[Nyal Mellor]

Ok these pages are still a work in progress but do contain some useful stuff about power and links to places where you can do further reading...http://www.acousticfrontiers.com/Why-Care-About-Power-and-Grounding.html

There is a lot of bs and not much science in av power product marketing, and it is an area that has been interesting to me of late. I would broadly divide the benefits of power products into two areas - protection and performance enhancement.

My take so far is that the ability to support the current draw peaks (I.e. dynamic load) is very very important...more to come on this from me at some point.

At least have your system surge protected. That would be a minimum.

[gold]

Majority of manufactures don't recommend Power Conditioners.  However, my PS Audio PPP, P5 and P10 made significant improvements in all areas.  The sound is cleaner with better staging, imaging and bloom.  I consider them a must in my audio systems. 

[Geardaddy]

Nyal, for the sake of thread flow, what specific aspects of power conditioning is bs and why...

[Tubeburner]

I am often amazed at the opinions formed by the uninformed. I studied engineering, but I am not an engineer. I am certified in electrical to trouble shoot and repair all types of electrical. At one point, I felt I did not need power conditioning. I had dedicated circuits, why do I need conditioning? I got a good price on a well known high end conditioner. I gave it a listen and heard some good things around notes that I never heard before. The sound stage had shrunk a bit. I am also a DIY'er. I build my own wire and have made huge improvements over some very expensive wire. Was it Belden, no. Power conditioners are built to a price point. I replaced the substandard IEC with a Furutech Gold and replaced the internal wiring with military spec silver wire. I also spent time making the grounds better and silver soldered where solder was necessary. Now the sound stage is huge and the bass is all there along with the whole musical spectrum. I use wire that has a sound I like. Whether it is your cup of tea, may differ, but this is just impressive to me. Would I go without power conditioning? No way. I am sold and this is from experience and my ears. You can't learn that from a book. My 2 cents.

[Nyal Mellor]

Nyal, for the sake of thread flow, what specific aspects of power conditioning is bs and why...

Hi, I am referring more to the marketing of power products for AV. It is one of those areas where:

- consumers have a general lack of understanding of what power issues there are, which ones they might have and which product solves which issue
- manufacturers add to this confusion by developing marketing material with lots of acronyms and 'proprietary' technologies
- magazines do not generally review power products
- there is a lack of even high level agreement on how to measure the efficacy of power products for high performance AV use
- 99.9999% of written material out there on power quality is from an industrial or computer perspective which have a somewhat different set of power requirements than AV systems

But really for me, and maybe this is my  , it does not seem complicated. Certainly compared to room acoustics it is an order of magnitude simpler in terms of variables to contend with.

From a performance perspective I have an instinct that the ability to deliver the current draw requirements of our AV systems is of equal if not greater importance than noise reduction. I am doing further research in this area and will hopefully be able to put together some findings at some point.

From a protection perspective I have a more conclusive answer which is that MOV based protection except at the service panel (i.e. a whole house surge protector) is not a good idea for any sensitive electronics. The only technology out there which conceptually makes sense in this application is series mode surge protection, offered by a number of companies but interestingly NOT by many others, I believe because it is patent protected and therefore subject to licensing costs.

I recommend the following book which is a little out of date in some aspects (its a book about computer power written in 1987!) and focused on specifics of computer power but provides an quite thorough briefing on power issues and technologies: http://www.amazon.com/PC-Power-Protection-Mark-Waller/dp/0672226375

[Geardaddy]

Nyal, I agree.  Current delivery or limitations thereof seem critical.  I think that is why a lot of people have developed an inherent bias against conditioning due to prior generation technologies limiting it.  I also agree on the room acoustic issue.  I am working with Starsound technologies (most of whom are engineers), and the room game is supremely complicated in comparison.

[Soundminded]

1+ to that comment.

As I "evolve" in this hobby (or become progressively more deceived... ), I have realized that room and power are foundational.  I do a fair amount of blinded testing of non-audiophiles to make sure I am not the victim of witchcraft.  Power conditioners do make a difference.  I do agree with Soundminded in that good, regulated power supplies should be relatively impervious to power disturbances.   However, the sonic differences with and without my conditioner (Dale Pitcher's Thereom) is glaring.  You go from relatively flat, cardboard sounding to a more 3d soundstage, decay, etc.  And that is with equipment that possesses large, regulated power supplies from manufacturers who state that conditioners are deleterious to their products performance. 

So, Soundmind, what pearls can you throw our way?  Do whole-house grounding schemes (ionic) make a difference?  Isolation transformers?  What should we be doing? 

Soundmind, when did you graduate from EE?  It seems as if many tools I know believe most of audio is witchcraft.  The blinded experiments from the 80s which apparently demonstrated that coat hangers are equivalent to expensive wire seems to be part of your textbook, knowledge base.  Here is a question for you:  do you believe power products or wire can effect timing errors (jitter) in the digital domain?  Is there any good science to demonstrate why any of this makes a difference?

Suffice it to say that I graduated from a small engineering school you probably never heard of in 1969. They made the courses as tough as they possibly could.

" Do whole-house grounding schemes (ionic) make a difference?"

They shouldn't. Residential buildings, especially wood frame houses are invariably star grounding systems (radial systems) virtually identical to isolated grounding in industrial buildings.  This is because in wood frame buildings unlike industrial buildings which use metal boxes mounted on metal studs which are grounded there are no opportunities for multiple paths to ground especially if the system is confined to one circuilt or where multiple circuits in the same room share a single ground return wire to the panel. Even if this isn't true a residential building is so small it's hard to establish much difference in ground potential between one part of the building and another. The use of IG receptacles in this type of building is therefore superfluous and rediculous. They are of dubious value even in industrial buildings although I specify them if asked. Their extra cost is marginal.

"The blinded experiments from the 80s which apparently demonstrated that coat hangers are equivalent to expensive wire seems to be part of your textbook"

In analog systems that would be a very bad mistake. Carrying a digital signal, if a coat hanger works at all it should work perfectly. That's one of the beauties of digital signals, the systems either function perfectly or they don't work at all. The only exception is where momentary dropouts lead to operation of bit error correction systems usually interpolating to fill in missing data for brief periods. If this sounds better to someone than the actual data say by clouding a cd with residue from some substance they're entitled to their opinion.

So called "power regenerators" are nothing more than a double static conversion UPS without a battery charger or batteries. IMO they should be compared to the genuine article like those I've indicated in other postings. The one that I've seen advertised recently has claimed marginally lower THD than most comparable UPSs. I doubt that makes any difference. Personally if I were in the market for such a device I'd buy on reputation in the power industry and price. The two brands I've mentioned most are those I believe to be most reliable although they're probably not the cheapest.  I've also posted elsewhere that IMO most sound systems will not benefit from anything more than an adequate MOV to protect them from damage due to overvoltage say from a spike.

Power disturbances have been very carefully and thoroughly studied. They are broken down into 9 categories, some of them carry highly technical names such as common mode noise and transverse mode noise while othes are more self evident such as voltage sags, dips, and total loss of power. As I also posted, a UPS will have a bypass mode. Not only does this facillitate repair without interruption which can be a very important feature when used to support data processing and laboratory equipment, in this case it would allow comparing the unit's effect in and out of the power circuit. Power condioners which increase in impedance including progressively as more current is drawn can restrict current flow to high powered amplifiers that are playing loudly. Some may find the result pleasing but from an electrical performance point of view it is clearly a defect.   
   

[vhiner]

Michael Fremer of Stereophile and Robert Harley of The Absolute Sound are both convinced that recently developed  DTCD measurements (this is easily googled if you don't know what DTCD is) explain why previous electronical engineering "theory" is misapplied to the performance of sensitive audio equipment.

But even if one doubts DTCD measurements (they or something like them will become a standard tool in the industry), one thing is indisputable: there isn't a reputable professional sound recording engineer/masterer who *doesn't* buy and use specialty power conditioning/power cords for his/her studio in order to improve component performance. That fact should tell us something. But we live in a world where people doubt a all kinds of reality they can't explain, let alone refute.

[grsimmon]

Michael Fremer of Stereophile and Robert Harley of The Absolute Sound are both convinced that recently developed  DTCD measurements (this is easily googled if you don't know what DTCD is) explain why previous electronical engineering "theory" is misapplied to the performance of sensitive audio equipment.

But even if one doubts DTCD measurements (they or something like them will become a standard tool in the industry), one thing is indisputable: there isn't a reputable professional sound recording engineer/masterer who *doesn't* buy and use specialty power conditioning/power cords for his/her studio in order to improve component performance. That fact should tell us something. But we live in a world where people doubt a all kinds of reality they can't explain, let alone refute.

Please,  enlighten us with the very very long list of all the recording studios that use specialty power cords to improve the sound....

[vhiner]

Please,  enlighten us with the very very long list of all the recording studios that use specialty power cords to improve the sound....

Bob Ludwig and Doug Sax to name just two. Two of the finest, nicest men in the entire business...so you might think twice about laughing at them.  Questioning their lengthy credentials and reputation should keep you busy enough. 

[jtwrace]

http://www.barrydiamentaudio.com/studio.htm

[Soundminded]

Please,  enlighten us with the very very long list of all the recording studios that use specialty power cords to improve the sound....

My hunch is that power "conditioning" equipment, particularly a UPS and most likely a backup generator would be required in constructing a studio for a large commercial recording company. It isn't just to preclude the possibility of noise but the cost of losing a take due to a power outage given how much money it costs to arrange for one makes it worthwhile. There are often multiple musicians, a recording engineer, technicians, various other people required on site for the session. Losing potentially an entire day can be expensive for them. And then there are deadlines to be met, even contractual obligations. If studios are busy they may not just be able to wait it out and come back the next day, the studio may be booked for other sessions. That's different from someone  listenng to a stereo system at home. As for special power cords, I doubt it, at least the kind that audiophiles pay big bucks for. Of course you never know, it depends on who is footing the bill. I once saw an ad in Sound and Video Contractor Magazine advising contractors to install their audiophile cables in commercial systems and equipment, not because they do anything of value but because their audiophile customers think they do and expect to see them. The pro market isn't so easily fooled.

Small studios are different. Usually keeping equipment cost low is uppermost in their owners' minds.

[roscoeiii]

Batteries are one solution to AC problems. But like all other design choices not without their own compromises. Batteries, regenerators, other power conditioner designs all have strengths and weaknesses. Anyone reading this should try out a number of solutions in their own system ad see what works best in their particular context.

[vhiner]

The advances made in power management since 1990 are staggering. Think about the computers that were being used (or not used) at the time. This anecdote may have limited relevance to a decades-later discussion about modern power management.

[brj]

The information on Shunyata's Dynamic Transient Current Delivery Analyzer and their testing might be of interest to those following this thread.  While much of their testing focuses on power cords, power cords can impact an audio system in a manner similar to a power conditioner - i.e. they can affect current delivery and are effectively a type of filter.

I've never (knowingly) auditioned a piece of Shunyata gear, but I found the information interesting and applaud their focus on actual testing.  (I think I learned of their efforts in another AC thread, but I don't remember where.)

[Geardaddy]

Good point about Shunyata brj.  Nordost has developed software that measures changes in timing errors or jitter as a result of cables, conditioning, etc....(http://www.stereophile.com/rmaf2010/nordost_and_vertex_measurements/index.html)

So, the reasons why cabling and conditioning make a difference are starting to unfurl.  Not information you would find in a vintage engineering textbook. 

[TONEPUB]

The main reason you need effective power line conditioning is simple.  Aside from voltage issues, there is a ton of distortion in the power line.  Some from the generation of the power, other from things plugged in on your nearby circuit. (i.e. your neighbors arc welder, your fridge, etc etc)  You can easily see and measure this with a Fluke AC distortion meter if that floats your boat.

The power supply in your component, depending on how good it is will take out some to most but not all of this, so the remaining distortion components get amplified by your gear, which leads to that "grainy" sound everyone talks about.

Removing this with a good power line conditioning system results in a grain free presentation.

While you can argue about this until the cows come home, you need only listen for about 30 sec to get the picture.

If the power line conditioning solution you choose, removes the noise from the system, does not compromise tonality or dynamics, you've got it right.

If you eliminate noise but affect the music negatively, you've got it wrong.

In all the time spent arguing about this, a demo could easily have been done.

I highly suggest a few auditions and to get some hands on experience.

[Rclark]

Yes batteries have a signature sound : awesome

[TONEPUB]

Yes batteries have a signature sound : awesome

There's a little more to it than that....

But overall, I'd rather take a well designed battery supply like Vinnie's Black Lightning on a small signal device over a mediocre AC supply.  At the high end, the AC stuff still has more dynamics.  And if you don't believe that, come on over sometime and listen to my Vitus audio MPP201 phono stage.

I've used Vinnie's power supplies to excellent result with a number of components and recommend them as highly as the RSA stuff.

I've even adapted other mfr.'s components to use the Black Lightning.  But batteries can't help me with a pair of 200WPC Class A mono blocks!

[Rclark]

Haha yeah there is that. I keep forgetting I'm a small room guy. But even then I would have battery powered source gear, dac, all that. Batteries right up to the 200watt mono's.

 At least that's what my experience right now is telling me I'd want. I love the sound of that clean clean power.

 And I have three AC power supplies for my amp, stock, 30volt, and a big Astron LS 10A, meant to power boat radars. Then I have the battery supply.

 By FAR, the battery supply is far more dynamic, clean, and powerful. Batteries provide huge current when needed.

 I do realize though that you've heard everything, but when you say AC stuff has more dynamics, you must be talking about some very very expensive gear.