In Reply to: RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's posted by SgreenP@MSN.com on May 9, 2015 at 19:45:19:
Yes, I've somewhat familiar with the "Ayre Conditioners" as they been deploying these in their components for about the past 15 years.
I thought they stopped using these things. But as I recall their ads used to state how Ayre strategically would place an Ayre Conditioner at certain offending frequencies throughout much of the spectrum.
I've never researched exactly what they do, but I have to assume they simply suppress those offending frequencies and in so doing, they also suppress the music in those same regions. In other words, they most likely are not real line conditioners but are simply filters to filter out certain frequencies in the audio spectrum.
You say you've tried other highly regarded line conditioners, but they brought nothing to the party.
There's a couple of things to mention about this:
1. Most line conditioners simply are not worth owning. They either do nothing or they induce their own sonic harm.
2. Doubling up any two types of line conditioning always or most always results in worse sound. Not sure why but it's true. I think back about 10 years ago when I owned a $10k preamp that included with it a cheap $5 AC filter inside the chassis right behind the IEC inlet. It was no better sounding than my previous preamps when I had my fabulous Foundation Research line conditioner attached it, as I did and do with all my components. When I plugged the preamp directly into the wall without a line conditioner, its sonics improved slightly. Soon thereafter, I opened the chassis and removed the $5 AC filter and using house wire connected the IEC connector straight to the power supply. Then the preamp came alive with a greater level of musicality. And far better than what the silly $5 AC filter could ever do.
This is no slight against Ayre, but I suspect they hedge their bets that since 99% of all enthusiasts don't partake in line conditioning and especially not in proper or superior line conditioning, their Ayre Conditioners give their products just a little performance edge in this regard.
Of course this leads me to believe that Charles Hanson of Ayre doesn't use superior line conditioning either.
Nevertheless, it is regrettable that mfg'erer never tells the consumer that their little $5 AC filter (or Ayre Conditioners) will defeat the musicality of even superior line conditioners, Maybe they know and maybe they don't know.
But what happens is somebody like yourself comes along and using Ayre's otherwise fine products and when you decide to try even the industry's best line conditioners and get funky results, you have every right to believe the funky sound is coming from the line conditioner and not the cheap $5 AC filter. Why, because when you take the line conditioner back out the funky sound ceases.
But then what happens is that now you, who seems to have a good head on your shoulders, tell others that you've tried numerous types of line conditioners and they didn't work, or didn't work well, ..... well, now the cat's out of the bag that all line conditioners are worthless,. My friend's friend's brother has a really nice well-thought-out playback system and he says line conditioners don't work.
After nearly 20 years, Foundation Research, which has always been at the top of the line conditioner heap, closed their doors a few years ago for this very reason.
As for me I wouldn't own any component that makes a lazy attempt to address proper line conditioning or AC filtering because I know the real benefits of superior line conditioning and these component mfg'ers don't.
As for the Vandersteen's, 12 or 13 years ago, i knew several who owned them and as I recall it was a bit of cabling nightmare with the external crossovers or DSP-like box. As I recall they needed multiple sets of cables, from the amp to that box, from that box to the speaker. But I do like their aesthetic design.
My main reason for my comment about not owning an active speaker is because I already know the very serious harm under-controlled vibrations do to an amplifier when it's sitting in a rack. There's simply no hope for properly controlling an amplifier placed inside a speaker cabinet. That's not even being at the epicenter of an earthquake, that is the earthquake.
And I don't mean to rag on either Ayre or Vandersteen as both generally make very fine cost-effective products that have a certain pride of ownership. But what most don't realize is that their very designs that give them just a tiny edge over competing products are in the end sometimes their products' greatest performance-limiting governors.
So I attempt to stay with the simple products myself that allow me to decide how best to apply superior AC management and superior vibration management.
For example, last year at this time I replaced my 2-componet system that retailed for $17k with a source and amps that retailed for $4k. Both of which easily outperform their predecessors.
But behind these 2 components retailing for $4k, is $14k worth of superior AC mgmt and superior vibration mgmt both of which make all the difference in the world and both of which I call laying a proper foundation.
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Follow Ups
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - stehno 20:47:04 05/09/15 (6)
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - SgreenP@MSN.com 21:13:29 05/09/15 (5)
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - stehno 22:34:19 05/09/15 (4)
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - SgreenP@MSN.com 12:54:09 05/11/15 (1)
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - fantja 16:11:27 05/12/15 (0)
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - SgreenP@MSN.com 11:57:30 05/10/15 (1)
- RE: Power cord for Vandersteen 5A's - stehno 00:24:41 05/11/15 (0)