One more thing. When I originally set up the Furman, I decided to listen to Adele 30 vinyl “All night parking”. The clarity of Adele’s voice, the Erroll Gardner opening scratchiness & deep bass are very telling. I have listed to it 100’s of times.
It sounded terrible, No clarity, weak bass… problem. I immediately went to stream with everything sounding great.
Apparently, in my haste to set it up, I accidentally plugged my turntable into the digital side of the Furman. Once I rectified all was good.
2 things. This demonstrates how dirty digital can be and its negative influence on analog. Digital & analog isolation is critical… those who recommend it are apparently correct…
AC Power
I have a relatively nice system, but have done nothing with my AC power, with the exception of upgraded PC’s and a cheap iFi plug in power conditioner. My question is multi fold… do I need to do something, and if so what? Dedicated line (15A or 20?)? Quality power conditioner? Both? Which one first? How do you tell?
My system is a combination of HT & 2 channel & I tend to use both simultaneously as I like to watch sports while listening to music.
My amp is (I think) a relatively low draw… Moon 330A, Rythmik sub, BHK pre, Aurender, Qutest w/Sbooster, R11’s. No high power amps are in my future & never listen above 75db. I do currently plug my amp directly into the wall. All my wall warts are gone. For my HT, add a 75” Sony TV, Marantz 7015 AVR & a Klipsch sub (although at zero volume the AVR & sub should not come into play).
I am considering buying the Furman IT-Reference 15i or 20i first as they are well reviewed & are priced very well on Amazon ($1,400 / $1,900). Before I pull the trigger, should I go dedicated power & at what amperage (my nephew, an EE & audiophile thinks I am drawing no more than 5 amps) as that will dictate the Furman model?
Interesting, my nephew thinks neither are worth the investment. His statement: “Do you have appliances on the circuit now? What kind of interference can they inject?...voltage drops would come from current draws...which trip breakers.
Not steady 60hz a good power supply handles. So it all comes back to was the power supply engineer dropped on his head as a child.”
”Personally I think it’s something audio people do when they have run out of gear to buy.”
Any thoughts or recommendations would be appreciated. Thanks!
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@erik_squires , just now I finally got around to checking av volts where I have my gera plugged in and I read 121.8. Assuming my readings stay right about there, that doesn't seem problematic, does it? |
@immatthewj - I believe the utility companies consider anything between and including 110 VAC to 130 VAC to be within spec, so 121.8 is fine. The performance issue for devices with linear power supplies, especially unregulated supplies (i.e. power amplifiers) are at the mercy of the incoming voltage so seasonal and daily fluctuations can affect them. In my current home my worst AC is during the hot summer months when the utility power sags and my own heat pumps turn on and off. Otherwise it maintains close to 120VAC. That's not including my monthly power event of some sort and storms.
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@erik_squires , as always, thank you for the time you spend offering informational content. As far as the Furman P-1800 AR, and I apologize because this has probably been addressed but as bad as my eyes are I cannot find it, you did say that voltage regulation is more important to you than isolation of components. But, judging from one of OP's follow ups, it does have an analogue side and a digital side? So I assume that to some extent it does isolate? |
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