Dekay: The breaker is the "safety valve". It should have the lowest rating in the chain. The wiring from the breaker to the outlet should be rated to carry more amps than the breaker. Same with the outlet and your power cord to the amp. The reason for this is that if you have a breaker that is rated for....say....15 amps and your wiring from the breaker to the outlet is rated for....say....10 amps it is possible for you to plug an appliance into the outlet that draws....say....13 amps. In this case your are pulling more current than the wire is rated for and fire could result before the the breaker pops and shuts off the circuit. Like Winoguy I think something is amiss with your main breaker. Homes (an apatrments) built prior to somewhere in the early to mid 70's typically have 100 amp mains. Since then there has been a steady increase in the size of the mains and it is not uncommon for new homes to have 200 amp mains. Hope this helps. Good luck, Doug
Amperage?
I hve a breaker (switch) box in out apartment that has the single line switches marked as being 20 amps. The main breaker switch (the one that switches all of the lines at once) however is marked 15 amps. The wall outlets are 20amp Pro models made by Levitron (which I will be replacing as soon as I figure out if they should be 15 or 20 amp). My question is should I be using 15 amp power cords or 20 amp power cords, or, does it make a difference (my amps have 15 amp IEC connectors, I think), also what about the outlets themselves (15 or 20 amp)? I do not own or intend to own high power or current amps. I owm an SET and a Musical Fidelity 50 watt amp.