[jarcher]

There you go. You don't even need a twenty amp line. 15A is fine if you're a low wattage guy like me. I think my entire system consumes less than 400 watts from the wall, and that if is all the source components are on at the same time.

Can you tell us what you would do?

I'm kinda a "high wattage" guy in the home theater room - but yeah - recognize that 20A is probably overkill.  Even the manual for the Krell Showcase 7 w/ a 1500W transformer recommends a 15A dedicated line (no mention of 20A). I trust Krell not to underemphasize recommended specs.

As for the other stuff, one of the reasons I like the Furman Eilte DM 15 is that it has displays for voltage & current, and all the other stuff together never draws more than about 2-4A, and that includes power hungry projector & xbox (surprisingly the single most power hungry component of all).

And lastly, yeah, it all seems better after midnight!

[7x57]

The late night improvement in audio sound was much greater with my old B&K Pro 10MC/ST-202+ combo than with my C-J PV-14L/MF-2250 combo. The reason is that the C-J specially designed power transformers reject a lot of line noise that got through the B&K power transformers. This was also proven by Police radio breakthrough while listening to the B&K amps while a transmitting police car was passing outside my home, and it happened on a regular basis. It has never happened a single time after switching to C-J amps over 10 years ago.

So with modern C-J amps, you are buying quite a lot of power conditioning without adding anything external, and C-J warns that some power conditioners may have a negative effect with their amplifiers.

[Early B.]

Scotch also tastes better after midnight.  Not placebo, just a difference in how our bodies relax and receive sensory input.  It holds true for audio too.  I'm sure that clean power has some small part to play, but our biology has an even bigger part.

I can agree with that (not sure about the Scotch, though).

Obviously, mood and relaxation plays a big role in how one "hears" music, and late night is a good time to 'chill." It's also more likely to be dead quiet late at night, so that may partly explain why our systems sound better. 

Why would a power conditioner better at night? Shouldn't a good one perform the same all day, regardless of whether the power is clean or dirty?

[Folsom]

The price of a good power conditioner sets the budget for the rest of the system in my world. I don't encourage the opposite, ever, under any circumstance. The corner stone of listen-ability is a power conditioner.  Without one I become uninterested quickly, or intolerant. If the system costs $50k, it helps a lot, but doesn't prevail over a power conditioner for retention of listening time.

A power conditioner is probably less necessary at night, but the music may be even better?

[JerryLove]

Some other likely (non psycological) causes for better sound at night.

Clearer sinus cavities.
Change in air temperature.
Change in humidity.
Change in room characteristics (caused by temp and humidity).
Change in speaker characteristics (caused by temp and humidity).
Change in brain chemical state (caused by where you are in your wake/sleep cycle).

[silver_strings]

The ambient sound levels are.also much lower