Listening Fatigue

isn't this thread getting interesting? Stehno why don't you just answer Sean's questions they seem very fair to me?

Stehno,

In your original post of 8-27-04 explaining the what a "proper" line conditioner should do:
(1) is the result of (2). (1) does not stand a line conditioner design objective by itself rather it is the result of successfully attaining the goal written in (2). Line conditioners, AFAIK, are made from passive elements (xformer, L & C) & I don't think that a passive element can do anything to lower the noise floor. Lowering a system's noise floor takes energy i.e. an active ckt. Needless to say, this will not be for free.
When a line conditioner successfully cleans up an AC signal & provides clean power to the electronics, it allows the system to operate at its inherent cummulative noise floor level that is, generally, much lower than that system's noise floor when fed with "dirty" AC power. This is what reveals "tremendous amounts of true, subtle, low level musical detail".

I 2nd Mejames: do answer Sean's questions, which seem very fair to me as well.

Bombay, I have one minor quibble with your post - passive elements CAN lower the noise floor by reducing the bandwidth of the power line noise. RMS noise is proportional to the square root of the bandwidth. However, the filters used in this approach usually degrade the transient response of the system. Active regeneration can lower the noise floor and still provide good transient response, constrained only by the dynamic current delivery capability of the regenerator's output.

Mejames: There's no point in Stehno answering the questions now. Bombay has already shown that ALL forms of line conditioning that achieve both audible and measurable results alter bandwidth in some way, shape or form. That's why i wanted to ask Stehno a series of questions. With his own responses, he would have realized that the goals that he mentioned could only be met with the ideas / designs that he was critical of.

Bombay: Your explanation basically sums up the situation. I just wanted Stehno to do his own homework. Not only would he have seen how contradictory his own statements were, he would have helped educate others in the process.

Nighthawk: It's quite possible to limit bandwidth without limiting transient response. The key to doing this would be to pick the proper hinge frequency and slope. Once these parameters were chosen, you would have to select individual components that could easily pass the desired amount of energy. For optimum performance, you would have to look at how much energy was needed in both a steady state draw and on a dynamic basis. By using "heavy duty" components that will easily pass the necessary power, series resistance is minimized and thermal losses are reduced. Sean
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Nighthawk,

Well, technically you are correct & thanks for pointing this out. I'm aware of this but I discarded the concept for my post because:-
My post was with reference to context where I referred to Stehno's 8-27-04 post. I referred to Stehno's "proper" line conditioner. So, I was putting forth my comments w.r.t. that. If you read his original post where he puts forth some 6-7 points re. what a "proper" line conditioner should do, #3 is: "A well designed line-conditioner attempts to induce no sonic harm of it's own"
If read Stehno's earlier 8-27-04 post he says "Whereas, a properly designed line conditioner would do no such thing as to suppress offending frequencies".

So, given that Stehno's "proper" line conditioner doesn't subdue the high freq by limiting bandwidth, I thought that I should not talk about passives lowering the noise floor - clearly these types of power conditioners are out of the discussion here.

Maybe I should have said that they can but put in parenthesis that this discussion here is not re. those types of pwr conditioners. I personally thought that this would further add to the confusion (there's plenty here!).
Anyway, hope that this clears things up.