AudioQuest NRG-X3 Review (AC Power Cord)

[TrevC]

My wife practices Ayurvedic medicine. It has been used across Asia for thousands of years. How or why it works I don’t know, but it does, and many “conventional” doctors know this, not least because most of her referrals are from doctors. I had consultants and physiotherapists trying to fix my shoulder for 9 months and an acupuncturist fixed it in 45 minutes. I don’t care how, I was just extatic to have movement back and be pain free. And they worry far less about cancer as rates are dramatically lower, about 4 times lower in India and Sri Lanka than in the USA.

All of this simply shows that human nature is that, if something works, they are often not that fussed how or why.

All your survey seemed to do is confirm that people who had an open mind about cables retained an open mind. If for whatever reason they heard benefits, no one based on a few measurements is going to convince them otherwise.

The theory and practice of Ayurveda is pseudoscientific. The Indian Medical Association describes Ayurvedic practitioners who claim to practice medicine as quacks.

 

[TheBatsEar]

The theory and practice of Ayurveda is pseudoscientific.

I'm afraid your mind is just not open enough, friend. Open it. OPEN IT NOW!

Around here you get sued if you sell Ayurverda or Homeopathy together with the word "medicine" or "medicinal".
Gives me great satisfaction.

 

[voodooless]

It has been used across Asia for thousands of years.

People also have been smoking since at least 5000 BC, what's your point?

 

[DWI]

The theory and practice of Ayurveda is pseudoscientific. The Indian Medical Association describes Ayurvedic practitioners who claim to practice medicine as quacks.

Good for them, western medicine has always been defensive against traditional medicine, but billions of people use it because it works. Next door to India, in Sri Lanka, most hospitals practise western and Ayurvedic medicine side by side.

I find this Engineers are Top Dog this rather narrow-minded. My wife can't add up a simple list of numbers. She went to a performing arts college. She also has an academic degree. All her Ayurvedic was learned post-graduate. She cures people of things conventional medicine can't. She is fluent in 6 languages. She's never had an IQ test and nor have I, but I did do the LSAT, which was interesting. Why do you have to measure everything, and everyone? Their IQ, their net worth?

If engineers think they know best because of intellectual superiority, that's not something I was aware of and certainly brings an interesting angle.

 

[JSmith]

people use it because it works

Ah but do they...

The power of placebo | BPS

thepsychologist.bps.org.uk

JSmith

 

[Purité Audio]

Pesky engineers just because they design, measure and test the equipment we use.
Keith

 

[TheBatsEar]

She cures people of things conventional medicine can't.

Relax bro. You will not make believers out of a bunch of EEs by writing what you write.

 

[DWI]

Has there been any actual ‘flow‘ of technology from the aerospace industry into audio power cables, discounting marketing fluff?
Keith

I wasn't limiting it to cables. I had in mind dCS and Chord at a very senior level. Nordost comes to mind. Max Townshend was an electronics engineer in the Australian Air Force, Colin Wonfor was at NASA and consulted for brands from CA to Goldmund, before designing the Tellurium Q cables. It's probably partly a numbers game as so many engineers are trained in the military and aerospace industries.

 

[DrZingo]

But seriously, relax. You will not make believers out of a bunch of EEs by writing what you write.

Well, everyone here is not an EE. I for one am an MD, PhD, spending my days diagnosing cancer, mainly by flow cytometry and DNA techniques like PCR. Of course, none of them has been around for thousands of years but hey, I have to go with the equipment that's available.

 

[voodooless]

military and aerospace industries.

Sure, it's very good marketing. Aerospace and military are known for reliability and good engineering. No doubt there are some smart people working there that could make excellent audio products. But it's a misconception that these fields use some kind of special cable. They use properly engineered cables for the exact job at hand. There is no cable that would lift the proverbial vail of the airplanes ailerons and make it handle better.

Well, everyone here is not an EE. I for one am an MD, PhD, spending my days diagnosing cancer, mainly by flow cytometry and DNA techniques like PCR. Of course, none of them has been around for thousands of years but hey, I have to go with the equipment that's available.

Come on, keep an open mind, try some herbs

 

[Ingenieur]

Most of my cables cost between $0 and $20, also a 12m AQ CAT6a at about $3/m because it is the only custom one I could get terminated and tested locally. I used to use $1.50/m Sommer speaker cable, but on a recommendation tried some speaker cables that have vanishingly low inductance and a design that seems to make them impervious to noise pollution, I bought those, and someone loaned me a power cable that seemed to lower the noise floor (it seems to have some form of network in the socket) so I bought that. I’ve spent more on a pair of tickets for a night out (box office prices). The power cable was given to me unboxed and it was unbranded.

I‘ve fed my streamer with both fiber and $10 CAT6a - no audible difference - and output using usb (a giveaway cable) and CAT6a - no audible difference. So I’m not inclined to try expensive Ethernet upgrades. But I have with power and speaker cables and I’m not open to being told I didn’t hear what I’m sure I did hear.

the USA does seem to have an obsession with cables that does not exist elsewhere.

Or look at it another way. The Industrial Revolution enslaved people in factories, destroyed agrarian society, and ultimately is destroying the planet. Those are of course averages and it is really only the exceptional people who make a difference, 99% are just fuel for the wheels of industry, and conventional IQ measurements mainly correlate with people seeking the most financially lucrative education. Do these things bring happiness? Travelling in parts of Africa and Asia where there is no TV, cars, certainly no planes, a healthy diet, little stress and traditional medicine, you wonder who are the lucky ones. And they don’t need audio systems because they can make their own music. But if you want to think engineers are at the top of the pecking order for the sake intellectual superiority, that’s up to you. I’ll go back to my book by a man brought up on a farm with only three years of formal education that ended at age 16. Don’t think he ever had an IQ test, but he won a Nobel prize for literature.

Our little ray of sunshine.


Physicists
Engineers, top 5

I do not wonder who the the 'lucky ones' are. I am one.

If you perceive something that does not imply reality.
I look in the mirror and see a brilliant mind in a handsome package.
No one else does. Lol

 

[Ingenieur]

Has there been any actual ‘flow‘ of technology from the aerospace industry into audio power cables, discounting marketing fluff?
Keith

No

May be the other way around in some cases. McIntosh Engineering Laboratories first amps were for industrial and mil application.

 

[Purité Audio]

I wasn't limiting it to cables. I had in mind dCS and Chord at a very senior level. Nordost comes to mind. Max Townshend was an electronics engineer in the Australian Air Force, Colin Wonfor was at NASA and consulted for brands from CA to Goldmund, before designing the Tellurium Q cables. It's probably partly a numbers game as so many engineers are trained in the military and aerospace industries.

Really, that’s a bit sad from Nasa to snake oil cable peddling.
DCS started in ‘pro’ audio didn’t take the long to realise there was more to be made in the domestic arena, Chord is that Chord snake oil cables or Chord hideous product design Chord?
Keith

 

[BDWoody]

If engineers think they know best because of intellectual superiority,

I think it has more to do with their actual education in the subject.

 

[CinDyment]

But I have with power and speaker cables and I’m not open to being told I didn’t hear what I’m sure I did hear.

the USA does seem to have an obsession with cables that does not exist elsewhere.

Then that is a position of Dogma and arrogance since it appears you have never blind tested yourself. You are the epitome of what you accuse others of.

 

[BDWoody]

Darko seems to have nailed it. The numbers say so.

He is a good salesman, of that there is no doubt. Do you watch a lot of infomercials? That's really all his videos are...

 

[theREALdotnet]

Well, everyone here is not an EE. I for one am an MD, PhD, spending my days diagnosing cancer, mainly by flow cytometry and DNA techniques like PCR. Of course, none of them has been around for thousands of years but hey, I have to go with the equipment that's available.

But surely, you’re not using the freebie POS power cords that came with your diagnostic equipment?!

 

[JSmith]

Do you watch a lot of infomercials? That's really all his videos are...

I'm just waiting for the day he offers a free set of steak knives to the first 10 people that like his infomercial.


JSmith

 

[Ingenieur]

If engineers think they know best because of intellectual superiority, that's not something I was aware of and certainly brings an interesting angle.

Not intellectually superiority overall but subject matter knowledge based on education and experience.
It is a cable.

 

[DWI]

But seriously, relax. You will not make believers out of a bunch of EEs by writing what you write.

No worries! It's quite eye-opening to read what engineers think of themselves and their discipline.

I worked as an engineer for just over a year for a company that had agreed to sponsor me. Probably a bit too macho, and a bit too dangerous (mostly on North Sea oil platforms). I studied something safer. So I have a little engineering insight from personal experience.