Opinions Wanted - My Amp Quandary

[Adam]

Adam. My MPS-1 hums and I have had two chassis and they were both the same. If you get info back from them that the hum should not be there please let me know and I will contact them as well.

adk, I heard back from Lonnie this morning (took over a week, but he's been out of the office). He says that the hum is probably caused by me having the amp plugged into my power console and that the hum should go away if I plug the amp directly into the wall. I'll try that later tonight when I get home, but thought that I'd let you know. If it goes away, then I'll need to ask him about surge protection because I'd be nervous to have it plugged directly into a regular outlet.

[ParadigmDawg]

adk, I heard back from Lonnie this morning (took over a week, but he's been out of the office). He says that the hum is probably caused by me having the amp plugged into my power console and that the hum should go away if I plug the amp directly into the wall. I'll try that later tonight when I get home, but thought that I'd let you know. If it goes away, then I'll need to ask him about surge protection because I'd be nervous to have it plugged directly into a regular outlet.

I was under the impression that you never plug an amp into surge protection. I have always plugged mine directly into the outlets.

[avaserfi]

adk, I heard back from Lonnie this morning (took over a week, but he's been out of the office). He says that the hum is probably caused by me having the amp plugged into my power console and that the hum should go away if I plug the amp directly into the wall. I'll try that later tonight when I get home, but thought that I'd let you know. If it goes away, then I'll need to ask him about surge protection because I'd be nervous to have it plugged directly into a regular outlet.

I was under the impression that you never plug an amp into surge protection. I have always plugged mine directly into the outlets.

Greg is partially right about plugging amps into surge protection units.While you can plug an amp into a surge protection unit it generally isn't advised as most units like this limit themselves to outputting 15 amps (the Belkin falls into this catagory) the IPS will draw for more than that at various times easily and while I can't remember the IPS max draw I do know that the MPS can peak around 32 amps so limiting to 15 really limits what it can do. Also, Emotiva says their amps have internal circuitry to protect against surges so there is no real reason to use a surge protector with it anyways so have no worries about plugging it into the wall.

Let us know how it goes.

[adk highlander]

I have mine plugged directly into a dedicated 20amp circuit. I was also told to not use a power conditioner or a surge protector for the reasons that avaserfi listed out.

I have called and left a message for him to talk about "the hum".

[GlocksRock]

Greg is partially right about plugging amps into surge protection units.While you can plug an amp into a surge protection unit it generally isn't advised as most units like this limit themselves to outputting 15 amps (the Belkin falls into this catagory) the IPS will draw for more than that at various times easily and while I can't remember the IPS max draw I do know that the MPS can peak around 32 amps so limiting to 15 really limits what it can do. Also, Emotiva says their amps have internal circuitry to protect against surges so there is no real reason to use a surge protector with it anyways so have no worries about plugging it into the wall.

Let us know how it goes.

This is good info, I didn't know that... I guess I should plug it directly into the wall. But now I'm going to need more outlets for all the crap I have.

[avaserfi]

This is good info, I didn't know that... I guess I should plug it directly into the wall. But now I'm going to need more outlets for all the crap I have.

Just as important as having more outlets is having enough power going through those outlets. If you have everything (display, sources, amp, processor, etc...) on the same circuit you are still going to be limiting how much power the amp can draw just in a different way.

While I know it isn't possible for everyone it would be ideal if you could have at least one separate circuit. For example when my dad was putting together his HT room I made him run another separate 20amp circuit just on the off chance he was going to run an amp! In the end it is a bit of work/money depending if you do it yourself, but if you are going to be spending a grand on an amp why not take full advantage of its power?

[Davemcc]

Help me with the electrical theory here. Won't the circuit continue to provide all the power that the equipment draws until the breaker trips? If the MPS-1 tries to draw 32 amps on a 15 amp circuit, it will trip. If it hasn't tripped, the MPS hasn't tried to draw more than 15 amps. In fact, the circuit with all other equipment hasn't been asked for more than 15 amps.

I'm not aware of any "soft clipping" in a household electrical circuit and don't see how it will limit current to an amp without tripping the breaker. Either it will give the amp all the power it asks for or shut down when the amp asks for too much. To my way of thinking, if you haven't tripped the breaker, your system is getting all the current it requires. Am I wrong?

[Adam]

To my way of thinking, if you haven't tripped the breaker, your system is getting all the current it requires. Am I wrong?

Sure sounds reasonable to me. I'm not about to claim that the current reading on my power console is precise or fast acting, but it hasn't gone above about 2.5 amps - and that's with all of my equipment on and running (RPA-1, IPS-1, receiver, SVS Ultra, TV, and DVD player).

[avaserfi]

Well there are a few things that come into play with a situation like this. Amps have internal power supplies that they will also use to draw on for instantaneous peaks, but when it comes to sustained power output a sufficiently large circuit is required.

As far as I am told/understand when one has an amp that requires large amounts of power long term, lets say a dedicated 20 amp circuit. If you plug said amp into a 15 amp outlet rather than constantly tripping your breaker it will just not produce maximum output. As far as I understand this situation is similar to having a single outlet that is being used by multiple devices the amp will just not be able to produce maximum output. So having a display, receiver amp and your sources connected to a single circuit will just limit the amount of power the amp will draw and thus limit its output.

Hope this helps. I wish I could be more detailed, but honestly this is as far as my knowledge goes .

[Adam]

Thanks, Andrew. I still don't understand why the amp wouldn't trip the breaker instead of "starving" itself, but no worries - I don't understand a lot of things.

How about my console only showing a current draw of 2.5 amps when I've got my system cranked? Would you still think that my amp is being limited (perhaps because my console isn't showing quick transients)? Perhaps I am just too sensitive and don't turn my system up loud enough.