Announcement

**MylesBAstor** · 02-03-2016, 06:41 PM

The Furutech outlets are definitely an improvement here. Brand new, however, the Furutech AC receptacles are a little lean; on the other hand, the lowe noise floor, space, etc are immediately apparent. The thinness does go away with playing.

The male and female RCA connectors and IEC inlet plug though absolutely blew my mind. Charlie put the Furutech male on the wire from the headblock and females at the inlet and outlet. While the solder connections are very nice (real lugs with a hole so can loop the wire through), the material dissipates the heat from the solder iron and makes the soldering process a bit of a bear to do. And same thing here about the sound. Little thin to start with but that fills out.

The difference in sound between the new Furutech and stock RCA connectors is on the order of swapping new for stock tape heads. In retrospect, we shouldn't be surprised since it's no secret that the SE connections we often are stuck with are garbage and were chosen for ease of unplugging and certainly not sound. After replacing all the connections, there was a tremendously reduced noise floor. (just like you hear with better heads) A much DEEPER and wider soundstage. All of a sudden, accompanying instruments buried in the mix and playing very softly on familiar tapes were revealed. It got to the point where I just found myself revelling in how much more there was to the music than I was previously hearing. It's the little things that make the music! Perhaps the biggest difference was relistening to the Hemiolia Records tapes--that I was previously ho-hum about--and suddenly being shocked by just how good they actually are. No blurring, fatness or amorphous quality in the low end. Far, far more transparency. Just more information overall.A greater sense of melody and rhythmic qualities.

While it's impossible to compare all these different products, it's clear that Furutech is onto something.

**Mike Lavigne** · 02-07-2016, 02:25 PM

my dealer is now almost done switching in these 7 sets of FI-50 male and IEC plugs. he's working on the last cable now. he started at 7:30am this morning.....it's now at the 4 hour point. he is my hero.

he's put them on the (1) dart pre, (2) power supply of the NVS tt, (3) Lampi Golden Gate dac, (4-7) the dual subwoofer amps per side (the MM7 bass towers have 2 separate amplifiers each).

we've continued to listen as he's worked and I've switched the cables in and out.

so far the biggest thing was the dac; which clearly took a step. the dart pre is battery powered so hard to know what to expect. we are listening to vinyl now and it does seem to have a bit more authority. even with only one sub amp powered the bass is really 'delicious'.

more later......

**MylesBAstor** · 02-07-2016, 04:34 PM

Patience. A quality not usually associated with audiophiles!

**Mike Lavigne** · 02-07-2016, 05:46 PM

provisional response;

wow!!

interesting to hear what improving power cords on subwoofers crossed over at around 35hz do for overall coherence and authority. more agile and expressive in the lower registers, overall cleaner and more real. crosses farther over into suspension of disbelief.

more subtle improvements on the vinyl than the digital; which makes sense with the phono stages battery powered. still the vinyl is better. the digital is quite a bit better.

of course; hard to separate and isolate cause and affect when doing more than one power cord upgrade.

these connectors sure look spiffy with the polished stainless steel over carbon fibre/nano crystal. but it's not just a pretty face.

and the proverbial 800 pound gorilla in the room is I have not yet upgraded the plugs for the power cords on the dart mono blocks which typically yield a large share of any power grid related upgrade.

of course; I'm only commenting on what they sound like in my particular system as my first blush perceptions.

**Mike Lavigne** · 02-08-2016, 12:17 AM

some pictures.....

**rockitman** · 02-08-2016, 05:21 AM

Those are sweet. My Nordost Odin PC's use the predecessor to those plugs. Maybe I will upgrade my plugs.

**MylesBAstor** · 02-08-2016, 08:07 AM

I have come around to the view that the weakest "link" in the system is the AC plug/AC receptacle interface.

If that connection isn't tight, clean, right metals, making good contact, resistant to vibrations, etc., forget about it!

**Mike Lavigne** · 02-14-2016, 04:39 PM

800 pound Gorilla---the plugs on the amps

I was pretty stressed. and concerned.

I had some friends traveling from out of town, listening and staying overnight Friday night, then listening Saturday morning and then leaving. I'd made a number of significant positive changes and the visit was to hear those.

on last Sunday morning my drug dealer/audio dealer Joe Pittman had installed 7 sets of the new FI-50 NCP male and IEC plugs on all my power cords except on the dart monos. my previous comments about that and my rave on it's affect noted that we had not yet done the amp power cables and I considered that the 800 pound Gorilla still in the room. I had not done the amp power cables since I thought I should send them back to Evolution to have them done; but after further consideration I decided to have Joe do those too. I wanted to hear what they would do. I was sure it would be epic.

so Monday Joe ordered the additional plugs; they arrived Thursday and he came over Thursday evening to install them. the install took some time but went smoothly and by 9pm we started listening. typical professional job by Joe. note that the next night my friends would arrive.

lots of additional detail. but there was a tonal imbalance. it was bright. the mid range was missing. those amps are so transparent. the new plugs were doing things. we listened for an hour or so, they did start to get a bit smoother. I was worried. 24 hours to solve. I was skeptical that break in would fix it. I listened until midnight; then pulled out my Audiokharma Cable Cooker and power cable interface and got that going.

overnight did not sleep much as this was bugging me. then it came to me.....hey.....I can adjust the bass tower crossover. in the morning I got up and listened. a little better, but no where close to balanced. so I proceeded to adjust the bass tower crossover from 32 hz, to 34, to 36, finally 39 seemed just right. relief. it was going to be fine. no doubt when they were fully broken in I'd need to re-tweak but the magical mid range had returned along with the additional transparency and detail from the plugs.

I put the cables back on the Audiokharma and went to work.

got home a little before my friends arrived and reinstalled the cables.....better after the 12 more hours on the cable cooker.

my friends did arrive and we had 2 great listening sessions that night and in the morning. lots of smiles and raves. a good time had by all. they left yesterday at 11:30am. i never spent a minute in the sweet spot while my friends were there.

i had to work then and when i got home last night i tried to listen but was exhausted and so fell asleep.

so this morning i was finally able to see what happened and enjoy it.

I'm blown away by this final step. I'd heard raves all weekend but as they had not heard the progression of other things I'd done it was hard for me to judge this last step. but this is a big deal.

the amps love those plugs.

**MylesBAstor** · 02-14-2016, 04:57 PM

Thanks for the update Mike! The Cable Cooker is really a great asset to have around. Do you as recommended, periodically retreat every 6 months, your cables on Alan's machine?

More dealers should have this (or the Nordost version) around as a value added feature for customers. I think cooking can improve every level of cables.

**Mike Lavigne** · 02-14-2016, 05:31 PM

Originally posted by MylesBAstor View Post

Thanks for the update Mike! The Cable Cooker is really a great asset to have around. Do you as recommended, periodically retreat every 6 months, your cables on Alan's machine?

More dealers should have this (or the Nordost version) around as a value added feature for customers. I think cooking can improve every level of cables.

I'm not religious about 6 month intervals, likely more like around 18 months for cables previously fully treated. no doubt it's helpful and takes cables further than music 'only' can ultimately. I've used it on cables with 5 years of music and it's improved them.

a cable cooker is very important for heavy gauge cables, such as my Evolution triple run speaker cables and triple run power cables.

OTOH I would never waste one minute of my time on a dispute over cable cooker performance.

**MylesBAstor** · 02-14-2016, 05:54 PM

Originally posted by Mike Lavigne View Post

I'm not religious about 6 month intervals, likely more like around 18 months for cables previously fully treated. no doubt it's helpful and takes cables further than music 'only' can ultimately. I've used it on cables with 5 years of music and it's improved them.

+1 Found that out by accident when I hooked up a non-treated PC by accident, sat back and wondered for an hour or two why the system didn't sound right. Then went over and realized that had put the wrong K-S PC back into the system.

a cable cooker is very important for heavy gauge cables, such as my Evolution triple run speaker cables and triple run power cables.

OTOH I would never waste one minute of my time on a dispute over cable cooker performance.

I add also tonearm and phono cables.

Alan also came out with a new product called the ground breaker to treat cables. Someday will get around to ordering that from him and checking it out.

In the end, the take home message is everything little thing in the system counts!

**Leif S** · 04-03-2016, 01:04 AM

I'm a huge fan of the NCF plugs.

Announcement

Furutech FI-50 NCF combo, male plug + IEC

Furutech FI-50 NCF combo, male plug + IEC

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