Pangea power cords

I got an AC-14 SE and an AC-9 last week. Upon opening the AC-9 box I was taken aback by the size and unwieldiness of this monster. Originally I was planning to use the AC-9 with my integrated amp, but the diameter (1") and bend radius are so big I plugged it into my bass amp instead and forgot about it for a bit. Normally I use a 12-gauge Monarchy Audio power cable on the bass amp, so the Pangea wasn't going to have an easy time justifying itself, and my current power cord on the integrated amp is a PS Audio Prelude (10 ga.).

A couple days later I plugged in my bass guitar and gave it a test run. What I heard was an unexpected smoothness and organic naturalness to the tone. Sure, there was good bass fullness as one would expect from a 9-gauge feed, but it was the refinement that hooked me. Still, it's an awfully unwieldy cord to gig with. If I send it back, it'll purely be for mechanical issues, not sonic.

Right now I have the AC-14 SE plugged into an Oppo DV-980H, which I use for CDs and SACDs. At $45 for a 1.5 that one's a no-brainer. Very sweet, detailed, refined. Digital never sounded so organic in my house.

*** 15-minute break ***

I just wrangled (and I mean *wrangled*!) the AC-9 onto my integrated amp and am playing a variety of music I just played this morning. Wow! This is a good power cord! It is *very* smooth, but not at the expense of transients and dynamics. The sound is richer and more organic, like what I heard on the bass amp, but obviously able to handle and delineate the much more complex waveforms of recorded music.

If you can live with the weight and stiffness, the AC-9 is ridiculously good at its price. My amp is an Onkyo A-9555 switching amp, and this cord makes it sound its organic best. If you're thinking of getting the 1.5M like I did, spend the extra few bucks for 2M because the big bend radius takes up a lot of the length going around corners.

I was using PS Audio Plus SC cables exclusively in my stereo. I purchased Pangea AC-14 cables for my home theater's Pioneer Elite SC-25 receiver and KRP-500M plasma and was very impressed with their build quality so I decided to try the Pangea cables in my stereo. I purchased AC-9's to feed my PS Audio Duet and amp, and AC-14's for my preamp and disc player. I noticed no difference between the PS Audio cables and the Pangea. (I had previously noted a huge difference going from stock to the PS Audio.) I sold the PS Audio cables here on Audiogon. The sale of one of which funded the Pangea cable purchase; the sale of the rest bought me a Grado PH-1 phono preamp. I have never regretted the switch. I plan to introduce other Pangea cables as they are introduced.

The Pangea ac-9 wins a Jimmy Award from Sound Stage http://www.soundstage.com/traveler/traveler.htm

UPDATE!

See my previous review on 4-15-10...

Ok, previously I had not liked the AC-9 pangea on my power amp. Subsequently, I got a PS Audio Power Plant Premier, and the sound went in the wrong direction. The soundstage was congested, fatiguing, and not as dynamic as I had previously experienced. But I let everything burn in for at least a month before I decided to try another AC-9. I let the AC-9 burn in for about a month in my system.
After extensive listening, it is better in this setup (with the PPP) then the AC-14.
MUCH BETTER.

Also, I bought one of the new AC-14SE to try on my pre-amp in place of the Signal Cable Silver Resolution cable.
I liked the transparency of the Signal Cable and kept it in place after trying the AC-14SE for about a month.
However, I put the AC-14SE on my Denon 5910, in place of the standard AC-14, and the sound got markedly better.
So this suggests to me that the AC-14SE may be better for digital sources instead of the AC-14.
The AC-14SE DOES need some burn in, however.

I also bought both an AC-14 c7 and AC-14SE c7 to try on my phono pre-amp power brick, and the regular AC-14 was the marked winner here. The sound was more open and tone was more engaging.

Anyway, I have even better sound than I had previously. Loving it!

I tryed the Pangea AC-9 power cord on my B&K Reference 125.2 power amp and found that the mids and top end sounded dull compared to the Emotiva power cord. I have since switched back to the Emotiva.