@emergingsoul thanks, it has been fun to put it together. I will look at options to replace the streamer. Adding the Teddy Pardo power supply in place of the switching supply in the Node N130 made a huge positive difference. A bigger difference than replacing wall warts on any of the DACs I’ve owned that came with one stock. The N130 has the same processor as many higher end streamers, and while I realize there is a lot more to performance than just the chip set, it has been my experience that the Bluesound is held back to a significant degree by the stock power supply.
kn
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@knownothing
A great question about power supply. you have an interesting system with a very strong emphasis on Power supply all kinds of stuff you’ve got.
Comfortable room.
I had a blue sound streaming Device and upgrading that made a lot of difference and I would strongly recommend replacing it given all the other things you’ve done which I believe are weighed down by this one piece . I agree it may be easy to use but a lot of other things are just as easy to deal with.
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I am a little confused. By an external power supply, do you mean an audiophile quality power regenerator? Let’s assume you do mean a regenerator like a Furman, PS Audio, Etc. A power regenerator is designed to produce pure sine wave AC without the electrical and RF noise contaminating a mains supply and house electrical distribution lines. A power conditioner is designed to filter electrical and RF noise from the mains and house distribution lines. Putting a power conditioner after a power regenerator is redundant since a regenerator is theoretically producing pure power. It will not physically harm equipment but theoretically not give improvement and possibly degrade SQ if there interference between filtering stages in the regenerator and conditioner. I can only say experiment and determine yourself if there is an improvement. I only use a conditioner that offers significant improvement in SQ.
However, if you use power supply to mean your mains and house distribution lines, then improvements using dedicated breaker panels, panel surge protection, dedicated lines, and/or better outlets before a conditioner will improve SQ because you are providing cleaner power that will challenge the conditioner less. Output after the conditioner will be cleaner.
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PC and equipment internal power supplies do have the common purpose of filtering out noise. Internal power supplies are entirely responsible for converting AC to DC and providing continuous voltage and adequate current, this affects dynamic capabilities of individual components.
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Years ago I bought an Audience AR-6 power conditioner. I lived in a big city, the house was built in the early fifties and it really made a difference in in the sound quality. A few years later, I moved to the country in a new house that was built on what was a cow pasture. When I set up my hifi, I didn’t put the AR-6 in and I really didn’t hear anything bad. After a week-ten days, I reintroduced the AR-6 and heard NO difference, but I I kept it in for the magnetic breaker in it. Six years ago, I moved back to the big city, into a home built in 1962 and had to but the AR-6 In pretty quick.
So I guess what I’m saying is can depend on where you’re living, how your house is wired, how your subdivision is wired and how many people you’re in your immediate area you are sharing with and for me now, I have a six story office building less than a thousand feet from me.
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I live in an older apartment building in a neighborhood with lots of old homes being torn down and replaced with condos (cash registers). Even before the gentrification of the neighborhood, the power was iffy, maybe once every several months I'd experience a brownout and even rarer, a blackout.
With all the new construction, there's been too many times that the power would go out and having my AQ Niagara 1200 in front of my gear provided protection as well as piece of mind. Those brownouts would cause flickering and surges as it came back on. Not good for anything plugged in. Getting something passive, like the AQ, wouldn't hurt. It clamps down when necessary and doesn't limit current. I don't see or hear any downsides.
All the best,
Nonoise
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Like so many things in this hobby there appears to be no simple answer to power conditioning. And apparently there are various types of power problems that can be addressed.
my goto reference for this is live testing done by alpha audio which you can watch where they both subjectively and objectively show that different conditioning devices work better in some situations better than others and in some devices better than others and ‘conclude’ that the results are situation dependent and you must try the specific devices in their intended places to know if or how much they will help.
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It still is very good to upgrade to a decent LPS power supplies especially at the starting points
for example get rid of the noisy wall wart a $10 piece of junk to the router That just adds more noise.
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@sns I would be interested in any insights or specific information you can provide on how power supply and power conditioners purposes are unique. I have a vague idea, but would like to understand more. I know power supplies typically convert AC to DC and provide the right voltage and current for the device, but also have some power conditioning functions too. That is about the extent of my knowledge.
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Components internal power supplies always matter a great deal, to believe power conditioning somehow negates the need for quality power supplies is fool's gold. Power conditioning and component power supplies serve entirely unique purposes.
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1st, have you seen the wire in the fuse?
For years, I used a chain where EVERYTHING that was on was collectively going thru a single tiny fuse, the entire load of amazing crecendos at loud volumes never drew more that that hard to see wire could pass..
2nd, I thought about my Furman P1800 PF R version
that always has 45 amps of current ready for momentary peaks. That means it is the Furman’s Capacitors that are my power plant, always the power source at any moment, not the wall or separate ckt or ckt bkr or street transformer, my own power storage in my rack, for as my fuse proved, is a small need..
IF you have actual problems, that’s different, but the majority of us solve imaginary non-existant problems, and
IF there is a rare actual problem, I can do something else for a while.
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Think first about running dedicated power lines direct from your electrical panel ALONG with audiophile grade wall receptacles as a best-step-up in audio performance.Add in a panel whole house SIEMENS surge protector at the panel. That’s a separate line for the amp and a second line for your source. It will be far better approach than a Pwr Cond simple plug in .
Then, ensure your components power cords linked to the anudiophile grade wall outlets are up to the task.
Ok….sure ….a quality build high-end power conditioner can maybe provide a further smaller further incremental step up, particularly if you have wild power swings experiences in some older buildings.
ok …if dedicated lines are a no-go, then a quality build Pwr Cond might help a bit.
But as pointed out in other posts, it’s a summary of the entire cradle-to-grave power supplied to your components that determines your audio performance quotient….not any Pwr Cond, in isolation.
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I tend to deal with both aspects the best I can. A good conditioner should only help, but I can’t say as though it’ll make up for the short comings of a cheap wall wart.
My conditioner is a Lightspeed CSL3200. I’ve never done any comparisons, and I haven’t removed it since installing it about 6 years ago, but I have upgraded the wall warts for my modded Bugle 3 phono stage, and my modded SMSL DAC, and both of those upgrades were notable, then I plug those into the conditioner.
A lot of lower cost components use those cheap wall wart unregulated switching power supplies, but it’s fairly easy to replace them with a linear regulated version with the same specs (many generic versions are under $50), and should always be a step in the right direction....whether you can actually hear it or not, it’s less likely to fail and cause a problem to the component. If you're the type that tries to leave no stone unturned, and you're looking for easy potential upgrades that don't break the bank, I'd recommend it.
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I don’t think there is any such thing as too much power conditioning. The higher quality the audio component the larger the portion of the component is used for power conditioning... and yet no mater how much better my components have gotten...most are now in the $20K range ... a separate power conditioner still improves the overall system sound, as did direct lines and specialty power outlets.
My strategy is always to buy better component versus upgrade the power supply... I would prefer the designer of the equipment choose exactly how to upgrade the power supply versus me buying some off the shelf better power supply. However, on budget equipment I am sure it can be a cost effective means of improving the sound.
Most high end companies have completely separate boxes for power supplies on their flagship products... for instance Audio Research Reference 10 preamp or phonostage.
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