Parasound HCA-3500, Am I Crazy?

The difference between the Ayre and Pass on vinyl might simply be a matter of the loading that is being presented to the cartridge via the phono stage. Unless you have identical settings on both preamps for the phono loading, one will sound "different" than the other. Even with identical settings, they can sound different due to parts tolerances and the variances in circuit design.

As to the power cords making such a noticeable difference, there's a lot to be said there. The purer that the power is being fed into the system, the less of an effect the power cords will have. If one is running some type of power line filter / conditioner and power cords are still highly influential in what one hears, that PLC or filter simply isn't doing much of a job.

On top of that, the better the filtration of the power supply within the component, the less of an effect the power cords will have. That's because the component itself is filtering out the hash and trash prior to applying any type of manipulation to the audio signal itself. While hi-fi components are quite costly, the power supply is quite often the first part of the component that is built to a price point. As such, this is why external changes to the AC supply side of each component can make such a drastic change in the audio side of what we hear.

Rather than spending hundreds and potentially thousands of dollars chasing various component / power cord combo's, why not take steps towards cleaning up the AC for all of the components simultaneously, and do so in a manner that is both measurable and highly effective? This is not that hard to achieve and the benefits will remain with your system regardless of the components used.

Once one does this in an appropriate manner, the use of inexpensive but well designed power cords will almost always deliver as good of results as far more costly cords that rely on marketing and snake oil to sound as good as they do. After all, their is nothing "magic" about 60 Hz power delivery, especially when one considers the design confines within a typical power cord / component configuration.

Spending hundreds / thousands of dollars on over-built & under-designed cabling and componentry that doesn't measure up, either audibly or electrically, is one of the greatest banes of audiophilia. All this on top of being a point of great frustration for the end user. Sean
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"Sean" is correct, address your power line issues with a quality conditioner then use an ordinary power cable of sufficient size. And, a preamp doesn't burn much current. Don't waste money on some long-green high zoot cable because it will never provide the benefits of a good power conditioner such as the MGE Topaz 100.

http://www.mgeups.com/products/pdt120/powerc/tpz100/t100.htm

By the way, Pass is top notch. Their new amps included.

Neal,
Is the MGE Topaz 100 a noisy unit - does it whirr or hum or make noise and does it restrict dynamics?
Is this the cheap effective alternative to a power regenerator or expensive audiophile product?
Thanks,
Bill

Mr. bill, no the Topaz 100 does not hum or buzz. It is not a true ferroresonant transformer like that employed in the Topaz model 800. So it's efficiency remains high and noise virtually non-existant. It will not degrade dynamics on a power amplifier assuming it is sized properly.

Although the model 800 may exhibit a small bit of hum, make no mistake it's conditioniong performance is second only to a true power converter/inverter and, only if the inverter is of the higher caliber type with a low THD sine wave output. Even then, the inverter is unlikely to ever equal the ferro system performance as far as the available current rating (short circuit impedance). Therefore the inverter solution stands to restrict harmonics much more than the ferro system.

The model 100 is plenty adequate for virtually all home systems and will beat the socks off any high zoot power cords and, probably most any competing power conditioner.

Nealhood: I agree with your comments although i would add that power cords should still be designed to resist RFI and pass plenty of current in an unrestricted fashion. After all, any exposed wiring / cabling can act as an antenna, so you've got to take that into account too.

Using heavy gauge conductors with a cable geometry that is naturally RFI resistant also presents a low nominal impedance and low series resistance. This allows current to be delivered in both a timely fashion and in the quantity needed. It also reduces the EM field around the power cord, so it is not inductively coupled into other signal or power cabling from other nearby gear.

As a side note, i'm using a unit that is similar to the Topaz mentioned above, but it is much larger, sturdier and heavier as it was designed for commercial applications. I've never weighed it, but when it was shipped into me, the weight on the bill of lading was listed as 450 lbs plus 30 lbs additional for the skid & packing materials. The 7.5 KVA unit that Neal made mention of weighs in at appr 116 lbs, so that should give you some idea of what i'm talking about.

On that topic, the Topaz T100H-7500 seems a little light to me at that type of power rating, so that tells me that it is lacking in core size. As such, i would consider this to be more of a 3.5 - 4 KVA unit in my opinion. Even at that level of output, you are talking about 30+ amps of continuous current capacity. Unless one is running very high current draw amps with very low impedance & low sensitivity speakers in a very large room, this should be adequate for most systems.

For sake of comparison, my old 2.5 KVA transformers clock in at over 100 lbs apiece, but they are WAY overkill on core size. I have seen 5 KVA and 7.5 KVA transformers that used smaller cores. That's the reason that i bought several of these, as i never had to worry about core saturation.

To take that a step further and for a more common point of reference, the old Tice Power Block / Titan iso transformers were rated for 1.8 KVA ( 15 amps ) and they clock in at appr 42 lbs each. Now you know why people running big amps used to complain about the Tice's ( and other "small core" iso transformers ) "squashing the dynamics ans smearing the sound at high listening levels" i.e. the core of the iso may have been temporarily saturating, introducing distortions and limiting peak current capacity.

This is why Tice came up with the Titan, as it simply used an additional yet identical transformer in parallel with the one found in the Power Block. This meant that you now had 84 lbs of core for the rated 1.8 KVA rating, which is obviously much better / allows more headroom during normal operating conditions. This is why i've said that you should look for an iso that was rated for almost double the max current draw of your components i.e. you have no chance of the iso distorting or saturating and the AC line impedance remains very low.

Obviously, power cords DO effect the sound of most components, but that's only because the components are still being fed "grunge" from the AC line and lack the proper design to deal with it. By going to the source of the problem and filtering the AC to a very high point of purity before feeding it to the system, you no longer have to rely on the guesswork of what power cord will "filter out the junk" the best on each individual component i.e. "The Super Vaporizer works best on digital whereas the AC Magna-Charger works best on amps". The only thing that power cord has to do at this point is deliver the proper voltage & current without allowing additional "grunge" & RFI to sneak back into the system AFTER the primary filter.

The fact that many "audiophile grade" PLC's still make "aftermarket power cords" somewhat of a "necessity" in order to achieve optimal results should tell you that the PLC itself isn't up to the task at hand. This could be why most of the "audiophile grade" PLC's don't provide meaningful spec's i.e. they rely on the thick metal chassis, fancy faceplates and snake-oil marketing departments to sell their mega-dollar units for them. Sean
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