[JerryLove]

Is any power cord advocate near me? I'd be happy to come over with a standard power cord, not tell you if I changed them out, and you can tell me if I did or not from the sound.

[Triode Pete]

With my short time auditioning Jason's Ncores, I wasn't able to test different power cords, but I was able to change between using the wall outlets and a Pure AV power conditioner.  While I notice a significant difference between the power sources on my ol' American iron AB amp, the Ncores were fairly insensitive to what they were hooked up to.  I had thought this to be somewhat universal in experience, that the Ncores don't really care what PC or conditioner you hook the up with, they pretty much plow though unfazed. 

I found that using a PI Audio Rev. B BUSS (a very good power conditioner) on Jason's NCore tour produced a blacker background (less noise) and a bit more gain & dynamics as compared to plugging directly into the wall.

I believe Danny Richie (GR Research) experienced the same thing with a PI Audio UberBUSS... here's part of his feedback while auditioning the Hypex NCore NC400... "I then plug the Triode Wire Labs power cables straight into the Uber Buss. This was a great combination. Now the bottom end came right back up and the clean tightness returned. The highs were still good too. It was a very pleasing combo. I then listened to them for several hours. The background returned to black as well. Clean spaces between the notes rather than a smudge from one note to the next.

Another thing that also keeps standing out in the back of my mind with these amps was that every time I swapped out cables on them I couldn't help but think how much performance was still being left on the table with these amps. On the back panel was one of the really cheap IEC connectors with the built in on off switches right on the connection. There was a cheap RCA to balanced adapter being used, and the binding posts looked really cheap. Just from my own experience I know there are a lot of gains to be had from the obvious upgrades. This makes me wonder also about the internals and if even more was being left on the table there too. These amps sounded really good, but they could be great.

Anyone looking at amps in this price range or above should give them a listen. I'd easily take them over any Krell, Classe, Mark Levinson or any other solid state amp that is considered a top level amp. Know though that you are not done with these by just buying the amps, or mounting the kit into a chassis. Good cabling and some power conditioning is a must."

I agree wholeheartedly with Danny...

My $0.02,
Pete

[cheap-Jack]

Hi
.

The hard part about doing a blind test when switching physical connections is involved, is keeping it blind.

In an audio show many years back, I was attracted to the nice musical sound coming out from a VTL tube amps demo room. VTL is famous for its tube amps, switchable tetrode - triode mode.

The demo was playing on a pair of VTL tube monoblocks on their normal tetrode mode. I know very well troides sound so much better than any pentode or tetrode. So I suggested to the VTL guys there to switch to triode mode. But the VTL manager there insisted there was no sound difference between tetrode vs triode.

So he put me into a totally "blinded' test in front of many other guests there by telling me to turn my back against the amps & loudspeakers (B&W). He switched back & forth the tetrode vs triode mode, & asked me which mode was playing - tetrode or triode.

Everytime I got it right - the amps sounded so much cleaner, detailed on triode mode compared to its tetrode mode.

A totally "blinded " test in a rather noisy environment of a audio show - yet I got it right no fail.

Yes, the vendors get their own "bias" indeed for the way they want to sell their products. Otherwise they are sorta too "deaf" to tell the sonic difference of their merchandises.

So with good ears, do we really NEED any ABX or blind tests to find out the sonic difference?

c-J

[Speedskater]

But "c-J" that doesn't meet the definition of a well run blind test.

[cheap-Jack]

Hi.

But "c-J" that doesn't meet the definition of a well run blind test.

So what definition is it? How effective it runs?

Any definition or protocol is man-made. As long as it works & shows result, we go for it.
What could be more effective than the totally "blinded" test per my above post?

The current deviced protocol of ABX shields numberless null results. It is good enough?

c-J

[JerryLove]

Likewise in ABX, when our brain perceives same piece of music repeatedly & monontously, it may lose its ability to differentiate distinctly the sonic difference between the components under test. Similar to the accupucture stimulation to our brain.

That's why so so many ABX tests end up with null result.

So why do so many ABX tests work just fine? How come H-K's ABX tests yield reliable results? How come, not only do people find a difference in sound, but to they almost uniformly prefer the same traits? See Sean Olive's work or Floyd Toole (such as "the Acoustics and PsychoAcoustics of Speakers in Rooms").

ABX works all the time on speakers. Why doesn't it work on cables?

Let's ask about the contrarily issue of fooling the human brain. When told a wine is more expensive, tasters rate it higher than when told it is less expensive. The exact same wine. How is it not possible that differences in cables are because you expect them (just like with the wine) and not because they are there.

Which is more plausable? That some mythic thing kicks in on ABX tests with cables that isn't there on ABX tests with speakers and for which, coincidentally, also completely fails to show up on instrumentation? Or that a well known and well documented psycho-somatic kicks in under pretty much identical conditions to where it's been shown in other fields and people hear a difference because they expect to hear a difference?

[OzarkTom]

Hi.
Do you believe in ABX? Sorry, I don't.

Paul McGowan of PS Audio and Bill Low of Audioquest made some very strong statements against ABX this week in Paul's newsletter.

 Go to:] www dot pstracks dot com/pauls-posts/emotions-high/

[Rclark]

Both manufacture cables.

[JerryLove]

It's lots of (bad) analogies an odd euphemisms with zero supporting data.

ABX disagrees with "I think it sounds better", and we know that the latter is true and the former is false because... well; that's where the argument falls apart, isn't it?

The massive *success* in ABX testing at clearly identifying differences and establishing preferences in all sorts of products, including speakers, lacks any objective test showing where it fundamentally fails... where other tests show better results and devalidate AB/ABX testing.

[OzarkTom]

Even the Linn founder, Ivor Tiefenbrun, was wrong 50% of the time when he was AB'ing digital to his famous LP12 analog playback system.

[jtwrace]

Even the Linn founder, Ivor Tiefenbrun, was wrong 50% of the time when he was AB'ing digital to his famous LP12 analog playback system.

That's pretty funny.  Is this printed anywhere?

[OzarkTom]

That's pretty funny.  Is this printed anywhere?

Yep! And this was in 1984.

http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/bas_speaker/abx_testing2.htm

[jtwrace]

Yep! And this was in 1984.

http://www.bostonaudiosociety.org/bas_speaker/abx_testing2.htm

[werd]

Lol

You guys that was done in 84. All that says is the gear down stream including the ABX box (lol) are strapping down the sound and noise to the point of indistinguishing the source components. That's all it is.

[werd]

Iow

That piece should be titled "Look how lousy the gear was back then. Not even the founder of Linn could tell his TT from a cd player "

It just shows how a bad  ABX testing  is perpetuated in the realm in scamming and deceitful arguments.

[Julf]

You guys that was done in 84. All that says is the gear down stream including the ABX box (lol) are strapping down the sound and noise to the point of indistinguishing the source components. That's all it is.

Did you actually read the article? One of the tests they did was specifically to see if he could hear the presence of the ABX box in the system...

[werd]

Did you actually read the article? One of the tests they did was specifically to see if he could hear the presence of the ABX box in the system...

Are you talking about how they scammed him into believing they were switching but really weren't. Goes to show what I am talking about. It's all parlor tricks.

[cheap-Jack]

Hi.

Are you talking about how they scammed him into believing they were switching but really weren't. Goes to show what I am talking about. It's all parlor tricks.

ABX is a major topic which should be moved to a new thread or even a new Circle.

FYI, Audio Asylum has established a dedicated forum for ABX discussion for many years due to lengthy on-going heated debates on it.
AA also banned ABX debates on any other forums in the Asylum.

c-J

[*Scotty*]

ABX and DBT are basically irrelevant to the majority of people pursuing this hobby and the irreconcilable differences of opinions and divisive nature of subject would strongly indicate that its discussion be limited or banned just to preserve some peace.
Scotty

[Speedskater]

Iow
That piece should be titled "Look how lousy the gear was back then. Not even the founder of Linn could tell his TT from a cd player "
It just shows how a bad  ABX testing  is perpetuated in the realm in scamming and deceitful arguments.

I think that many people would say that the high-end amps and pre-amps of that day are the equals of very modern gear.  Just look at the prices of the good old stuff on Ebay.  Also that test was done with a first generation CD player.

But now any skilled listener should be able to tell the difference between most commercial LP's and it's equal commercial CD.