Power conditioner

@bosssound 

Thanks.  The part that threw me was you wrote "BAD".

I thought that perhaps you meant that the Alpha box was bad or its USB interface was bad.

↓↓↓+1↓↓↓

I've had similar positive experiences with the Berkely Alpha Design Alpha USB interface.

@seymour-krelborn 

My streamer uses an asynchronous chip, which means the clock is on the chip. It does not use the clock on the CD player's transport, so I can't really put anything in between them.

@audio-b-dog 

I am trying to figure this out.  But I do not think that your streamer's clock is what you will ultimately hear, because the streamer will feed the re-clocker, and the re-clocker feeds your DAC.

Your streamer is just another hop along the way from some internet based music service.  Ultimately, the device / re-clocker / transport that is connected directly to your DAC would have the final say on clocking and affect the sound quality of your DAC.

Where I had written "your streamer (any model) will sound much better", I should have written: "your DAC (any model) will sound much better, regardless of the streamer"

That is my understanding.  But I am still learning.  Please correct me if I am mistaken.

I think it's more complicated with an asynchronus DAC. I don't think my CD player's clock is used. I heard that from my dealer, but I haven't had a chance to check out all the technical stuff. 

@seymour-krelborn 

”It is my understanding that the most important power cord, is the one which connects the Niagara to the wall.  That power cord (the right one) is expensive, and there might be some people that do not believe in those power cords being beneficial?”

+1

The largest improvement to my system from changing any power cord was going from a Shunyata Venom HC to an Alpha Zi-Tron HC to supply my Shunyata distributor from the wall.  The sound of every source in my system improved. The difference was noticeably and undeniably positive.

kn