Amp — Leave on or turn off
I always turned my Benchmark AHB2 amp off after use every night. After all, why is there an on off switch on the front panel if not to do that? Last night I accidentally left it on. This morning, when I played my first record, I couldn’t believe my ears. The same record I played last night sounded infinitely better. I tried a second record and that, too, was much better.
I know there’s a debate on the question of leaving an amp on all the time.
I now know where I stand!
@benanders Exactly how many people do you know who’ve had a fire hazard from audio equipment? It’s probably at about the same percentage as getting hit by lightning. Using your logic, you should probably never drive a car because you could get into an accident. Gimme a break with your fear mongering. |
@bigtwin So, in your 20 years in the insurance biz did you ever see a claim based on audio equipment being left on? How about a refrigerator? That’s always on, so how many claims did you see from a fridge causing a problem? The likelihood of an amp causing an issue from being left on is so small it’s downright laughable, and those yelling fire on this are just feckless alarmists IMHO. I take your point about insurance companies being stingy about paying claims — I had that happen once and am still pissed about it.
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I left my McCormack amp on 24/7 (unless we were leaving for a week or more) and only had to replace a fuse over 20 years. McCormack recommends leaving the amp on I think partly because many electronic parts don’t like constantly cycling between cold and warm, but I know some other manufacturers recommend turning it off so may be product specific (obviously you don’t wanna leave a Class A or tube amp on). Anyway, I’m with you on just leaving it on. |
@aball What’s your evidence to support this? Steve McCormack advises to leave his amps on (again, not Class A SS amps) to the point when they do their amp upgrades they decouple the power switch so it’s just attached to a dummy light so the wife knows it’s on. If it’s plugged in, it’s on. My McCormack amp was powered on 24/7 for 20 years with no problems other than a fuse, which is pretty damn strong evidence. It defies logic/common sense that constantly cycling electronic components from cold to warm doesn’t put stress and wear on them. And what makes you smarter than Steve McCormack? |
+1 @charliee Few of his posts make any sense, and he’s nothing if not consistent which is why I no longer read any of his inane threads. My amp runs at 80 Watts at idle, which doesn’t kill the environment. All my lawn care equipment runs on batteries and all my vehicles are ULEV so pretty sure my environmental footprint is smaller than most even with leaving my amp on. |
