Power line conditioners..

[SimontY]

Oops, looks like somebody posted twice

power treatment, power cables, speaker cables and interconnects DO NOT and CANNOT change your system sound

Yeh, dam, I forgot that I guess the only rational explanation for my experiences is that I have either imagined a hard, cold, thin, glaring and harsh sound for nearly one year, or that I am now imagining a tonally accurate, low-glare, low-harshness, pleasant sound now... dream on cable ignoramuses!
(to be fair to these people, I don't hear much difference at all either, through lesser speakers, which can and do mask all subleties, *and* most potential harshness - perhaps that's the issue sometimes (not that I want to start another fruitless cable debate!!!))

[mrfeedback]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by SimontY
Yeh, dam, I forgot that I guess the only rational explanation for my experiences is that I have either imagined a hard, cold, thin, glaring and harsh sound for nearly one year, or that I am now imagining a tonally accurate, low-glare, low-harshness, pleasant sound now... dream on cable ignoramuses!
Nah, you've spent a year cooking your ears so by now all systems sound "low-glare, low-harshness and pleasant "

Eric.

PS - You are also imagining that I posted twice.

[Notorious]

Originally posted by mrfeedback
Haven't you read some of those other threads - power treatment, power cables, speaker cables and interconnects DO NOT and CANNOT change your system sound - these products are peddled by snake-oil salesmen to take money from the gullible. Eric. [/B]

Hehehehe.. That's exactly what they said to Noel Lee of Monster cables back in '79 and guy proved that it makes world of difference to what you use for interconects and speaker cables..
Of course it makes difference.. It's only that one cable "sounds" better than the other (Cable can't "sound" ) but it can make your preamp to amp and CD / Phono to preamp etc. dynamic range match closer. Some cables act in some combinations like filter adding resistance and capacitie and blocking / delaying frequencies where you wouldn't want them to..

I have MIT's Shotgun interconects and Transparent Ultra speaker
cables with their own filter network. For my SME turntable I use 5000si 99.9999% silver cable . And I tell you it took me long time to find right combination testing whole bunch of different manufacturers. You don't hear me saying that what I have is "the ultimum" but in my situation that combinations work great.

[mrfeedback]

Ooops, I forgot to add that cable direction CANNOT and WILL NOT make any difference.

Eric / - In nay-saying mode.

PS - I returned a recording studio monitor that I repaired to a friend today.
I hooked the speaker up and HELL, something's wrong, the two speakers sounded starkly different, and not proper center mono imaging.
I hooked the second speaker into output B, and switched A/B outputs and they still sounded different - damm, maybe the other speaker is faulty too ????.
I took both speakers down from their mounts and tried them alternately from the same speaker cable, and they sounded as similar (same) as can be expected - hmmm, whats going on here ???.
I took a closer look and guess what ? - the direction of one speaker cable was reversed WRT the other speaker cable.
I remounted the cabinets, corrected the cable direction issue and both speakers then sounded the same and produced good (correct) center mono imaging.
To confirm I reverted one cable and the problem came straight back - we both agreed on this.
I then reversed the other cable direction (both cables again in the same direction but reversed WRT previous) and my friend commented that this sound was different and that he preferred this direction.
This friend has no real technical knowlege, but he does know sounds - as a muso and composer he ought to.

[commstech]

Originally posted by SimontY



Another thing to try is to take a motor-run capacitor, or lighting capacitor (I have 10uf) and put it across live and neutral, and put some 'Y' class caps across live and earth, as well as neutral and earth. And put varistors across them all too. I made a filter like this, and it seems to add warmth and realism to the sound. But like before its so long since I plugged it in...

i have ASC 20uf oil caps rated 400vac. is there any safety implications by connecting such a high value cap across the live and neutral? will it trip my power supply?

[commstech]

can anyone advise?

[wuffwaff]

Hi,

why would you do this? If you want to make some sort of lowpass you will need a resistor in front of the cap (as in a loudspeaker filter). Other wise only the output impedance of the wall socket combined with the input impedance of the rest will form some sort of filter.

20uF will dissipate quite a lot of power when connected directly to the mains. I don´t think that it will trip your power supply but maybe it`ll go BANG

William

[SimontY]

Originally posted by commstech


i have ASC 20uf oil caps rated 400vac. is there any safety implications by connecting such a high value cap across the live and neutral? will it trip my power supply?

Sorry, but I'm no expert. If in doubt use something that is specifically designed to work on the mains, like a lighting capacitor or x1/x2/y class noise suppression cap (although these only come in small values).

I use a 10uF lighting cap, and it really does improve the sound. If in doubt seal it in a metal case (and ground the case), where it can't hurt anyone if it blows up.

And please remember to use a bleed resistor, because I think 20uF 240v AC could be pretty lethal if it stung your hand!