So, I had 3 power cords to evaluate. First off, I'm very new to the wonders of power cords; that is, that an after market power cord can make a difference at all. I had heard such tales, but never tested it out for myself until recently. Greg Kong gave me the MIT Z-cord II to check out. Sure enough, it did improve the sound of my system. Imaging improved. Sounds separated, taking on more realistic spatial relationships. The overall presentation was, consequently, more realistic. So, I got my hands on another two cords to do a comparison.

The MIT Z-cord II is a sight to behold. At either end it is surrounded by 5 inch long, somewhat rectangular, tumors. These tumors filter out radio frequency interference (RFI) and electromagnetic interference (EMI) at frequencies of 100khz or higher. This is a cumbersome cord to connect, but clumsiness is a small penalty given the increased quality it brings.

The Clayton power cord came courtesy of Wilson Shen, of Clayton Power Cords. He states,

The Clayton power cord is a high-purity copper 12 awg stranded cord, silver plated, insulated with heavy-duty Teflon housing in flame retardant expandable sleeving, with high quality IEC connectors and plugs (Hubbell)."

The Custom House cord contains 4 conductors with a center core of copper. Often a less flexible center core is used, such as Teflon. The problem here is that when a stiff cord is bent, as cords often are, their properties change. As with a coaxial cable, once it's bent more noise gets in.

All of my impressions were based on the sound of the cords powering the Meridian 508/20 CD player. Conventional wisdom is that power cords make the largest difference with source components. Consequently, I kept the power cord to the Krell KAV500i integrated amplifier constant, using Krell's supplied cord. Of course, out of curiosity, I did substitute all 3 cords for the Krell's and each one made a significant improvement in sound. I was clueless about the price of these cords during my comparisons. I thought the prices ranged from $100 to $800.

I relied upon Ben Folds Five's Whatever and Ever Amen (BK67762) album pretty heavily; my specific comments all reference it. It's a well done recording. Nothing stands out as artificially highlighted, as on some audiophile recordings, yet all the sounds are quite clear. It sounds as if the band played live in the studio, and I believe they did. The players seem to be occupying a common space. I found this recording to be a helpful evaluative tool, and a fun listen-most importantly a fun listen, or I never would have chosen it. Life's too short.

My first comparison was between the MIT Z-Cord II and the Custom House. The first thing I noticed was that using the MIT cord made the music sound louder. Curious, but setting this aside in my mind, I focused in on which cable gave me a more realistic illusion of a performance in my living room. It took two songs to reach the same conclusion that I did after dozens. The Custom House was the better sounding cord. First, it images better. Both image size and palpability are superior. Listening to Ben Folds Five's "Selfless, Cold and Composed" from Whatever and Ever Amen (BK67762), for instance, Ben's head sounded more headsize.

Going from the Custom House cord to the MIT on this track, and any others, I distinctly heard a loss of dimension. Using the Custom House cord also resulted in a wider soundstage. On "One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces" I heard music from speaker to speaker. With the MIT cable the sounds bunched towards the center a few inches. Lastly, detail was a touch superior with the Custom cord. Cymbal taps had a bit more sparkle and texture, breaths taken by Mr. Folds came through just a little more clearly.

The Clayton Power Cord was not a match for the Custom House cord, either. While the Clayton certainly gave a more 3 dimensional sound to the music than the MIT, it did not have the Custom House cord's clarity. On "Song for the Dumped" the Custom House held my high regard by bringing life to the opening cymbals. The Clayton Power cord sounded a bit dull by comparison. I was not hearing enough reverberation. The improvement in sound in my system, going from the Clayton to the Custom House, is greater than I've heard comparing certain similarly priced CD players in the $1,000 to $1,250 range.

Summary

All three of the cords that I listened to sounded better than the factory supplied cords. (Once again, life gets more complicated.) And, all three cords gave me three different sounds. (And again.) Fortunately, I had no problem deciding which I thought was most realistic. For my system, the Custom House cord is the one to get. It's most salient characteristic was it's ability to give me more information. More than just the initial attack of a sound, you hear it's decay and it's echo off of the venue's walls. You can better hear the texture of sounds. You can better tell that the singer just had a cigarette, for instance. These are the kinds of things that matter to crazies like me. No more factory cords for this guy.