I'm certainly no stranger to exploring various AC outlets.
https://www.whatsbestforum.com/showthread.php?23376-Fun-with-Metallurgy&highlight=metallurgy (see post#4; these are just one set of matched pairs, each with 30 or 40 amp dedicated lines that drives my Soulution monobloc amps and JL Gotham subs).
As many know, I am not fond of rhodium outlets or rhodium terminations on interconnects, and while I prefer the top end of the GTX-D gold AC receptacles, I agree they do have a slightly warm midrange coloration and sluggish low end. The Oyaide R1 connectors had a lovely top end, but was not the last work in bass definition. Therefore I keep returning to good old copper/brass AC outlets such as the Shunyta CopperCONNS or the plain jane-but fine sounding- Hubbell 8200 but keep wondering, what else is out there that might be superior?
Recently I've been exploring Stealth Silver AC sockets for AC power to my amps.
http://stealthaudioelectronics.com/silver-socket/
There are as many audiophile opinions on silver as there are applications for its use. I've avoided silver for a long time based on bad experiences from silver coated copper wires in the past. But there are plenty of audiophiles who think highly of silver wires when used in certain applications, for example, tonearm wiring. In addition, some cable companies such as Synergistic Research also use pure silver in their interconnects to favorable reviews. There are several good reasons to consider silver. First, the conductivity of silver is unquestioned. In addition, one of its most attractive properties is that, like gold and copper, silver is a dimagnetic metal (i.e. not attracted to magnetic fields due to having unpaired electrons in their outermost orbit, unlike paramagnetic metals such as rhodium, platinum, palladium etc.) But let's skip the metallurgy mumbo jumbo. Do silver AC receptacles sound good? It's still an experiment in progress, but so far, I'm encouraged.
Break-in took about 5-7 days and followed a typical pattern; day 1 was decent, degrading to horrible sound by day 3, with recovery largely occurring by day 5. The tell-tale sign that break-in is complete is when the bass “comes in”, which occurs last and in this case, was complete by day 7. And believe me, with Soulution 511 monoblocs, you will have no doubt about hearing when the bass comes in.
Sonically, I’m impressed. The biggest audible difference occurred in an area I didn’t anticipate- a marked reduction of harshness and glare on loud dynamic passages. There was a smoothness and linearity to the sound that eluded me with all the previous AC outlets I’ve tried in my “lab”. I might also agree that a bit of haze seemed removed in general- the so called “more open window” effect, but I need to validate this further by switching back to my control outlets.
Is the benefit of the Stealth outlet simply due to a modest ~2.85x increase (vs. brass) in conductivity with the silver outlet? Is it due to the fact that silver is dimagnetic as opposed to paramagnetic nickel flashed over copper? Was it a lack of “battery effect” from using pure silver vs other outlets which use plating of dissimilar metals? All of the above? I honestly have no idea but I like what I heard and thus I am now prompted to continue the “silverization” experiment to its logical conclusion. If changing one receptacle in the AC pathway to silver was beneficial, it seems to me changing the AC male prong and the IEC connector of my power cord would be equally advantageous so will likely pursue some additional "silverization" with silver AC plugs and IEC connectors if things remain positive with further listening. As I've said before, it's not just a composition of a single AC connector or plug that's important. It's what you are connecting it to that matters just as much, if not more. And of course, what might sound good with my Tara Cobalt AC cables with highly specified ancillary gear, just might not sound good with another brand of AC cables or other ancillary gear. We shall see.
