Nordost QKore grounding unit

audio.bill said:
I don't know how exact I can be, but I will attempt to share my understanding of what they are referring to by "artificially cleaned ground points". Such grounding systems generally attempt to remove noise in the ground, to lower the residual noise in the reference ground point of the system. They do so by effectively filtering the ground to remove undesired noise, but exactly how they accomplish that is not generally shared and likely considered to be proprietary. I have seen some similar products that use a ribbon or plate conductor which is connected to the ground and is immersed in a cavity filled with select rare earth elements which claim to filter noise in the ground. What Nordost refers to as low voltage attractor plates could be referring to such a conductor being used in their filter implementation. I cannot explain the science behind the reactions involved nor to the effectiveness of this type of noise filtering, but am just sharing what I've read about such designs. Nordost's implementation also provides independent clean grounds for the AC power grounds (QKORE1) and the signal grounds (QKORE3). I also found another description (likely also from other Nordost product description) which states: "the Low-Voltage Attractor Plates (LVAPs), constructed with a proprietary metal alloy and a passive electronic circuit, in order to draw stray high frequency noise and voltage-generated magnetic fields to a manufactured earth point, leaving a clean reference behind." Hopefully this additional info is helpful, but of course it doesn't explain their implementation in full detail.
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Thank you Bill, appreciate it. What you describe is exactly the point of the experiment.

Most of what you cite, is marketing speak with self-invented words that could mean anything. Therefore it is not really helpful. What becomes evident from it, however, is that the QKore is a purely passive device meant to provide grounding for components. I understand that a proprietary metal alloy might be used to provide grounding, for reason or not. What an electrical circuit should achieve, in a device not being connected to a power outlet, escapes me.

Therefore, I wanted to test what simply grounding the components to a common ground could bring. For this I chose a substantial piece of a very conducting material to connect the devices to. And it obviously achieves something.

Therefore, I really would like to see a tear-down of the QKore to understand what actually is inside. I think one purpose of the excessive pricing is to disincentivise such attempts.

I am not claiming my experiment does what the QKore does, because I don’t know what it does, except to provide grounding. But I even more question the cost of 5,9K w/o cables for the QKore6 in the EU. That might be pretty excessive for what it actually does, if the Nordost grounding wires are to be used as a reference.


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Bar81 said:
Is everybody clear that there are different types of grounding - chassis, signal and mains earth?

It seems like there's a lot of mixing of types. That copper bar hack job a few posts up is chassis grounding (as are the Tripoint products) while QKore to my knowledge seems to be signal grounding and mains earth grounding (not that it couldn't also be used for chassis grounding - similar to the CAD GC products I use). You don't use the same unit for more than one type of grounding unless it has some type of separation of grounds between the different posts on the back (which is an unusual setup, but it seems at least one of the QKore units is designed to be used for both signal and mains earth grounding at the same time).
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The copper bar is providing common ground for device signal outputs. It would be an idea to also add mains earth. But I don’t have a means to do that so far, as the AQ Niagara does not provide a ground connector similar to the Nordost power bar.

I think the QKore6 offers signal ground and mains earth in one box, as you can also ground the power bar.


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Kuoppis said:
The copper bar is providing common ground for device signal outputs. It would be an idea to also add mains earth. But I don’t have a means to do that so far, as the AQ Niagara does not provide a ground connector similar to the Nordost power bar.
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My bad, I didn't notice the top of the picture, I remember just the bottom part of the and had assumed the top of the cable was the same - it's clearly signal ground.

You don't need a ground connector although that helps. You can simply use a power plug end plugged into your powerstrip.
 
Bar81 said:
My bad, I didn't notice the top of the picture, I remember just the bottom part of the and had assumed the top of the cable was the same - it's clearly signal ground.

You don't need a ground connector although that helps. You can simply use a power plug end plugged into your powerstrip.
Click to expand...

That’s what I also concluded. I will just configure a Schucko plug with only the ground connector attached.


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All set. Added a ground-only cable from the Niagara to the CopperKore (that’s how I’m going to call it). Now I have signal and mains ground together.

There’s definitely a WAF factor to the copper bar as well, my wife likes it. Only meaningful audio purchase so far, she contends. Except, she insists I should only buy gold bars from now on.

Whatever the heck it does, it sounds just wonderful.

82d6cd3fd4605cae47afb215be7c32a2.jpg



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Color me perplexed.

I started this CopperCore challenge a bit semi-seriously, just to challenge Nordost’s outrageous pricing for this purely passive QKore unit. I did not expect much, except a bit of fun, tongue-in-cheek. But bloody hell, this thing works. It absolutely has a tremendous impact on SQ, in respect to detail retrieval, dynamics, bass heft, structure of the music. And the impact is not at all subtle. Not at all.

A couple of weeks back I tinkered with my system and then started to listen. But the music sounded dull, lifeless, thin, not dynamic at all. Investigating the problem I found that I had forgotten to connect the cable connecting the power amp to the CopperCore. Reconnected, problem solved, I was a bit surprised by the difference.

Last week a friend recommended a vocal jazz album. So I bought the vinyl release (China Moses, Nightintales - posted in the vinyl thread). This time however the vinyl sounded pretty dull. First I thought the guy had recommended something that was not well recorded. But what made me wonder, is that he is also a rather committed audiophile and pretty much knows his stuff. So I checked out the digital version on Tidal, and it was great.

The thing is, I usually like my vinyl setup. As a matter of fact, digital and vinyl, are usually both quite ok in my system. So I started pondering why the vinyl and digital versions sounded so different. The only delta I could come up with was, that while the preamp as such is grounded to the CopperCore, the vinyl ground was not.

A bit more cable mongering and drilling, and the TT grounding was also connected to the CopperCore. Et voilà, there it was, the beautiful vinyl sound with details, dynamics, structure, great bass and all.

To be honest, I would have never guessed this €150,- hack would one day become a critical component in my six figure system.

Go figure [emoji15].


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Kuoppis said:
Color me perplexed.

I started this CopperCore challenge a bit semi-seriously, just to challenge Nordost’s outrageous pricing for this purely passive QKore unit. I did not expect much, except a bit of fun, tongue-in-cheek. But bloody hell, this thing works. It absolutely has a tremendous impact on SQ, in respect to detail retrieval, dynamics, bass heft, structure of the music. And the impact is not at all subtle. Not at all.

A couple of weeks back I tinkered with my system and then started to listen. But the music sounded dull, lifeless, thin, not dynamic at all. Investigating the problem I found that I had forgotten to connect the cable connecting the power amp to the CopperCore. Reconnected, problem solved, I was a bit surprised by the difference.

Last week a friend recommended a vocal jazz album. So I bought the vinyl release (China Moses, Nightintales - posted in the vinyl thread). This time however the vinyl sounded pretty dull. First I thought the guy had recommended something that was not well recorded. But what made me wonder, is that he is also a rather committed audiophile and pretty much knows his stuff. So I checked out the digital version on Tidal, and it was great.

The thing is, I usually like my vinyl setup. As a matter of fact, digital and vinyl, are usually both quite ok in my system. So I started pondering why the vinyl and digital versions sounded so different. The only delta I could come up with was, that while the preamp as such is grounded to the CopperCore, the vinyl ground was not.

A bit more cable mongering and drilling, and the TT grounding was also connected to the CopperCore. Et voilà, there it was, the beautiful vinyl sound with details, dynamics, structure, great bass and all.

To be honest, I would have never guessed this €150,- hack would one day become a critical component in my six figure system.

Go figure [emoji15].


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Click to expand...

I think your spot on.

Now create a mechanically tuned case, some nice packaging and only include a couple of cables and charge for all additional then market the hell out it and you may just slip into the audio industry.

Point I’m trying to make is this all starts somewhere.


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I think you’re right, that’s how it usually starts.

But in my case the limitation is, that I do run a unit with hundreds of people in a major corporation. So my business interests lie elsewhere [emoji3].
 
Kuoppis said:
Hi Bill, as I am not familiar with the technology, what are Low Voltage Attractor Plates, technically speaking?


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In the rest of the electrical world, a Low Voltage Plates eliminate the need for an electrical box where low voltage Class 2 circuits are used. Namely wall plates. Attractor plates, right !
 
Nice job Kuoppis. I'm on track to make one of those myself. So far all I have done is taken a 10 gauge military spec silver coated wire and ran it from my distribution block parallel to my power wire down into my panel. I noticed an immediate calm come over the system. It was much better then prior.

For a while now I have heard people saying double the ground in your system. Even double the neutral. It would be something akin to your power cord having a 12 gauge on the hot and a 10 on the neutral and ground.

If you read the grounding this ain't no joke thread by ultra-fast, you'll see I'm a little spun up myself over grounding. I posted what I find to be an interesting Mike Holt video last night. I'm going to try and drive ground rods 40 or 50 ft at my house. I would then be hoping to have a ground system such as yours tied to my ground rods via my service, using that same silver coated military-spec wire.

I have slowly been building a new distribution power strip for my system. I bought 1/2 inch by 3/4 inch ofc copper bars. I have been Drilling and tapping them to make my power strip. I figure I could get a plate of ofc copper like you have, then drill and tap making a Connection Pointe for all the new ground leads. Thanks for doing the experimental work and validating it Work's in your setup. I have two other friends who did the similar to no effect. They did not go to a dense solid bar of copper. They went to the Earth ground in there power strips. I myself have taken ground wires from my chassis grounds to my power strip to no effect. I have heard going to the RCA's is better.
 
Darn, I have no open RCA on my gear accept for my preamp. All I have is chassis grounds. I will still try grounds to a dense bar. Maybe it is also absorbing and damping micro vibrations at any frequency that is on the line. Maybe a strap works better to that affect than round wire? Hmmm.
 
Kingrex said:
Nice job Kuoppis. I'm on track to make one of those myself. So far all I have done is taken a 10 gauge military spec silver coated wire and ran it from my distribution block parallel to my power wire down into my panel. I noticed an immediate calm come over the system. It was much better then prior.

For a while now I have heard people saying double the ground in your system. Even double the neutral. It would be something akin to your power cord having a 12 gauge on the hot and a 10 on the neutral and ground.

If you read the grounding this ain't no joke thread by ultra-fast, you'll see I'm a little spun up myself over grounding. I posted what I find to be an interesting Mike Holt video last night. I'm going to try and drive ground rods 40 or 50 ft at my house. I would then be hoping to have a ground system such as yours tied to my ground rods via my service, using that same silver coated military-spec wire.

I have slowly been building a new distribution power strip for my system. I bought 1/2 inch by 3/4 inch ofc copper bars. I have been Drilling and tapping them to make my power strip. I figure I could get a plate of ofc copper like you have, then drill and tap making a Connection Pointe for all the new ground leads. Thanks for doing the experimental work and validating it Work's in your setup. I have two other friends who did the similar to no effect. They did not go to a dense solid bar of copper. They went to the Earth ground in there power strips. I myself have taken ground wires from my chassis grounds to my power strip to no effect. I have heard going to the RCA's is better.
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Cool. Will be interesting to see what you find out.

I think it might make sense to have quite a solid grounding core. Mine is 5 Kg solid copper.


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Kingrex said:
Darn, I have no open RCA on my gear accept for my preamp. All I have is chassis grounds. I will still try grounds to a dense bar. Maybe it is also absorbing and damping micro vibrations at any frequency that is on the line. Maybe a strap works better to that affect than round wire? Hmmm.
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Rex, parallel grounding the pre will be a significant gain


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Hello Everyone, I am very interested in finding out what this ‘copperKore’ does. Do you still use it Kuoppis? I just wondered, how exactly do I connect the speaker wire to a) RCA and b) ethernet plug for grounding purposes?
 
ElieD said:
Hello Everyone, I am very interested in finding out what this ‘copperKore’ does. Do you still use it Kuoppis? I just wondered, how exactly do I connect the speaker wire to a) RCA and b) ethernet plug for grounding purposes?
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Don’t connect it to the speaker.


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Hello Mike, I will have to rephrase. I am not planning on grounding my speakers but Kuoppis used some speaker wire as grounding cable for his equipment. I wondered how u would connect the grounding wire ( in this case some speaker wire) to the rca plug and the ethernet plug, for grounding, technically?
 
Hi, I see this is a bit of an old thread but I hope still a current topic. Grounding issues always exist and QKore also still does ;-)

I have become increasingly interested in the QKore, or similar, because I have been haunted by a slight noise issue for a year (when I first noticed it). My magico Q3 speaker tweeter and midrange both hiss and hum a bit (audible at about 1m in complete nocturnal silence), where L + R are the same and independentof amp volume. Note: I find this noise to be too much for such gear, where reviews and manufacturers talk about how low the noise of the apparatus is and how black or silent the background is. I know that a tweeter will always hiss a little bit, but the midrange too?

I have tried many things to find the cause or source, like:
  • Firstly I disconnected XLRs of pre from poweramp: noise seriously reduced, still a light crackling when ear on top of tweeter. Now I reconnect pre and poweramp to find cause at preamp or other input sources or power.
  • Use an ungrounded wall socket: no difference
  • Change XLR cables between pre and poweramp: no difference
  • Disconnect all inputs to preamp: no difference
  • Changed (upgraded) power cables to pre and poweramp: no difference
  • Swapped the used AC sockets on my QB8 of the various components and even removed all but the amps: no difference
  • Changed preamp and poweramp: no difference :oops: (I tried a Soulution 511 poweramp with Vitus MP-L201 and a Zanden 3100 and also with a Gryphon Antileon EVO poweramp and now even with a Gryphon Commander preamp). Still same noise/ hiss in tweeter and midrange speaker.
  • Turned off/unplugged all wifi, switches, Bluetooth and Philips Hue lighting etc in the house: no difference.
  • Removed metal objects close to the equipment in case they could serve as antennas for noise: no difference
Every time I change or upgrade something I hope I have solved the issue but so far no luck. The fact that disconnecting pre from power is the only thing that reduces the noise, still gives me hope. And considering all I have tried , the only thing I can think of is the grouding. I presume that my Gryphon's have incredibly capable power supplies so the AC power should be clean but that ground is still the same, possibly noisy, ground as in the wallsocket. Nevertheless, I feel a bit lost... Am I paranoid ? ... are there solutions?

So, I am wondering whether a QKore is the device that cures the issue.

Any experiences, opinions or advices?

Thanks!
 
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pietpara said:
Hi, I see this is a bit of an old thread but I hope still a current topic. Grounding issues always exist and QKore also still does ;-)

I have become increasingly interested in the QKore, or similar, because I have been haunted by a slight noise issue for a year (when I first noticed it). My magico Q3 speaker tweeter and midrange both hiss and hum a bit (audible at about 1m in complete nocturnal silence), where L + R are the same and independentof amp volume. Note: I find this noise to be too much for such gear, where reviews and manufacturers talk about how low the noise of the apparatus is and how black or silent the background is. I know that a tweeter will always hiss a little bit, but the midrange too?

I have tried many things to find the cause or source, like:
  • Firstly I disconnected XLRs of pre from poweramp: noise seriously reduced, still a light crackling when ear on top of tweeter. Now I reconnect pre and poweramp to find cause at preamp or other input sources or power.
  • Use an ungrounded wall socket: no difference
  • Change XLR cables between pre and poweramp: no difference
  • Disconnect all inputs to preamp: no difference
  • Changed (upgraded) power cables to pre and poweramp: no difference
  • Swapped the used AC sockets on my QB8 of the various components and even removed all but the amps: no difference
  • Changed preamp and poweramp: no difference :oops: (I tried a Soulution 511 poweramp with Vitus MP-L201 and a Zanden 3100 and also with a Gryphon Antileon EVO poweramp and now even with a Gryphon Commander preamp). Still same noise/ hiss in tweeter and midrange speaker.
  • Turned off/unplugged all wifi, switches, Bluetooth and Philips Hue lighting etc in the house: no difference.
  • Removed metal objects close to the equipment in case they could serve as antennas for noise: no difference
Every time I change or upgrade something I hope I have solved the issue but so far no luck. The fact that disconnecting pre from power is the only thing that reduces the noise, still gives me hope. And considering all I have tried , the only thing I can think of is the grouding. I presume that my Gryphon's have incredibly capable power supplies so the AC power should be clean but that ground is still the same, possibly noisy, ground as in the wallsocket. Nevertheless, I feel a bit lost... Am I paranoid ? ... are there solutions?

So, I am wondering whether a QKore is the device that cures the issue.

Any experiences, opinions or advices?

Thanks!
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Hiss is a full range sound so yes, if you hear it in the tweeter you'll hear it in the midrange and woofer too.

Messing with your power is unlikely to do anything to fix this. Changing the gain of your amplifier will.

To me this sounds like your speakers are a bit more sensitive so don't match the excessive gain that your amp has. More powerful amps tend to have more gain so that when driving an inefficient speaker, the preamp does not have to work any harder to make that all work.

The applecart is upset when you try to use a higher power amp with a more sensitive speaker- then the noise floor of the preamp and amp together (as you found out) becomes more audible. If your amp has settings to reduce the gain that would allow you to deal with the problem.

BTW if you need to be within a meter to hear this issue its not a big deal (all electronics have noise). It doesn't affect the sound at the listening chair.
 
Thanks atmasphere,

I can't argue with what you're saying about the speaker sensitivity vs amps :-) Unfortunately I cannot change gain of the poweramp. Or, can I? I can change the bias current from low to medium and high, which sets the amount of Class A power, according to Gryphon. But that doesn't affect level of hiss.

It's just that I've never heard this amount of hiss from such high-end equipment before. Some hiss from a tweeter with your ear right next to the tweeter, yes, but at 1m and even from the midrange, I don't expect.
Moreover, other pre and poweramps I've tried, give the same hiss.
Note that it’s also the same for left and right and independent of volume setting.

I then wonder what one refers to when manufacturers or reviewers say that an amp has an extremely low noise floor, black backgrounds, dark space etc. I'd expect that means very little to no hiss at all.

Yet, I am starting to (have to 😉) believe what you're saying.

Cheers
 
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