what will i hear? "upgrading to naim power cords

Posted by: av in bc on 27 February 2005

i am currently using nordost shiva cords on the nait5 and the cd5, the flatcap2 has a ps audio cord and the hi-cap2 has an original naim cord.
in order to help fund the hi-cap i am changing to an all naim power cords and selling the others. my question is. will this be an upgrade?
Posted on: 27 February 2005 by Kid Tandem
AVinBC,
Before you sell your aftermarker cords be your oun judge!
You probally have all the original stock Naim PC's that came with your equiptment.
Swap them in and give a listen.
IMO I feel aftermarket PC's sound better than the stock Naim PC's.
I started testing that theory since I first listened to the CD3 at my local Dealer.Most of my friends agree ,and then some of my friends like to keep it ALL Naim TOO!!!
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by Gary B
Hi AV
IMO YES, "some" people have noted better sound with different PCs, "almost all" say a Hicap is a big step sound wise, and it is, i will not forget the day i added a cap to my old 72/140 system, WOW, smoother,deeper,faster, and just plain nicer !!

Go for it, Regards Gary B....
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by andy c
Hi,
This test is vsry subjective IMO. You can ask as many folk as you like, but it depends upon what you want out of the presentation.

I used to use Kimber power cords, amongst others, but went back to the original Naim leads in the end.

andy c!
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by NB
You will get a different sound.

As to whether you prefer the Naim to the Nordost is down to your listening preferences.
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by Mr_Sukebe
quote:
As to whether you prefer the Naim to the Nordost is down to your listening preferences.


I'd agree with that.
My personal experiences were that aftermarket cables on the amplifiers made them sound worse, with subdued dynamics and a robbing of life.
On a CD player, I found it cleaned up top end treble "hash", without adversely affecting sound.
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by Frank Abela
That's interesting, by moving from Nordost to Naim I'd expect there to be an improvement in the musicality of the system at the expense of the HiFi attributes of space, air and soundstage.
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by Alan B
I agree with Frank. I have tried several power cords woth my 72/140 SNAPS (yes only SNAPS, sorry!!) and the NAIM cords are just more musical.
Posted on: 28 February 2005 by sean
Over the years I must have spent about £2000 on various power cords, mains blocks, etc. I'm sure you have guessed, I have ended up back with the Naim ones which sound much more fun.

Sean.
Posted on: 01 March 2005 by Tigger24
funny you should mention this, there is a thread regading power cords and conditioners in the av forum, and the chap posting is using a combo of the discontinued shunyata leads (can't remember the exact models!) and the black hydra 6, and he reckons they make a massive improvement. I have only had my setup for a 2 weeks so is not properly burnt in, but i did try swapping the naim cable for a volex iec lead with 13amp fuse in the player and i couldn't hear any difference between the two. For what its worth, yes a lot of people may say the naim leads sound better on naim kit, but i can't help but wonder whether they sound as good when using them on say cyrus or arcam kit?, and they are decent leads but when push comes to shove they are just basic moulded iec cables with a decent rewireable plug attached, nothing fancy, so the only reasonng i can see for naim not recommending "aftermarket" power cords is because the power supplies are a) good enough not to need external filtering/conditioning or its down to the simple fact that some people say specialist mains cords and filters have an undesirable effect on the sound.