Power to the People

Power conditioning is a big issue amongst audiophiles.  There are some exotic, expensive gear out there that supposedly provide better AC power to your gear.  I have some doubts about the necessity of some of this gear, but if you have the dough, try them out.

When I rewired my house, I put my stereo system on a separate circuit.  This made some sense, but may not be possible if buying an existing house.  I also used 12 gauge romex, houses today have downgraded to 14 guage (smaller diameter) electrical cable, which may be OK.  I also used 20amp, outlets which guaranteed a tight fit for my power cables.  These were not much of an additional expense.

I was also impressed by comments from Bob Carver that all decent audio gear has filtering built in.  I know enough about circuit analysis to see all the filtering and bypass caps universally used in gear.

Today you can buy super boxes that protect, filter, even regenerate the AC into your gear.  But why go from sine wave AC to square wave back to sine wave?  Seems like losses would enter into the equation.

I did find several recommendations for this power strip, even from Absolute Audio!  This strip provides plenty of outlets, has sophisticated surge protection, and noise filtering, all for under $200!  And all your equipment grounds are tied back to the same point. You can find it on Amazon and some local dealers.

 

Tributaries - T10 - 10 Outlet - Swivel Power Strip

I probably should add a note about the new switching mode power supplies many manufacturers are now using in their gear,  including in top of the line components.  Eliminating a huge power transformer reduces costs and is more efficient.  SMPSs do created high frequency noise, but filtering takes care of that.  I suspect that design of SWMSs also means no big AC power conditioning is needed.