Recommendations for 20 amp electrical outlets

(FYI you will not wire the IG, Isolated Ground, outlet as an IG outlet to your existing branch circuit wiring. I assume your branch circuit wiring is three wire. Hot, neutral, and EGC). EGC, Equipment Grounding Conductor.

@jea48 , sorry that due to my limited understanding  I have to ask, but what do you mean by this?  If I bought these outlets (either the Levitons or Hubbles) . wouldn't I simply replace the existing outlets that I bought from Lowes by connecting the existing black, white, and equipment ground wires to the Hubble or Leviton outlets that I bought?  Am I misunderstanding this?

What is an IG outlet? The safety equipment ground contact on the outlet is insulated, isolated, from the metal supporting back strap and the center 6/32 threaded metal hub of the outlet used to hold on the outlet wall cover plate.

@jea48 Oops. Sorry again. I just reread your post for the 4th or 5th time and I went and looked at a duplex outlet I had bought a while back ago at Lowes (Eaton) and the equipment ground (third "hole"/uninsulated wire) IS in fact connected to the backstrap. So this Eaton that I bought a while back ago at Lowes is NOT an IG, correct?

@immatthewj I am not recommending using an IG (Isolated Ground) outlet to feed audio equipment in a dwelling unit, house. My recommendation for the old stock Hubbell IG5362 120V 20A slender/compact style duplex outlet for the reasons given in my post on 08-29-2024 at 12:31pm .

@jea48 , I apologize for asking what I guess is going to be some stupid questions about what is I guess some basic stuff.

But you are saying not to use an IG outlet, and isn't an IG outlet one that has three "holes" (hot/black, neutral/white, equipment ground/uninsulated)?  And I did click on the link you provided for those Hubbells on ebay and that appears to be what those Hubbell outlets are?  

Sorry, I know that this is pretty basic stuff, but I guess I am misunderstanding something about it.

Thank you, @devinplombier .  I truly don't have a good understanding of the subject of home electrical and the isolated ground nomencalure confused me (which is not hard to do).  Amm my circuits, including the dedicated circuits I installed for my system, are NOT isolated ground circuits, and obviously none of my duplex  receptacles are IG receptacles.  I was confusing IG with the uninsulated equipment ground.  Just something else to put in the "what I learned today" column.  Thanks again for helping me out with that.

Gotcha, @jea48  .  That definitely clears it up for me now.  I did not know what an 'isolated ground' was before, and now I do.

None of the duplexes I installed in the circuits I installed for my system are IGs, and on the existing circuits in my home that I have worked on before, I do not remember seeing any insulated equipment ground wires, nor do I remember seeing any insulated ground wires connected to the neutral bar behind my panel, except for the insulated white wires.

That typed, one of my many flaws is that I have tunnel vision and if I am not specifically looking for something I do not see it or I often forget what I saw assuming that I did see it.

This is interesting though, because back in the '90s I bought a DIY home wiring book at Lowes, and a few years ago when I was installing some more dedicated circuits I referred to it to see what I needed to do behind the panel, and the pictures were actually showing insulated (green) equipment ground wires coming back to the neutral bar behind the panel.  Now I have to assume that the pictures were of an IG?

Anyway, TMI, but I didn't feel comfortable working behind my panel using what that book was showing me, so I watched a few youtubes of people putting new circuits in and used those as my reference.  

Some of these house wiring YouTube videos are lethal. Literally. Just saying :)

@devinplombier , I am sure that they could be.  I just was not comfortable with the instructions in the book I bought.  I actually watched a few youtubes and the ones I watched basically showed all the same thing.  Fortunately I wasn't doing anything very fancy, just adding three new circuits, but I just was not exactly sure what all I had to do at the electrical panel end of the job.

It's like a lot of things--it depends upon what you have in it and what you  want to get out of it.