If it comes from kit, accessories or other I'm happy. Either of the above that didn't make it went back.
More tests at the weekend
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Post by pre65 on Apr 3, 2015 11:33:01 GMT
When I stop building other stuff I plan to spend a bit of time building five high quality mains cables using a design that is not my own but given to me by a rather clever chap, watch this space. I'm watching. I would like to try a "better" mains (IEC) lead or two and see if I can tell the difference. Several of my motley collection of IEC leads are too long so custom built ones would be an asset.
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Post by MartinT on Apr 3, 2015 12:34:25 GMT
Go for it, Philip. You can buy silver cores, sleeved or unsleeved. Try a braid and use air spacers, teflon sleeves or heatshrink, whatever you think may work best. You can buy outer braiding if you want shielding and finish it any number of ways. Connectors can be costly, but there are inexpensive silver plated connectors available such as from The Missing Link. I wish a few members would try it and report back. If you only want to try one cable, make it the main system feed.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 3, 2015 12:39:38 GMT
I can see the point if the lead has some sort of filtering, but if it's just a bit of wire then I'm happy with a kettle lead. Wire is wire, and confirmation bias has to be the reason people can hear a difference IMO.
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Post by John on Apr 3, 2015 13:47:42 GMT
Bias is a good one Martin can confirm when I came around with a mains cable I knew was good but I did not play it up to Martin. As a result he changed his more expensive cables. Exaptation Bias would of suggested another result as the RA cables were a lot more expensive
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Post by MartinT on Apr 3, 2015 14:10:34 GMT
Indeed, John, expectation bias would have meant I'd still be on my ultra-expensive Russ Andrews/Kimber power cables. The cable you brought around was an unexpected revelation and started me on the path of searching for better cables, which ended up in my downgrading to better sounding and cheaper cables over a period of time.
I've been on the power cable path a long time now, since about 1994 when I bought my first 'special' cable.
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Post by MartinT on Apr 3, 2015 14:12:39 GMT
I can see the point if the lead has some sort of filtering To the best of my ability I believe this MUST be the primary reason for some cables sounding so good.
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Post by tony on Apr 3, 2015 15:44:16 GMT
Myself, Gary and Brian have tried quite a bit of experimentation with mains cables-cable/iec plugs/mains plugs/fuses. Without spending a fortune you can make very respectable cables.
Noticeable differences were heard with each iteration...as always synergy and sonic preference come into play.
Anything that flows current can make a difference sonically-not always an improvement though!!!
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Post by Greg on Apr 3, 2015 20:26:07 GMT
Go for it, Philip. You can buy silver cores, sleeved or unsleeved. Try a braid and use air spacers, teflon sleeves or heatshrink, whatever you think may work best. You can buy outer braiding if you want shielding and finish it any number of ways. Connectors can be costly, but there are inexpensive silver plated connectors available such as from The Missing Link. I wish a few members would try it and report back. If you only want to try one cable, make it the main system feed. Kind of been there and done it. Several years ago I bought specialist wires from www.vhaudio.com and used recipes from Chris VenHaus himself and used them to feed my CDP and Pre and power amps. Generally I could not tell any difference over standard leads. As I said before, my experience of bringing improvement to sound is much more effective if I concentrate on the circuit within units and the components used in that circuit. This brings the biggest difference, is relatively easy to swap in and out and if something doesn't sound right, it doesn't cost a fortune to change, unless of course you are considering vh audio Teflon caps! The thought of spending twenty years chasing cable options to me seems a bit of an obsessive nightmare. I have no time for it. Kettle leads are fine, albeit, the best option is not to have an IEC plug and socket and to have the mains lead hardwired into the component it is feeding. Interesting that those few manufacturers who are simply not driven by market forces and genuinely care about the sound of their products don't seem to embrase the need for esoteric mains leads. in terms of mains supply, I found updating the input fuse to a higher ampage made the biggest difference, but obviously only do this if you are sure it is safe having tested the reliability of the component in question accordingly.
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Post by pre65 on Apr 3, 2015 21:25:03 GMT
There is no doubt that IEC (kettle) leads are a convenience, but I would think that he who said "the best connector is no connector" is probably right.
So, in future, I may well wire a good quality mains lead straight into the PSU of all my new builds.
What is accepted as a "good quality" mains cable at reasonable cost ?
Belden 19364 seems about as cheap as you can get for "audiofool" quality. £6.95 meter from David at MCRU.
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