Have your say & ask the experts

I'm looking at my next upgrade, and my aim is to improve picture quality. Having just had Sky+HD installed, I am generally impressed with most HD images, but I'm looking to improve things even more without replacing my TV (which isn't really an option for the foreseeable future).

I bought a Tacima CS929 mains conditioner a while back, which improved picture and sound considerably, especially for such an inexpensive item. But all mains cables for the TV, Blu-ray player and receiver remain of the bog standard, bundled variety.

Do you think some Clearer Audio Copper Line Alpha mains cables for the TV and Blu-ray player would make a difference to PQ worthy of the outlay? I'd get one for the receiver but its mains cable is (stupidly) integrated and non-removable.

I understand this is a subjective issue, but I'm interested in everyone's opinions, and especially the opinions of those who own these particular cables. The input of the What Hi-Fi team would also, of course, be greatly appreciated.

 

I brought this cable for my Sony Bravia and noticed an improvement in PQ for dvd and 360 hdmi, def worth the outlay.

I tried cables and conditioners with my plasma but without visible changes, i guess my picture is allready very good to me, i guess i have reasonable clean power to my house.

Soundwise however, i did try many different mains cables and compared them for a few days. The only cable that made a great improvement was a WireWorld, an Aurora to be more specefic. I could lend this from a dealer. Allthough this dealer  has a few brands like Chord among others, he only had very good results with the WireWorlds so far. He use this cable for his own system and is in the buissiness for more then 30 years, so he must be right as i witnessed the difference myself at home. The Wireworlds use a clever design that acts like a conditioner. I allready posted about these mains cables here on What Hifi and advised them to try them out, but it seems most people here are put of and stick with brands they know, and they aren't reviewed by What Hifi (yet) i think.

Liam19:

Do you think some Clearer Audio Copper Line Alpha mains cables for the TV and Blu-ray player would make a difference to PQ worthy of the outlay?

Dear Liam19

We have many customers using the Copper-line Alpha on TVs, projectors, blu-ray players etc. and picture quality usually improves significantly. We offer a 60 Day Money Back Guarantee so you can audition for yourself with your own system and if you are not fully satisfied with the results you can return for a refund. Also it is worth bearing in mind that it is best to use shielded power cables from your Tacima to your components since unshielded power cables can pick up airborne noise after filtering thereby undoing the good work done.

I hope this helps.

Best regards,
Darren

Well I took delivery of a Copper-line Alpha mains cable a few weeks ago now, which I immediately hooked up to my TV (replacing the freebie that came with it) and plugged into my Tacima CS929.

While the cable itself is thick and appears to be very well built, to be honest I was pushed to see much of a difference in terms of PQ. It may be just a little cleaner, I suppose, but the difference wasn't nearly as obvious to me as that made by the Tacima.

 Now I face another dilemma. I had always planned to later fit two more Alphas to my Blu-ray player and Sky+HD box (both of which are also on freebie cables, which look particularly thin and flimsy next to the Alpha!). This would give me the peace of mind of having good cabling throughout my system, ensuring the best performance possible. But my relative indifference to the cable's effect on the TV has left me pondering endlessly whether or not I should bother to finish off the upgrade?

I suppose my main questions are:

1) Could fitting an Alpha to my Sky+HD box improve picture and/or sound quality?

2) Would fitting an Alpha to my Blu-ray player potentially improve sound quality in particular, since it is my player decoding HD audio tracks and converting them to multichannel analogue?

3) Could fitting a Figure 8 adaptor to the end of an Alpha (a necessary addition for use with the Sky box and Blu-ray) affect the cable's performance? 

The answers to your questions (these are my opinions, but if you look at my kit list, I have done quite a few tests!!!)

1) Yes to both.

2) It does with mine using HDMI cables.

3) The figure 8 adaptors, in my opinion, are unsatisfactory....the alpha falls out of them, ot the figure 8 adaptor falls out of the machine if anything is moved/knocked. Instead I cut the figure 8 cable that came with my blu ray/dvd recorder about 4 inches from the figure 8 (disconnected of course). Stripped the wire and added one of these onto it....look at 'Male IEC adaptor'

http://www.cleareraudio.com/onlinestore/Accessories.html

Then plug in the alpha into it and job's done....It better as it puts less weight/strain onto the actual socket in the machine, thus it does not 'fall out' as much.

Now, the best part.......alpha is a good cable, but.........

I have borrowed and bought more expensive mains cables, and I'm afraid the more you spend the better it gets!!!

The Chord Superscreen (£65) is a step up, even on my £150 Sony blu ray player....more mature sounding (with music blu ray's).....

Then the Chord Power Chord (£130) is even better (truely amazing difference).....more detail, separation midrange and much deeper bass. Again, that cable is really used on my cd player, but I tried it on my sony blu ray last night, and I'm tempted to upgrade my alpha to it.

Again, the alpha is very good.....it's like everything else though, the more you spend, then better it gets!!!!

Forgot to say.......when using the alpha on my tv, I noticed very little difference too. These cables are much more effective on source components........like blu ray, dvd recorder, and cd players.

Even trying one on my receiver, the difference was nominal compared with the other components mentioned in this post......

Liam19:

Well I took delivery of a Copper-line Alpha mains cable a few weeks ago now, which I immediately hooked up to my TV (replacing the freebie that came with it) and plugged into my Tacima CS929.

While the cable itself is thick and appears to be very well built, to be honest I was pushed to see much of a difference in terms of PQ. It may be just a little cleaner, I suppose, but the difference wasn't nearly as obvious to me as that made by the Tacima.

 Now I face another dilemma. I had always planned to later fit two more Alphas to my Blu-ray player and Sky+HD box (both of which are also on freebie cables, which look particularly thin and flimsy next to the Alpha!). This would give me the peace of mind of having good cabling throughout my system, ensuring the best performance possible. But my relative indifference to the cable's effect on the TV has left me pondering endlessly whether or not I should bother to finish off the upgrade?

I suppose my main questions are:

1) Could fitting an Alpha to my Sky+HD box improve picture and/or sound quality?

2) Would fitting an Alpha to my Blu-ray player potentially improve sound quality in particular, since it is my player decoding HD audio tracks and converting them to multichannel analogue?

3) Could fitting a Figure 8 adaptor to the end of an Alpha (a necessary addition for use with the Sky box and Blu-ray) affect the cable's performance? 

I would recommend going up to the Copper-linefor the Blu-ray player, it makes quite a big difference to both with the biggest being to the sound.  That MGM lion has never sounded so good!

Hi there

Ive had good results (so far) with buying a Tacima 6 way conditioner, putting a ferrite magnet on my amp mains (its a fixed lead so difficult to upgrade to shielded) & making my own mains cable for my PS3.

The soundstage has improved alot - no placebo'd effects at all, it did make a difference.

As for my own mains, the ps3 - i will be honest i have not noticed much difference, perhaps a little smoother & more defined in colour but can not gurantee that. But again the sound quality is better, so im thinking the Tacima has done most of the work, but making my own lead will not have made it worse. Plus with all my wires & wireless & ethernet leads etc & mains wire, it will definately be helping against the interferance.

I am going to make my own lead for the Panny plasma & sky HD when that turns up. As the price thats charged for mains is OTT for myself, so i made my own as i like a bit of DIY

I also shortened the Tacima from 2m to 1m & used a MK silver plated toughplug & 13 amp SEM silver plated fuse.

My own PS3 lead consisted of MK tough plug & Fig 8 (C7) plugs both silver plated, a SEM silver plated 5 amp fuse, high content silver weld for the fig 8 connections & Supra LoRad mains shielded, twisted cable 1.5mm silver wire.  Very high shielding, can deffo recommend this cable. It can run 10amps, which is way more than req'd. & overall its far cheaper making it myself.  I also have nice braided black sleeving that expands & fits around the cables & some heat shrink to give it the 'professional' finish!

Edit to say, i did have a tight fit with the 1.5mm cable into the fig 8 plug, for you to bare in mind, i had to cut the sleeving back to the start of the plug & run just the 2 wires in for the connections, but with careful cutting, heat shrinking & patience it turned out well.

So to finish off i will get 2 more MK silver coated plugs, another fig 8 silver coated plug & i have an IEC plug silver plated already. I will also be buying 3 mtrs of the supra lorad 1.5 for the tv & skyhd.

Don't forget the copper-line alpha is clearer audio's entry line cable.  The also do copper-line and silver-line which are better quality cables still (and both WHSV 5 star rated I believe).

I don't know if the Copper Line Alpha cables specifically need time to run in, but when I connected mine to my tv, there wasn't a noticeable difference to my eyes. But I thought I'd keep it for most of the 60 day return period just to see it the picture improved.

Near the end of the period, I went back to my old cable, and the difference was quite noticeable. The picture with the CA cable was much cleaner and sharper than with my standard cable. Needless to say, I never returned it.

Just give it time before dismissing it, or deciding whether or not to upgrade other cables.