Why Expensive power Cables when Romex behind Wall?

Hi Meby,
You are mostly correct, as that is one of the concerns providing it is being plugged into a hospital grade outlet, that it will not arc. If you do not plug it into a well designed outlet, it still could. The other design approach is to limit the possibility of a short because wires can not come in contact with each other unless the cable is completely torn from the plug, and by then it wouldn't be live anyway (providing it was wired properly). Hospital grade really means nothing more than very well designed. Tom

Ok, here is my current thought train on this; Yes, I agree that I would not want to be "hooked up" in a hospital with lamp cord and a $1.49 plug. Fortunately for me, none of my gear came with such low grade pcs. I truly doubt that when Nelson Pass sits down to design military grade circuit boards for my equipment, that he is going to cut corners on the pc. I don't think top notch designers put cheap pcs on $3k+ amps or preamps, why would they? Sure, mid-fi and lower does not go to extremes, but then you are not paying the arm and a leg in the price for those extremes. So where do I think money would be well spent as far as power goes? Drop a dedicated line from your breaker box to your gear. Get a quality 20 amp breaker (hospital rated) and use hospital rated romex, carefully run the line without staples or cable nailers to your location, and then use a hospital grade outlet(s). I really can't imagine anything better than this other than buying a power rectifying device (PS audio, Threshold), which would nullify the need to do this providing it has the capacity to meet the demand placed on it. If you buy a power supply that is not big enough for the demand, you have gained nothing. The dedicated outlet is a LOT less expensive, but would not provide all the benifits that a well designed power plant would provide. In MHO, I would keep the pc's that came with good equipment, and do one or the other properly depending on your budget. If they want to use the pc off my Threshold gear on me at the hospital, I have no problem with that. Tom

It's interesting that no one seems to disagree with what I said earlier in this thread, and no one is saying that expensive pc's are a good investment. That must tell you something. Tom

Hi Albert. You are correct, I did not read your entire post. I got to where you were explaining the lengths you had gone to improve your service, and stopped there. Now that I have read the entire post, I have a couple of questions for you. Is your private transformer a pole or slab transformer? Can you tell me the manufacturer and model number of the unit. The reason I ask is that I was a custom home builder, built a home for a Doctor who had about a $150k system a few years back. This guy was driving me nuts trying to get me to change his transformer because he was having to spend thousands of dollars on hi end power cords, and he blamed the transformer (also private, but because of his location). I spent an entire evening at his home listening very carefully to his system, while he switched power cords to prove his point. And he was right, the expensive power cords did make the system sound better. But his argument was that he did not previously need them. Finally I called in a favor with a friend at FL Power, and had a new transformer installed for the Doc. It was by a different manufacturer. Not even a day passed and the Doc was on the phone to me inviting me for dinner and thanking me over and over. He wanted to prove to me that he was not nuts, so I accepted. We went through the identical listening tests as with the other transformer, switching pc's, but this time - NO DIFFERENCE could be distinguished between the expensive pc's and the stock Levinson pc's. And I have to say that his system just sounded better over all. There was one pc that did seem to sound different out of the 10 or more we listened to, but I can't honestly say it was better. At the end of the evening, the Doc gave me a $500.00 tip and told me I had "saved his system". So, if you have a room full of people that all hear when you switch pc's, I would say that it is very possible that you have a bad transformer. I don't mean defective, as FL Power tested his old transformer, found nothing wrong with it and installed it on another street. Jerry, my friend at FL P did tell me confidentially that the difference between the two transformers was aluminum. One used some, the other did not. So, if you can tell me the brand and model of yours, I will drive up to the Doc's home (he no longer lives there, but I can still check the transformer). And it just so happens that the very next home I built has the same type of transformer (I had become keen to noticing this by now) as the one I replaced on the Doc's home, so I can check it too. I doubt there are that many manufacturers of transformers commonly used by power companies, so I've got a feeling you may not have even heard your system at it's best yet.

Florida is not to kind weatherwise either, sounds just like yours. Maybe FL Power had to change his transformer too and it drove him out? Who knows? The guy drove me nuts for 6 months, but anything I know about hospital grade wiring, I know from him. He even went in and red chalked the slab with notes to the drywallers where he wanted the drywall glued and not screwed. He drove my electricians crazy too, but they made a mint off of him. He was paying the installers all kinds of money for "electrical favors". At first I was charging him when I saw things I wasn't making a markup on, but there came a point I gave up as my electricians charged me only the bid amount. Just one question though, being as that you went to such extremes to make your supply the best it could be; wouldn't a power plant of ample size been a better move? So that no matter what transformer you ended up with, voltage drops, spikes, etc, the power was cleaned and constant?