A nice description and these are the areas of reproduction I care about. Thanks.
It will be interesting to hear if the silver DC cable makes a difference.
A nice description and these are the areas of reproduction I care about. Thanks.
It will be interesting to hear if the silver DC cable makes a difference.
@Gazza, what would you use the second rail to power?
Whatever it is it will need to be max 12V and the pair of devices not draw more than 4A in total, if I understand the Plixir website correctly.
I wonder one rail could power the eR and the second rail could be used to power a Cisco 2960 switch? I use both switches.
Hmmnā¦i told the wife the national rail service can be unreliableā¦this is another rail service best to have a spareā¦donāt think she believed me.
It was suggested by @Chag that i should remove and listen again. Well the kit is going back tomorrowā¦so i am on the Uptone supplied power supply. To be fair it is a good psu, but i still lose the wonderful insight of a piece of that i find hard to explain.
So why two railsā¦another ER or an external clock at some point. We have a house bunny rabbitā¦i am down the rabbit holeā¦donāt try to save meā¦he bitesš¬
Never mind the teeth, think of the ears!
Here are a couple of pics of the Plixir 2 rail 12v/4A power supply. The blue Elementa virgin copper cable is the standard supplied cable, this is thicker than the standard one supplied with the 2 amp version i tried last week. The thin grey cable is their āStatementā silver cable. I ran with the blue standard cable for a couple of hours sounded great until i changed to the āStatementā cable. It sounds much faster, greater sense of PRaT, the standard cable sounds a bit bloated by comparison. Yet to dare ask how much the āStatementā costsā¦about Ā£100 on the Plixir siteā¦probably more after shipping, dealer margin etc.
All that makes me say that the Mcru option 3 is a good bargain for its price and capabilities.
It comes with SR orange fuse, Silver Oyiade gold plated dc cable, and good quality power cord with furutech plug.
However only one rail. But I donāt need more.
Thanks for the update Gazza.
Have you noticed any difference between the one and two rail Plixirs listening via the supplied copper stranded DC cables?
I assume, according to your description and depending on price, the silver Statement DC cable is a no-brainer?
Well thereās the rubā¦the 4A version has a different cableā¦much thicker than the 2A version. I guess to take the current, though the thin silver cable is rated at 10A maxā¦so it was not a straight comparison. But i marginally preferred the 4A version and thicker cable. I will call Signals tomorrow for a chat as the silver cable is at least 2 metres long ( too long) which is not available on the Plixir website. But interesting testingā¦a little silver coated shoelace is much better?
I guess the one and two rail Plixirs should sound the same, especially if they are only powering one device. The difference you heard might simply be down to the different stranded copper DC cables, the thicker one for the two-rail Plixir being superior.
I am wondering if the two-rail Plixir might be compromised (compared to two separate one-rail Plixirs) when powering two devices. The difference in price between 2 x one-rail vs 1 x two-rail Plixirs is only Ā£150 (Ā£1000 vs Ā£850) by my reckoning, and there is the added advantage of flexibility over positioning with the separate Plixirs, if the two devices to be powered are apart from each other. It also seems you are stuck with one voltage output with the two rails, i.e. 12 v in this instance, which may not suit both devices to be powered. I accept however that there is more flexibility over current in that there are different current options to choose from, with the combined draw from both devices not to exceed the rated maximum from the supply, in this instance 4A.
I would be interested to know the price of the Silver Statement cable and if there is a cheaper, shorter version.
Apparently Sean Jacobs knows how to isolate different rails. If I had to go for 2 rails and more, Sean Jacobs or SR7 would be my choice, because they have a long expertise and strong reputation.
Apart if I could compare both with Plixir, which must be difficult to do.
I have a limitation on the present number of power sockets available, hence my interest in a 2 rail. The next generation music-works block is still 6 sockets. I will get back to you on price-of the cables. I intend to try powering my others witch in this room over the weekend to see if there is a drop off in performance. My gut feeling so far is this is well thought out and well made.
Spooky!
Cheers Gazza. Hope the Plixir casts a spell and works its magic.
Update on my SR4T experience for anyone who might have interest. I had found the Paul Hynes LPS a mixed bag at best - an improvement in terms of colour and dynamics, but slightly obvious and every track somehow had the same character as the last and I felt the stock supply had a more natural flow, albeit with an obviously less full, almost pastel colouring and grainy texture, yet an ultra fast and natural sound that I didnāt want to ditch for what I was hearing from the SR4T as suppliedā¦
So
Since my 30 day send back was looming I got in touch with Stephen at Paul Hynes to negotiate a return. He was understanding and extremely helpful, but mentioned that there had been a problem with the silver DC cable with a recent customer ( Iām guessing he was referring to @bluesfan) with a defective connection on his cable and wondered if I had a similar problem since mine was from the same batch. So, send back date was extended and a new Silver, plus a Copper cable for reference were duly sent and arrived today .
The new Silver cable sounds very (VERY!) much better and this is certainly enough to make the SR4T a keeper. Possible that I did have a similar issue to bluesfan, I donāt know. Initial listening with the Copper cable would suggest that itās nowhere close, but Iām going to burn it in for 24 hours and just check it again. The Silver currently sounds superb. Every piece I play has me riveted and impossible to stop a track once itās started. For me, thatās the best possible recommendation.
Hi KJC,
if I hadnāt been through a similar experience, I might question your sanity.
Yet I have.
The first silver cable ās1ā that I tried made the streamer produce amazing hifi music yet without emotional engagement or the ability to hold my interest. This occurred when the cable was used to supply either the EtherRegen (ER) or the opticalRendu (oR). Throughout, I have used the originally supplied copper cable āc1ā on the other item. Nothing in my university degree level grasp of both metallurgy and electrical engineering helps to explain such a phenomenon. Itās bizarre.
So Stephen sent me a replacement silver cable ās2ā and a second copper cable āc2ā to try.
With c1 on the ER, I put s2 in place of s1 on the oR. The result? Magic. All the hifi virtues of s1 but with the emotional engagement of the c1.
Flushed with success and relief, Stephen sent me a third silver cable s3 as a thank you for persevering.
With s2 on the oR, I replaced c1 on the ER with the new s3 cable. It was like s1 all over again.
So I have settled very happily with a copper cable on the ER and the second silver one powering the oR.
Yet I am completely mystified as to why I am hearing the effects produced by different silver cables.
Yours head scratchingly, BF
It is interesting the @KJC says the (second) silver DC cable was an improvement over the copper version with the SR4T powering the eR but @Bluesfan preferred the copper cable in this configuration, albeit in conjunction with oR on which he preferred the silver cable.
I wonder if it is down to the difference in local network set ups. It would seem that the silver cable isnāt always preferable on the eR.
Hi Nigel,
I think it is more to do with variability between silver cables than copper is better on ER and silver on oR. Whichever silver cable I used to compare with the copper one, the silver cable always made music sound more smooth, refined and calmer in a good way. The copper cable in comparison made music sound relatively uncouth and less resolved. This difference was evident regardless of whether the comparisons were made on the ER or the oR.
The other observation I would make is that the benefit of the better supply was subjectively about 4 times greater on the oR than the ER. If you have both an ER and an oR and can only buy one of these SR4T supplies, I would put it on the oR.
Best regards, BF
Pleased to hear that you have had excellent service from Stephen at Paul Hynes and that you are now hearing what the SR4T can do.
I have been very pleased with mine with the silver cable and was a little surprised to read of you initial disappointment with the product and lead.
My goodness thatās a bit confusing!!
Do you think, forum rules permitting (?), that Stephen could be persuaded to add any commentary from his perspective on what might be happening here? Particularly as Bluesfan appears to be encountering problems not experienced by others such as MichaelF. I have a strong interest in this as Iām considering adding an sr4t to my set up and I am notoriously poor at the art of cable faffing!!
Peter
I know what you mean Peter.
In summary, my experience is that:
Hope this helps, BF
Maybe for all the cost involved it could be prudent to get both copper and silver, break my habit of a lifetime and get cable faffing!
Peter