People use to that I keep bitching about electricity. Practically anyone who developed playback to a more or less capable level and who has ears know that quality of electricity hugely affects sound. I personally do not fight with electricity - I defeated its victory. When the electricity is good then it sound fine but when the electricity bad then the only suitable course of actions it to shut down the system... or completely disconnect from grid. When the electricity is bad then none of the known to me methods help….

Couple days ago a guy that I know and I decided to make an experiment with reels transfers and I was trying to record something to my tape recorder from CD. The CD that I was recorded was very “clean” and very high quietly. However, when I put the headphones on and put the recorder to “record” then I heard hugely distorted sound when each single pitch was surrounded with a cloud of gray fog and HF ringing. I thought that something got broken with my Stellavox and was very upset but then I pull the PS off the Stellavox and went to drive Stellavox from butteries. Alleluia! All noise is gone and sound got instantaneously cleaned…. Probably next time I need to do recording with Stellavox connected to grid and discounted and post it on my site…. What the hell of ugliness!!!

I do not really ask any advise if any find a good solution to cure electricity. I am pretty sure that I did tried whatever is know and have no interest to experiment anymore. Many things do help with electricity, though screw up something else but still nothing could be better then “good electricity day/hours” and no power treatment devises. Interesting that my power amps are less subjected to electricity power crises but the front ends are very temperamental and too damn electro-sentimental…

hi romy

angstrom makes some nice filters

http://www.angstromresearch.com/filtri_eng.html

regards angelo

cv wrote:

Funny, I was just thinking about battery powering of amps... I know you have identified that the problem is more with the sources, but it would be interesting and quite feasible with the Melquiades and other components... wouldn't want to try it with a 2000V muscle SET... If you could put up with the manic hassle of recharging and the sheer space required by the cells, you could go 100% battery - or maybe go filtered mains for the tube heaters. Would be interesting to hear what Super Melq could do with a sealed lead acid power supply on the OPT... no time constants in the power supply... But there are probably better things to spend time on...

It “might” be a good idea to lift AC supply on front ends. The phonocorectors and DACs are notoriously sensitive to bad electricity. I was in past running CEC TL1 form buttery power and I do not partially like it.  It was “clean” but overly sterile and with substantial deduction of dynamics. The DACs are different, at least the DACs that I had and they are VERY-VERY sensitive.  I have a 1936, RCA-made isolation 100W transformer that I sometimes plug my DAC in when electricity is very bad. It helps tremendously. It does not make sound as good as when electricity is good but still it very beneficial. Unfortunately I have to unplug it when electricity is good as it screws some other aspect of sound. As you understand I am not a big fan to plugging this thing here and there…. so rarely use it. Pretty much any know to me power line handling devised: transformers, regenerators, filter, etc work in the same way – minimize one problem and screw other…

I was thinking to put my Bidat on DC many times but Bidat in order to sound OK should be well warmed, with 12 more then hour under the belt… so how beneficial would be to switch to DC? Perhaps a good idea would be keep it running all time from AC and then switch to DC only during the listening… However, since I’m experimenting with a new DAC now, that one that runs very hot and eats a LOT of juice I think the buttery powered Bidat project is on the very back burners for now….

guy sergeant wrote:

perhaps you need a rig like this to run things from

The problem in here is that we stick with intellectual and logical justification of what “might” work. Yes, the own regeneration should be good. Yes, the buttery powering should be good. But as you begin to actually try and if you really concerned about the actual Sonic results instead of subordination of your senses to the goal of justification the abstract concerts then you might observe that the results of you deeds are not as exiting as you would like them to be. However it is not the only problem with your deed but it very much might be too bogus or juts too faulty concerts.

We, do not pursue in audio for a metal peace with our believes but rather we pursue Sound. Are any relations between Sound and state of electricity? Unquestionably the relations exists and very strong. Do we possess methodology or know how that would allow use to convert bad electricity into good one? I do not think so as our analyses of wave shape, spikes, harmonic distortions or the presents of different noises is not inclusive enough reasoning. I do not even mention that as soon you begin to correct any of the “bad things” about the electricity we screw up something else…

Also, an this is me very personally, I completely disregard any people in audio who do not equate this scientific methods of analyses and decision making with realty of accomplished sound. Whoever they say, if the do not posses ability to objectively assess the sonic benefits of this scientific actions then the only reaction they get form me, and the only reaction they deserver is inevitable:  “Go Fuck yourself.”

For instance look at the very reasonable guy from Lithuania:

http://www.lessloss.com/

All this objectives might be very correct but…

“LessLoss is conscious that all marketing is inherently prone to hype and cynicism. In return for your intelligence, we pledge to avoid, where possible, argument based on subjective perception. We shall remain scientific, and shall never succumb to mere emotional persuasion. “
Well, if those people are not intelligent enough to understand that there is nothing subjective in subjective perception then do they have any reasons to make a properly sounding DAC? There are many folks out there who have electrician education and who have fluently operates by the notions of bits, volts or Hzs. However it is not enough to make Sound. There are many folks who design their DACs for satisfaction of their oscilloscope and this why this DACs all sound like crap. It is the very same with power lines – none of the freaks that I have seen who made the power treatment devises talks about Sound. None of their products (at least those that I tried) works as they should – they mask out the narrow problem but screw the Global Sound. I am sure that those “no subjective perception” Lithuania guys are sitting in the same very shallow boat.

The Cat

I believe this system was actually developed for people living in parts of the world where the electricity supply is truly terrible, in the first instance a customer living in a more remote part of Thailand. I believe that the number of batteries used can easily be increased. I believe the amplifiers the guy in Thailand used were actually some of the larger Jadis designs and the system he has runs these amps and his other equipment from a small hut built next to the house.

My own exposure to this includes listening to it at a show and at the manufacturers place. On both occasions the music produced by the system made more sense to me when the mains supply was decoupled.  Where I live, I think the mains supply is ok. No large towns or heavy industry nearby. I doubt the effect would be so pronounced.

I'm always amused by your concern regarding everyone else's ability to discern what might or might not achieve a successful result in the pursuit of good sound. It's remarkable given their limited criteria and comparitively barbarian methods for evaluating their results, that engineers at the BBC, your local radio station and at companies such as Koetsu, Ortofon, Revox, Neumann, DG, EMI,  etc etc just occasionally manage not to screw things up. Pure luck I suppose.

rgs

Guy

guy sergeant wrote:

*** I'm always amused by your concern regarding everyone else's ability to discern what might or might not achieve a successful result in the pursuit of good sound. It's remarkable given their limited criteria and comparitively barbarian methods for evaluating their results, that engineers at the BBC, your local radio station and at companies such as Koetsu, Ortofon, Revox, Neumann, DG, EMI,  etc etc just occasionally manage not to screw things up. Pure luck I suppose.

I would agree with you. Mostly it is because the pure luck and because the moronic faulty knowledge that dominates awareness of the today’s engineers was not developed or did not managed to penetrate the engineering masses deep enough. Also, no one would tell you how good those Neumanns or Ortofon were compare to how they could be….

Returning back to the subject…. While I was writing my last biting post a revelation stroke me how to resolve the electricity problems. I think I have invented a methodology according to which ALL problems with electricity should be resolved by the very nature of THE method. It is VERY different with whatever currently is being used and I am very excited to run it with my technical folks and to learn if it migh be implementable.

Romy the Cat wrote:

Returning back to the subject…. While I was writing my last biting post a revelation stroke me how to resolve the electricity problems. I think I have invented a methodology according to which ALL problems with electricity should be resolved by the very nature of THE method. It is VERY different with whatever currently is being used and I am very excited to run it with my technical folks and to learn if it implementable.

I know that I’m fool but I can not help myself the electivity is keep screwing me and nothing can help. The toys that the industry offers to deal with are hardly effective and mostly made for the “other people”. Still me being a fool I keep trying some of that power-helpless crap, keep confirming that I should not do it again…

Still as fool as I am, I am allowing for giving to them more chances and am considering trying the APS PurePower 1050 regenerator. It is basically the same as PS Audio’s Power Plant. The Power Plant. Did not work for me, will the PurePower 1050 regenerator work? I do not know, let me know if you tried it…

http://www.purepoweraps.com/aps.htm

The PurePower regenerator has some theoretical advantages over Power Plant but it is imposable to say anything further because they all maliciously lie and their marketing assurances worth absolutely nothing. The PurePower claim the pure 100% regeneration and 92% of efficiently… it should follow as a big question mark. Still the biggest question would be how good this thing decouples from the grid and how much is screws up SOMETHING ELSE IN SOUND while it dose the decoupling and regeneration…

Romy and friends,

Reading about the sensitivity of your system to electrical power supply problems reminds me of the days when I used to make my own equipment as much for the learning experience as for the final result.

One of the mundane things I learned is that standard audio equipment, including shielded cable connections, did not (and possibly still does not) follow good GROUNDING practice. You connect the stuff in the usual way and you are bound for problems.

The sensitivity of your low-level equipment, the success of using battery supplies on some sources and the inability of line filters and conditioners to alleviate the problems without causing other problems suggests that you might look again at the grounding in your system.

Remember, a grounding problem does not always result in hum or any noise in the absence of signal. Grounding problems are dynamic and disturb the signal and so can masquerade as or exacerbate a power supply problem.

At the risk of stating the obvious and trivial to experienced practitioners:
  1) Cable shields should be grounded at only ONE END, otherwise you are providing multiple ground connections between pieces of equipment.
  2) The single cable shield connection should be connected to the internal central ground point by wire not by chassis. Usually, the cable shields must be disconnected at one device's connector.
  3) Sometimes, one cable shield of a stereo pair is connected at both ends to make the ground connection between devices but this is not as desirable as a single separate wire for grounding each device to an external central ground (STAR grounding instead of cascaded grounding). Remember a cable shield is intended to reduce noise, not carry signal or ground.
  4) The system as a whole should be carefully grounded. Sometimes household grounds are inferior and a high-quality separate connection to a good outside ground is needed (a subject in itself).
  5) You may have a stray voltage problem.
  6) Your audio system might benefit from a dedicated power line, isolated from other household appliances.
  7) If you live in an apartment building consider moving.

Grounding, so basic and simple, can be a subtle and tricky thing. It is important but cannot be perfect and therefore always suspect. The more problems that involve the low-level equipment the more I would suspect faulty grounding and shielding at least as a contributing factor. It should be obvious that the more extensive the system the more likely the problems.

On the other hand, where grounding turns out not to be much of a problem, I wonder if the new high voltage battery technology used in hybrid cars might be useful at least for the true audio obsessive.

Regards,
Robert

RF at Ona wrote:

Reading about the sensitivity of your system to electrical power supply problems reminds me of the days when I used to make my own equipment as much for the learning experience as for the final result. One of the mundane things I learned is that standard audio equipment, including shielded cable connections, did not (and possibly still does not) follow good GROUNDING practice. You connect the stuff in the usual way and you are bound for problems.

You might be right thought whatever I know on subject suggests that the problem is not related to grounding. I would invite your apparent expertise to asses what it going on.

My entire playback is all single ended. The playback is powered from 3 dedicated 8ga 20A each lines taken as close to the “street” and the “code” allowed me.  Do not use the household grounds for years with my playback. In fact the 3 dedicated power line do not even grounded to the common grid’s ground. I have my own ground – 10 feet 5/8 cupper poll driven in backyard’s, in the electrically fertilized soul (at the time what it was driven in). From the grounding poll I have 12ga cable running to the grounding terminal of my preamp. I did not measure the grounding impedance but I think that it should be marginally low.

I did not do it recently but a few years ago I checked the AC polarity on all elements of my playback and made sure that they all where in phase. There are no (known to me) loops in the systems. There are few sources that are not connected to the dedicated audio lines and plugged juts to the ground lifted household lines: motor of my TT, the logic section of my preamp and etc… None of them have any electrical or grounding contacts with signal path.

Now is the freaky part. The effect of grounding in my entire playact is absolutely not auditable. I checked it when electricity was good or bad – it was irrelevant to Sound and to noises. What I meant - the connection or disconnection of the main ground of my playback had absolutely no auditable affect of any kind. In fact I am known to run my playback sometimes in complete lifted mode, with no reference to ground at all. It is not a good or secure idea but I had my rational sometimes (current bios of the cables and so on…) In fact I had once running my entire playback at 220V with reference to 120V on lifted ground – there was no effect to sound as well.

On another hand the misery that coming from electricity comes and goes and it is very much auditable with day by day fluctuation or sometimes by hour by hour fluctuation. So, I can make a presumption that it is NOT the grounding problems…. Please, explain me if you feel otherwise

Robert, you said that if I live in apartment building then I should consider moving. Well, it is not juts apartment building but the apartment building located in the very hart of Boston, right in downtown in the middle of everything. Surely it is the worst possible scenario but it is how it will stay for a while. I kind of like to walk outside of my building and be able to see women who can afford plastic surgery…. :-)

Paul S wrote:

Money back guarantee???

Well, my research of the subject leaded me to talk with their distributor. He turned out to be very much clueless and loaded me with a pile of incredible BS. I spoke with the guy at the manufacturing faculty. From my point of view allow they were not very equipped to deal with customers if a customer demands a little more then just generic bumper-sticker audio-phraseology of audio publications. They peaty much paraphrased to me their reviews with inability to say anything more.

Still, the message that I got form them suggested that they feel that their products does sound differently then PS Audio power plant. They stressed dynamics but I have no idea if they undusted how the stupid harmonic firmness “improves” dynamics. The PowerPlants “improves” dynamics by “expediteing” the tone and striping harmonics… Do PowerPlants do it because the re-generation of because the balanced outputs I do not know. The Balanced isolation transformers from Euitech and others do the very same harmonics  trick and I presume it might be due to the symmetrical power:
 
http://www.goodsoundclub.com/Forums/ShowPost.aspx?postID=35#35

I do not know if the APS PurePower unit is “better”, if it should be the case then it’s will not be by design – it is a regular regenerator as any other. I kind of liked what the PurePower’s Richard told me – he said that he feels that it sound different then from what I accustomed to get from generators. (It sounded to me that he had no idea know why – which is perfectly fine to me).

With all of it there is one undeniable positive fact that PurePower does – a free home trial – the way how it should be. It sets a very right prospect to try the PurePower unit.. I am intend to order this re-generator from PurePower, who knows perhaps, even if accidentally, something might be useable in the world of power re-regenerators.

George wrote:

Even though a PS Audio and others create a perfect AC sine wave this does not seem to be the answer, even for low draw front end components. It seems that some type of problem is still coming through.

George, you not need to tell me about it. In the past I have the entire system lifter on PowerPlants (4 PP300 on ML2 and one of PP3000 front end) I know very well that they do not work as they should.

George wrote:

So what I think you need are individual adjustable filters for each component at the IEC inlet. Some components might be immune to bad power and others might need only minor help. When the power is particularly bad you might need more correction and need to use filters on all components vs. moderately bad days when you might need light filtration on only a few units. Plus you need to be able to bypass the filters when power is good.

Good points and I have thought about it. The ASP unit that I will be trying doe has a bypass.

George wrote:

The other thing that should be considered is that part of the problem might be airbourne RFI which must be changing during the day. Filters on the inlet IECs I think still solve the problem but we can no longer blame the power company. Airbourne pollution would also explain why regenerators do not work perfectly.

Perhaps, I do not know. What I do know that whatever annihilates sound is transparent to anything… unit you physically decoupled from the grid. One of the things that solicited me to try the APS unit was the assurance of the APS guy (Richard) that what I run ASP unit from internal battery + regeneration vs. the plugged in wall + regeneration ….I should hear no difference in Sound. From what he said I can make ONE of the following concussions:

1) The APS unit is the real God-send thing the does properly decouples the load from the mains.
2) The APS unit produces so much crapy noise in the regeneration mode that it overrides the nose of the bad mains
3) The APS guys who tried if are deaf or are clueless what to listen while they are listening
4) The APS guy juts lie.

Well, will see what happens….

George wrote:

I don't know if this is the same thing, but when I had my Lamm LP2 phono stage I was constantly annoyed at how quiet it was. Record noise disappeared but not in a good sense. My guess, probably wrong, is that the Lamm had excessive AC filtration and nothing I did could be bring the sound back (except get a new phono stage). I'm thinking that with more and more AC problems that manufacturers are adding stronger and stronger AC filters, which will help most people but cause deficiencies for others.

Interesting that you mentioned it in this thread. I was complaining about it what I was bitching about Lamm ML2 phonostage. If has nothing to do with AC filtration but with the fact that LP2 was made to attack notes sharper then they should be and it stripes harmonics from sound, consequentially reducing the surface noise. In fact I NEVER considered the reduction of the surface noise as a positive quality:

http://www.goodsoundclub.com/GetPost.aspx?PostID=397

Anyhow, in case if LP2 it was not the power but juts very poor sounding correctors that I also was very pleased to get rid off. BTW, if you do not use that built-in MC step up horrible transformer and use your own transformer and LP2 as MM then the effect of “the sharp and glitzy sound will be much minimized”. So, it is hardly the electricity… but rather the Lamm’s “big theory about the human hearing”… :-)

Power Plant VS. Premier. Question for Paul

Paul, I have a question to ask: what are the SONICALLY BENEFICIAL DIFFERENCE between your old PowerPlants and your new Premier units?

 I would not ask you to enumerate the factual taking points well descried in the products information on your site: the new amplifiers, efficiency, power and a number of other things are obvious and are self-explanatory. What I would like you to do is disregard the new amplifiers, efficiency, and bypasses and to express what you feel is deferent in the Premier that from your point of view should make the Premier SONICLY different then the old PowerPlants. I did own Power Plants and used them in quite different application: I should confess that they, although did what they intended to do, but they did not do what I need them to do and despite being regenerators they still were transparent to bad electricity, compression and noises, not to mention that PowerPlants objectively had own Sound.

So, if you do not mind, I would like to ask you to  answer to the following format.

1) What technical (design, circuitry, topological, generator) differences between PowerPlants and Premier that you feel should have SONIC IMPACT?
2) What you personally feel is the subjective difference between the sonic performance of PowerPlants and Premier?
3) When electricity is very good and you run playback from Premier vs. in bypass mode then what differences in Sound you might name?
4) What you feel differentiate performance of your Premier from your competitor (who do full regeneration) or from $7K-$9K commercial regenerator units?

Paul, I ask you because I am considering your unit, along with the simple units of some of your competitors. You guys sell honest – offering in home trial period – but frankly if your new Premier is just a “Class D” irradiation of the PowerPlants then I would not waste your company time and mine time to try it. (I owned 5 PowerPlants). I would also prefer to head the information from you instead to read about it among the doodles of some idiot-reviewer who, I am sure, will drool stupid saliva about your products in near future.

Michaelz wrote:

Does this mean one may one day get free power from the neighbors?

Well,

The most miserable things about electricity that you never know what to do. I had in past different filters and mny imaginable power gismos, a number of isolated transformers, balanced transformers, regenerators…

For a couple years I was running five PS Audio P300 Power Plants: 4 P300 drove the 4 Lamm’s ML2.0 and one P300 drove the front end.  The Power Plants did OK job but when the electricity was good then the bare mains “sounded” better then the Power Plants. Also, the problems with electricity problems are not constant and sometime the mains begin to pump that “white noise”… This “white noise”… makes anything transparent to it and goes through anything, including the Power Plants. Eventually I stopped to use Power Plants somewhere in the beginning of 2002 as I recognized that Power Plants has own sound: upper mid range become slippery and too artificial and the entire harmonic effect of symmetric power did not make me too happy.

I have some guys that I know who build quite serious dedicated studios and home installations. They are radical enough and their solutions for powering home-level installation are starting from $50K-$60K. So, they suggested me that “nothing works” besides a complete physical decoupling from the power grid (they use own diesel-generators and it is what I would do if I did not live in city). I have 2 other solutions of good decoupling (with no butteries) and perhaps I will try them in future but they are hassles…

Frankly, I have no answer and no good recipe for power solution for myself as now. I ordered a CleanPower unit to try. It has some interesting futures (bypass, no balance operation, less magnetics) but I have no idea at this point how it sounds and if will not dive into “steps” at heavy load…

In your case Jessie, I do not think that 50Hz make a bid difference vs. the US 60. With P300 I use to run everything at 90Hz but it was not really a big deal. However during my experiments with European electronic I did fund that my 120V/200V ADDITIONAL TRANSFORMER did crap sound. I had a few transformers – all of then sound differently and all of them sound worth then what I did no use them. In US we have 110V but our power lines to our buildings are 220V, as least to my building. I use to have 220V feed and it was quite good. I do not know if it is so but I presume that European distributor transformer might have two secondaryes of 110V connected in series. If so then you might use one of your dedicated feed from juts a half of the secondary… BTW, if you go to this direction then be advised about that very ridicule phenomena that I have experienced…

BTW, the Jessie,

since you will be apparently mingling with you PP converting it into Euvro (Romynism form European Voltage) then you might find the comments of the PS Audio owner worth attention. Sure, not when his older PP is archaic product he is egger to make those comments. I never head him in response to the European fool-reviewers drool about P300 post any manufacture comments stating the their observations are worthless because their units used the faulty sounding transformers… Wait until the Premier MK2 become available and …suddenly we learn that the first Premier had some “known sound inflicting flows that we have fixed in the MK2” It reminds me as a few years ago Lamm was instructing his customers that if you buy his amplifier more then 5 years ago then you need to sell it and but a new one because the  parts that he used in a few years of being exploited are losing ability to comply with his “theory of hearing”…..

Anyhow here is what PaulMC said:

*** The P300 European version relied on an output transformer to raise the voltage on its output from 120 to 230. This transformer wasn't the best thing in the world for the system and it led to some colorations in the sound. One of our goals with the PPP was to eliminate the need for this step up transformer which, indeed, we did

Ref: http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/psaudio/messages/1/10549.html