Dedicated power to audio system—how extreme to go?

[ctsooner]

Which power conditioner do you use?  I have found that any of the Garth Powell designs for AQ will make a large difference for the positive in most systems.  Would a dedicated one be best?  Probably, but there are a few filters that install at the box that could also be very  helpful and still be affordable.  Jsut another option or two.

[John Gallup]

17 minutes ago, ctsooner said:

Which power conditioner do you use?  

Audioquest Niagara 3000.  Another reason why the Romex upgrade might be overkill.

[GdnrBob]

@John Gallup,

Have you tried to push a fish line down the space for wiring?

Sometimes, you get lucky.

bob

[John Gallup]

1 hour ago, GdnrBob said:

Have you tried to push a fish line down the space for wiring?

Yeah I could probably fish the wire, but it's all the drywall holes I'd have to make and repair that discourage me. This shows the routing from the attic through the listening room. All the shelves would have to come out, and the cable would have to turn a corner in the wall and then cross about seven or eight studs to get to the outlet by the audio rack at the left of the picture. All doable, but sheesh....

 

Edited September 26, 2021 by John Gallup

[ctsooner]

I have and LOVE the 3000.  A true sweet spot, especially for me as I like my amps plugged into teh wall directly (Quatro's are into the 3000).  Not overkill by any means, but a GREAT start and even a strong finish for many.

[Holmz]

What is under the floor?

 

On the floor:https://www.neutrik.com/en/product/nac3mp-hc

Into the amp: https://www.neutrik.com/en/neutrik/products/powercon/powercon-true1-top/powercon-true1-top-cable-connectors

Edited September 27, 2021 by Holmz

[arni]

This is someplace I would be very wary of the audiopiliac BS. The people with the cleanest (electrically) wiring are hospitals. Circuits on dedicated grounds all over. Special grade outlets and equipment plugs, etc. Medical equipment is nothing like somebodies amp. Zero hype and it gets the daylights engineered out of it. A ventilator should not fail, ever. For a measly stereo skip the GFCI unless your amp is near a sink, dedicated breaker, ground+neutral runs isolated out to the ground rod. I have put in circuits like this (for a cash register) and it is completely simple. Isolating one or more ground and neutrals in a panel means an extra insulated bus bar to terminate on.

Never use bigger wire or breaker than you have load.

 

Be more wary of EMF (like from lighting) and induced currents from parallel wire runs. A simple power conditioner, or surge suppressor/filter at minimum.

Edited May 26, 2022 by arni
verbosity

[GdnrBob]

I never knew of the replies until today.

In any case, @John Gallup, That is is handsome room. I love the triptych. Do you know what it represents?

Did Jea48 ever respond to your post? I see he/she is still posting on Audiogon. Too bad  I couldn't get him/her to respond. He/her had a very detailed knowledge of electrical wiring, and provided, in my opinion, very good advice.-Much like Almarg, who I hope is resting comfortably in heaven listening to his Daedalus speakers.

 

Bob

 

[John Gallup]

2 hours ago, GdnrBob said:

I love the triptych. Do you know what it represents?

My wife is the artist. Not sure it represents anything, but I'll pass along your compliment and I'm sure it will be appreciated.

Never heard from Jea48 but I've pretty much stopped visiting Audiogon.

[John Gallup]

20 hours ago, GdnrBob said:

I love the triptych. Do you know what it represents?

Checked with the artist. She did it in 2010 (as a birthday gift for me, coincidentally) and it's called "Elemental Realms."

[GdnrBob]

I 

18 hours ago, John Gallup said:

I've pretty much stopped visiting Audiogon.

I, too, am considering leaving Audiogon. Some posts are far too polarizing.

Others are somewhat basic, and have already been discussed.

Most are just plain boring.

Bob

[ctsooner]

I slowed down over there because of a lot of that.   I pick and chose what I post on  

[GdnrBob]

Great minds think alike, no?

😊

[TomicTime]

Yep, lots of crazy people there…I do enjoy the Music section, especially the Whats on Your Turntable thread…. some very cool folks there for sure….

Jim

[TomicTime]

John - Love your room and the art 😉 Wonderful 

[John Gallup]

10 minutes ago, TomicTime said:

John - Love your room and the art 😉 Wonderful 

Thanks for your kind words. Because tinkering with the system is what I do, I've made some changes since then:  

(1) Wrangled the M5-HPAs a bit closer to the Quatros to clear up some floor space. 

(2) Replaced the Rogue Aries phono pre-amp with a Sutherland Little Loco.

(3) Added the clock for the dCS Bartók DAC/streamer.

The "bookshelves" are Ikea's cheapest "Billy" models so I have no compunctions about hacking them apart to hide wires and replacing their backs with sound absorption foam. That's also why there aren't any books on them 🙂.

 

[ctsooner]

I too like the look. I’m terrible putting stuff together lol

[GdnrBob]

Ikea is a great source for shelving/bookshelves. I use a mix of different models in my home.

I'd love to hear the DCS Bartok.

BTW- what is the material covering the lower part of the bookshelves? It looks like fabric.

I like the way you added rubber (grommits?) to the bottom for wire management. It looks very professional.

Bob

[John Gallup]

48 minutes ago, GdnrBob said:

BTW- what is the material covering the lower part of the bookshelves? It looks like fabric.

Its "acoustically transparent" fabric over STC-60 class sound absorbing foam from Acoustimac.com. The upper shelves have a two-inch thick slab behind ther brown fabric and are intended to absorb front-wall reflection; the lower ones have maybe 10" of the stuff and in theory act as a bass trap. I've got some more of the same stuff at the top and bottom "corners" of the rear wall. It wasn't done scientifically and I'm not sure it made a difference. I think the optimum bass trap location is vertically in the room corners, but that's architecturally and aesthetically impossible, even though my wife is very forgiving of these adventures.

A lot of folks praise GIK Acoustics' support and design services, but I haven't tried them. I also learned quite a bit from the videos Dennis Foley does at AcousticFields.com. The grommets come from Amazon.com

[arni]

The drywall work is easy. Use about a 3-4" hole saw in a drill directy over the stud. the hole saw will cut a disc out of the dry wall. A couple of smacks with a chisel will make a notch to run your wire (I would use BX), then a nail plate over that(edit..fish to the next hole) and finally you take the disc you drilled out with the hole saw and put it back in the hole. This leaves only a very narrow slit to fill with patching compound. I would use real plaster, not drywall mud (ie. hot mud) in the fastest grade which is 5 minute. This is real plaster and actually chemically sets. You will have to work fast but it will set chemcally ( it is real old time plaster) and can be any thickness. Won't shrink.  Give it a couple days to dry (it will be hard) then a touch with sandpaper and paint it. The paint will be more work than anything else. Mix the plaster in a disposable bucket to save cleanup time. Down side is storing the leftover bag of plaster.

I would run through the bookshelf and just box in the wire or go behind the acoustic panels. Because BX is metal shielded you should not get RFI off the wire. When you terminate ground one end of the BX outer shield.

Edited May 29, 2022 by arni
add

[John Gallup]

 

3 hours ago, arni said:

The drywall work is easy. Use about a 3-4" hole saw in a drill directy over the stud. the hole saw will cut a disc out of the dry wall. A couple of smacks with a chisel will make a notch to run your wire (I would use BX), then a nail plate over that(edit..fish to the next hole) and finally you take the disc you drilled out with the hole saw and put it back in the hole. This leaves only a very narrow slit to fill with patching compound. I would use real plaster, not drywall mud (ie. hot mud) in the fastest grade which is 5 minute. This is real plaster and actually chemically sets. You will have to work fast but it will set chemcally ( it is real old time plaster) and can be any thickness. Won't shrink.  Give it a couple days to dry (it will be hard) then a touch with sandpaper and paint it. The paint will be more work than anything else. Mix the plaster in a disposable bucket to save cleanup time. Down side is storing the leftover bag of plaster.

I would run through the bookshelf and just box in the wire or go behind the acoustic panels. Because BX is metal shielded you should not get RFI off the wire. When you terminate ground one end of the BX outer shield.

This is some master-level electrician advice, thank you! One thing I'd add is that some say BX is not a good way to go for power near audio systems, because the more-or-less random alignment of the conductors inside the armored cable is not as good as the side-by-side alignment guaranteed with Romex.

[Holmz]

I use this one the plaster, and they have a vacuum hose that fits onto it and attaches to a vacuum.

It is easiest for me to bung in the plaster a bit low, and then sneak up on the level in layering steps… so as to avoid having to sand too much.
(But it is the best ~$100 set up for plaster sanding I have found.)

https://www.mirka.com/en/p/Sanding-Block-Mirka-Handy--230-80?category=products/accessories-and-consumables/hand-sanding-tools

[BKDad]

https://www.jensen-transformers.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/generic-seminar.pdf

https://www.jensen-transformers.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/AES-Ground-Loops-Rest-of-Story-Whitlock-Fox-Generic-Version.pdf

[ctsooner]

BK, I forget. Are you an engineer?  You share fairly technical writings, that I can sort of understand.  This has been a favorite of mine (thank goodness I took Mr Epstein's electronic class frosh year in HS).  It's a very long read and with my MS issues, I wasn't able to read in one sitting and I forget some important info as I tried to catch up later in the day.  I do understand the gist of it I think.  

I have spoken to both Richard and Garth about grounds and a few other power related items.  Much of what I read is what they both have said.  

I wish I could talk on the tech side of this paper, but I can talk about real life listening.  I have heard some noticeable improvements in my system making various changes from cords, so the outlet's themselves, to using dedicated outlets.  As much as listening is subjective, it's also very real.  When I was at Rutan's a couple of years ago, during Richard and Brad's visit, Gardener Bob (Mr Wong) and I went into the stores front entrance where Johnny has the Treo's set up (and now also the VLR's).  We were listening to Ayre electronics and I forget what else (Bob??).  Johnny put the CAD grounding device into the system and then he would take it out.  We heard a noticeable difference, especially IRT the initial attack of a note and it's subsequent decay.  It was so much better with the inexpensive (subjectively) CAD device.  

After speaking with Richard about this, he said that it if a device is designed properly, that the CAD shouldn't have any effect on the SQ.  I spoke with a couple of designers (the engineers behind the names) from various well known companies (I love how audio is small and designers themselves will openly discuss their products with so many of us) and they said the same thing as Richard did. That said, that darn CAD device I we listened to did something pretty amazing for under 2k (I forget how much they are), but I really need to listen to it in my own system to see if it does anything and if so, what.  

I'm wish I understood more of this as it's fascinating stuff to say the least.  I've been blessed to never have a ground loop in my systems as it would just piss me off and drive me away, lol.  

[BKDad]

I absolutely do not question whether these devices make a difference in the perceived sound.  And, I'm not using perceived in any sarcastic sense.

The big question is just why they do what they do.  If you step back and do a thorough analysis using existing Earth bound physics and subjects that are taught at the college freshman level for electrical engineers (or, at least, used to be), the answers can be found.  And, Mr. Vandersteen is very right (surprised?). 

Think about this just for a moment.  Just why do power cords matter?  Pretty much all power cords do a great job at passing the 60 Hz (or 50 Hz outside North America) power currents.  

So, what is it then?  The power cords must be part of a circuit that also passes other signals.  Bill Whitlock explains that in those two papers.

But, why would you want that to begin with?