Power Conditioning on the Cheap


This is my first post here after a bit of lurking, so please be gentle.  I realize this subject must come up a fair amount and I've read erik_squires blog posts on the subject, but I was hoping to get the community's opinion on the relative merits of a few relatively basic power conditioners.  I've narrowed my list down to a few options at a range of (fairly modest) price points.  From low to high they are:

Furman PST-8D

ifi Power Station

Furman Elite-15 PF I

Shunyata PS10 w/ Venom Defender

Audioquest Niagara 1200

In a perfect world where I didn't have a limited budget I would probably buy something higher up the line from Shunyata, but since we live in a decidedly imperfect world, these are my options, although I would welcome other suggestions that fit within this price range.

I should also probably mention that while I value subjective reports on the sound quality of various products, generally speaking I give more weight to objective measurements or at least arguments based in sound science.  More embarrassingly, I also place a certain amount of value on aesthetics.  Aesthetic taste being inherently subjective, (a debatable point, but for the sake of argument lets just assume that it's true) lets just say that when I lust after completely unobtainable equipment it tends to be from companies like Soulution or Pilium rather than Dan D'Agostino or darTZeel.

incorporeus

the old Shunyata Venum blocks I disassembled contained metal oxide varistors, which I and another poster have found to squash dynamics, particularly with amplifiers. I am not sure if the current models continue to utilise them, but it‘s definitely something I would look into

despite claims of elaborate filtration all they contained was a varistor and a capacitor

I tried an expensive PS Audio power regenerator and it had no discernible effect, whatsoever. The dealer who'd brought it over agreed. 

Given your stated  budget limitations, you could buy something from a vendor that offers returns and try it out for yourself for a month.

FYI: Audio Advisor carries Furman. 

I have an older Shunyata Hydra 6 (probably about 10 years old) and my experience has been very positive. There has been no degradation of sound whatsoever, to include the preamp and amp being plugged into it, and it has performed flawlessly preventing any surge damage.  The sound overall is much more dynamic and open as well.

My PS300 is a very good power generator, but it’s old and still running, Finally I have to give it rest, and I also want to save electricity, I decided to buy Wisdom power ES, did not expect anything, To my surprise it surpass my PS300. It’s so quiet and very natural sounding.Its excellent. You can call Jim the owner , he can give you more info, he knows what he is doing.