Extreme Snake Oil

[Gringoaudio1]

I'll point out the elephant in this room: https://www.industrial-electronics.com/sams_metallic_4.html

Fascinating.

 

[RenPa]

Translation Akikoaudio:

Akiko Audio Tuning Disc

A powerful tool for relaxed music playback.

The Tuning Disc is charged for 7 months with vibration particles of natural origin. This irreversible process takes place in-house, giving the material unique properties, which ensure a very relaxed music reproduction. The disc should be placed on or under equipment or speakers so that the energetic energy has the opportunity to influence the immediate environment.

Small details become more audible and, together with a quieter background, ensure a quiet and natural music reproduction. The well-known recording that you thought you knew through and through can therefore also surprise.

The Tuning Disc can be combined very well with our other tuning accessories, because the operation is completely different, but the purpose is the same; Enjoy your music in a relaxed way!

The Tuning Disc is made of stainless steel and is equipped with felt at the bottom, to protect your valuable equipment. The format was not chosen by chance; the diameter is the same as that of a CD and the Tuning Disc can also be used to unclog CDs and DVDs before playing them.

Because the Tuning Disc spreads an energetic field in the horizontal plane, the disc can also be placed under equipment and speakers, without the need for direct contact with the disc.

What improvement can you expect:

- More relaxation when listening to your music.

- Music is perceived as more natural and pleasant. Listening fatigue doesn't stand a chance.

- Spatiality increases, because small details are better perceived.

Placement:

- On the preamp and phono amplifier.

- On the power amplifiers.

- On source equipment.

- On or under speakers.

- On power distributors and power conditioners, switch, modem.

- Anywhere in your set where interference fields negatively affect the sound.

unbelivable...

 

[Punter]

UFO's?

View attachment 294403

Akiko Audio - Audio Accessoires

Verbeter uw geluid, verminder EMI/RFI storingen door toepassing van Akiko Audio producten.

www.akikoaudio.com

142 Euros is a lot for a drink coaster

 

[Ruhled]

Do cable lifters perhaps have a legit benefit? With the heavy, garden hose size cables they are often used with it seems they might reduce the stress on the equipments' connectors?

 

[Galliardist]

Do cable lifters perhaps have a legit benefit? With the heavy, garden hose size cables they are often used with it seems they might reduce the stress on the equipments' connectors?

How many wrongs make a right?

 

[Keith_W]

Do cable lifters perhaps have a legit benefit? With the heavy, garden hose size cables they are often used with it seems they might reduce the stress on the equipments' connectors?

Maaaaaaaybe. If you had one of those super heavy audiophile cables and it happened to have poor terminations then yeah it probably could.

I think that cable lifters look nice. It reminds me of retro-futuristic cities:

Apart from cosmetics I can't think of any other objective benefit.

 

[Speedskater]

Do cable lifters perhaps have a legit benefit? With the heavy, garden hose size cables they are often used with it seems they might reduce the stress on the equipments' connectors?

I would think that the floor is a much more stable environment than hanging the cables in mid-air.

 

[MoreWatts]

Be very careful folks. This Furutech power cord reviewer at Part-Time Audiophile specifically states that CABLE LIFTERS were his 'gateway drug':

"Then I started reviewing all those Furutech NCF products, and I realized I had stumbled onto something unique. The Furutech NCF Boosters, those small but hefty trestles for all your cables, were truly my first venture into the world of noise suppression. I heard a difference by merely putting my ear close to the woofers of my speakers and immediately noticing a reduction in the electronic presence I heard when I merely laid a loudspeaker cable upon that cradle. Once I had experienced the improvements that NCF yielded, I started investigating grounding systems, power conditioners, Ethernet switches and components that use expensive raw materials known to reduce inductance, which creates noise."

The floor is your friend. Cable lifters only lead to a path of woe and misery...

 

[MarkS]

Some day I hope to be able to lift my cables with this:

 

[Short38]

The remaining significant problem to be addressed in the interconnect, power cable, and power purification spaces is longevity. I hope that the major players in this magic space will discover that these devices have a “half life” meaning they are really consumables. There is of course a razors edge here where the quality of product should never be questioned meaning the marketing needs create an understanding of “half life” by reference to responsible auto maintenance, particularly fluid changes and tire replacement.

An additional area that I have not seen discussed is the use of aftermarket cable cozies but this may be covered in another thread…

 

[robwpdx]

Up until 2019 there was a FB group posting built to order very large analog? power amps built by Asian vendors. I haven't found them in a search of ASR. They seem to be based on a Crown design, conventional power transformer up front, and rows of power devices in a fan-cooled heat sink tube.

Anyone know the story of these? Is the idea you need a very large generator to power them?

 

[Galliardist]

Up until 2019 there was a FB group posting built to order very large analog? power amps built by Asian vendors. I haven't found them in a search of ASR. They seem to be based on a Crown design, conventional power transformer up front, and rows of power devices in a fan-cooled heat sink tube.

Anyone know the story of these? Is the idea you need a very large generator to power them?

View attachment 298111View attachment 298112

I'm not sure these belong in the Extreme Snake Oil thread. Maybe start a new thread on them? They don't seem to be fakes and a lot of those old Crown designs are public domain now.

 

[antcollinet]

Be very careful folks. This Furutech power cord reviewer at Part-Time Audiophile specifically states that CABLE LIFTERS were his 'gateway drug':

"Then I started reviewing all those Furutech NCF products, and I realized I had stumbled onto something unique. The Furutech NCF Boosters, those small but hefty trestles for all your cables, were truly my first venture into the world of noise suppression. I heard a difference by merely putting my ear close to the woofers of my speakers and immediately noticing a reduction in the electronic presence I heard when I merely laid a loudspeaker cable upon that cradle. Once I had experienced the improvements that NCF yielded, I started investigating grounding systems, power conditioners, Ethernet switches and components that use expensive raw materials known to reduce inductance, which creates noise."

The floor is your friend. Cable lifters only lead to a path of woe and misery...

Inductance crates noise - who knew?

 

[egellings]

Inductance crates noise - who knew?

Hooda thunk? It's those capacitors, dammit, that are causing the noise problem, hey? As for those giant amplifiers, they could make sense for a stadium or similar large venue, although in that case, I'd go switch-mode and save a lot of waste heat energy.

 

[Sokel]

I saw just earlier a AC mains crossover.
Yep,it's made to exclude anything from 130Hz and up,20 kilos,it's (custom) price was 2.300$ back in 1976.
No visible brand,attached thick cable,painted with a similar coat that big transformers are painted,3 outlets.

Have you ever see such a thing?

 

[Killingbeans]

If it was a crossover, it would have two outputs. One that suppresses above 130Hz, and one that suppresses below.

What you're describing is a low pass filter. Was it designed specifically for audio playback, or was it an industrial component that was taken hostage by nitwits?

 

[Sokel]

If it was a crossover, it would have two outputs. One that suppresses above 130Hz, and one that suppresses below.

What you're describing is a low pass filter. Was it designed specifically for audio playback, or was it an industrial component that was taken hostage by nitwits?

Yes,your description is better.
My friend got a whole rig from the widow of a friend that passed away and was crazy about vintage,kept a record of everything he had with details,etc.
This thing was in the same rack (at the side-bottom but not sure if that was it's original place) with an EMT 927.

 

[Sequitur]

Not sure where to put this, hope this section is o.k. Anyway, was researching some reasonably-priced digital audio equipment than can play DSD and FLAC files, as I like the sound of them. I happened upon this recent review: Dreaming With a Stealth Audio Cables Power Cord. First thing is the price. According to the review,

offered to send me a sample of his company’s $8,200 Dream 20-20 power cord, I knew that it was an offer that I could not refuse. I have heard good things about Stealth’s products for many years. To boot, the 20-20 is a photogenic looker.

That is quite the price, for a power cord. But the piece goes on to claim a couple things I don't understand. For example:

On the outside, the Dream 20-20 features something that I have not seen before – a ferromagnetic collar that slides over the cord’s external length. Stealth states that moving the collar allows the user to tune the cord's "sound" by manipulating resonances in and around the signal path.

Does that make sense to you? A magnetic "collar" can "tune" a power cord's "sound"? It makes no sense. There's more jargon:

Just as an example, Stealth states, the 20-20's complex, vibration-reducing, matrix conductor geometry consists of 176 interwoven, individually isolated, oxygen-free copper wires that together are almost an inch thick.

Not understanding what this means, a no-vibration matrix conductor that has no oxygen. And finally,

Examining the rest of this impeccably-made power cord revealed an extreme attention to detail. The ground pin on the male version of the proprietary connectors, for example, is serrated, i.e., it has teeth that help the connector securely grip the AC receptacle.

Serrated teeth on a plug? What is that for? Here's a picture of it:

 

[delta76]

Typical extreme snake oil bullsh*t. None of those claims is true.

More in https://audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?threads/extreme-snake-oil.24765/

 

[delta76]

Oxygen free copper, ofc is a fairly common material in audio wires. Nothing special about it ( it is good material with low impedance and lasts longer, but that is about it). No material in a power cable will improve the sound, period.