Interesting talk on Power Conditioners

[Dan Banquer]

Power Conditioners

I think you analogy of medical equipment and consumer audio is a bit skewed. I would fully expect that medical imaging eqipment would be a very robust design with noise immunity already built into the product. If you start taking a closer look at most of the consumer electronics out there I think you will find this is not the case.
Hope this helps,
d.b.

 

[mtrycrafts]

I think you analogy of medical equipment and consumer audio is a bit skewed. I would fully expect that medical imaging eqipment would be a very robust design with noise immunity already built into the product. If you start taking a closer look at most of the consumer electronics out there I think you will find this is not the case.
Hope this helps,
d.b.

I finally found my letter back to me from Bryston:

"The typical 60Hz AC waveform contains approximately 3%
distortion, in the form of harmonics, noise and interference from
such sources as RF and motor commutation affects. Bryston's
power supplies filter out this distortion and noise with a typical
efficiency of 99.999%. The remainder, (0.0003%), is further
rejected by the amplifier circuitry itself. It is essentially
immeasurable in the amplifier's output under any circumstances."


But then, Bryston is not any other consumer product.
Perhaps the other makers may need to list their filtering capability?


Did you mean to include a link in your post?

 

[Votrax]

The Audiophile APS 1050 I ordered seems to cover these 3 things. There is qutie a bit of marketing hyperbole on their site too, but the core purpose seems to be legitimate.

I am a bit curious about the AC-DC-AC conversion process they use. Do most conditioners handle voltage regulation that way?

The APS 1050 is an uninterruptible power supply. By design all UPS's perform the AC-DC-AC conversion so when you loose your ac supply the battery supplies the DC to the inverter circuit. Conditioners will only stabilize your rail voltage, as there is typically no regulation. As for the rest of the circuitry in a receiver there are solid state regulators which give a solid DC output with a wide fluctuation on the input. Typical voltage regulators have 75dB of ripple rejection at the output as well.

 

[Dan Banquer]

Power Conditioners

"The typical 60Hz AC waveform contains approximately 3%
distortion, in the form of harmonics, noise and interference from
such sources as RF and motor commutation affects. Bryston's
power supplies filter out this distortion and noise with a typical
efficiency of 99.999%. The remainder, (0.0003%), is further
rejected by the amplifier circuitry itself. It is essentially
immeasurable in the amplifier's output under any circumstances."
Toroidal transformers can come equipped with a faraday shield on the primary side of the transformer. If this is the case then the filtering can happen that way also. However, this is rather rare as this can be pretty expensive to do, and is not done on most consumer audio gear.
Mytrcrafts: can you ask Bryston if they did that with their toroidal transformers?
d.b.

 

[awesomebase]

Just my $0.02

This is one of the best conversations I've read on a subject so far, so thanks for all the inputs. I have a Belkin PureAV Line Conditioner and I love having it. As for interference on the lines, it acts more as an insurance policy than anything else. In the beginning I noticed that it seemed to cut down on some of the video problems (i.e. occasional static, some ghosting on channels). However, since that time we've switched to digital cable so I'm not sure that it is bringing about any real "benefit" other than surge protection. Our home is not quite 2 years old so the circuitry is fairly stable, and it doesn't seem to me that it is doing any voltage regulation because it reports voltage typically in the 113 to 120 range. That seems to vary more when all the equipment is on and we're using things like a Microwave oven and/or regular oven or other kitchen appliances. As far as I can see though, it doesn't affect the performance of the audio or video equipment. However there are a number of design benefits. First off, it keeps all the plugs in the back and on a particular shelf in your audio cabinet. That is just good for organization. It also provides a plug in the front for use with the occasional laptop/camcorder hookup to the TV. I like the ability to switch certain areas on or off, if for no other reason than to prevent children from turning off/on our TV rapidly when we have get-togethers (it is a rear-projection LCD). Of course the TV offers its own set of protections as well, this is just another level of it.
I just want to say that I value this product quite a bit and wouldn't hesitate to get one for the Home Theater downstairs when I start to build that up. You spend a little extra than what you would for a good surge-protecting power bar and you get a good, convenient, solid piece of equipment. I'm certain there are others that are much better, but, I got mine for just over $220 when it retailed at $699. The Monster Power Bars were selling for about as much and the convenience factors alone justified the Belkin.
If I didn't have $7000+ worth of equipment, I probably wouldn't have bothered, but, $220+ is a relatively small price to pay to ensure that your equipment has another level of power protection. That is just my experience, I can't honestly say that video quality using digital cable has improved with using it as opposed to not using it. I do know that DLP and LCD rear-projection sets are more sensitive to spikes in power and that this is one of a number of factors that contribute to premature lamp-replacement. I hope that helps!