Power conditioning is not snake oil, but it’s not everyone who needs it. Two houses ago, the power to my home was near a hundred years old . It was noisy, we had voltage spikes and the difference between daytime and nighttime was huge. I ended up buying a used Audience Power conditioner and most of the noise went away. We moved to a brand new subdivision with all the power underground. The power was so much better and you couldn’t hear a difference with or without the conditioner. We’ve moved again and we’re back in the big city, but in area with both above and underground power. We can go for days or weeks with the power being pretty good, but there have been a few afternoons where you could really hear noise like a buzzing and a very faint squeal , so I put the conditioner back in on just my Streamer, CD spinner, DAC and Preamp.
Power conditioners
Seems that engineers who work in industries that demand actual control or reduction in EMI/RFI and other things, use industrial power filters that actually do what they claim to do and they have the measurements to back it up. The Shunyatas and all the rest of the audiophile associated pieces that are basically a fancy power cable receptacle, rely on what they hear (and any objective, rational person knows that is 100% subjective and not valid). Read about it here
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@curiousjim You are exactly correct. I need power conditioning for my home in south Florida, densely populated area, lots of power fluctuations due to a myriad of AC units constantly on/off the grid etc.. My C-J amp was in need of frequent re-bias until installing a PS Audio P10, later upgraded to a P20. Now the amp never needs attention. Tube life has been greatly extended. Conversely, our second home is in rural New Hampshire, power is much more stable and there is no similar requirement, hence a power conditioner is not installed. The need for power conditioning is very much situational. |
Always paralleled power conditioning with fuel contamination. Contaminated fuel translating to ragged performance. Also filter my water which affects cooked dishes. Seems straight forward. Certainly sonically profited from my selections (Puritan Labs). If others scream snake oil, fine with that too. None of that is inflicted on my ears. |
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