Dedicated Line for HiFi

basically its just a 1:1 isolation transformer. Labelling it "balanced" is a nice way of referring to it.

The virtue of a 1:1 is that because such transformer coils are inherently poor carriers of RF so it acts like a natural filter against spikes and line noises from other equipment (water heater, air cond, hair dryer, etc) in the AC line.

The massive coils in the 1:1 transformer also act as a form of electricity reservoir, the same which can also be achieved much like capacitors in similar DC circuits.

U can label them as Energizers, or Duracellers (pun intended) or etc. The operating principle is still the same.

ImpactZone....


Thanks for the detail write up and the cost to build one of these by your goodself

cheers

Thanks for clarifying about all the electrical tweaks. Sometimes these tweaks are just overkill but I would like rather go for it than be left feeling 'not done it'

with all the tweaks done (dedicated line, earth ring, A&L MCB, etc) , can consider wireworld or transparent cable run from the mains. if the sound still not good enuf, put Cardas or Acrolink power cords in the system. Or can also consider a purepower 2000 with its incomer from a Richard gray or a python shunyata. and the plug the cables connect to has to be cryol treated furutech. what else. this is hifi.

You just do whatever is within your financial ability and is reasonable and sane. Meaning if you have a 20k system, then the level you do would be different from someone who has a 200k system, and again different from someone with a 5k system. We just do whatever is in our ability. Also of course we can't be starving ourselves or deprive our family of any luxury at all while we go and use high-end expensive cables for the mains wiring, right ? So all these is just for discussion and by right needs not be said la, as I always say forumers are intelligent people we are trusted to be sensible and common sense in our indulgement.

The only problem you have is that something like a dedicated power line from the mains DB is considered a very 'big' job. This is because depending on the location of your listening room, you may need to hack a lot of walls and that is going to be messy and expensive. In a way, it is a big job and much more involved than simply changing an equipment for e.g. So in this case, sometimes you may need to plan ahead a bit. E.g. consider your career path and try to peep into the crystal ball. What kind of system will you potentially be playing in say 5 or 10 years time, into the foreseeable future when you are better off financially, more stable domestically but still staying in the same house. In this case, if you have some spare cash, then you may need to consider a trade-off. Instead of that brand new CD player, you might want to consider spending more to do a better dedicated mains, in preparation sort of, for a hopefully higher-end system in the future.

I think u all neglacted the importance of a dedicated grounding for Hifi . As we know all our home equipment also dump lots of noise into the ground. A proper dedicated grounding will benefits our Hifi .

No, at least I highlighted it but I think most others wanted to as well. However, the issue of grounding can be a two edged sword. Most people just use the grounding that comes originally in the house mains as it has to be assumed that it was properly done. I know of at least a couple of people with grounded properties who installed a dedicated earth spike into the garden, specifically for the hifi mains but only to discover the original ground works better. I remember it has something to do with the conductivity of the earth at which the spike is installed. It seems normal electrical contractors mostly came out from 'hock see chai' background and it is practical on the job training. So either their sifu don't teach them or their sifu don't know about grounding and how to do it properly. So ask many electrical contractors and it seems most don't have the proper equipment or don't even know how to install a good ground. I believe the original ground that comes with the house mains are probably designed by qualified people, or Tenaga with the proper procedure and/or equipment so in many cases, it is better. So for my case anyway, I decided not to take the risk but make sure my dedicated mains spur runs its own ground wire which is connected to the ground terminal at the mains DB. So in theory, there is minimum contamination from the rest of the house circuit. If you want to install a dedicated ground for the hifi, I strongly suggest to use a qualified contractor, at least one who -seems- (if we are not qualified ourselves, we won't know if they are for real or not) to know their stuff. Or we can ask them for their procedure I think.

To close off, I know, first hand, of at least TWO cases where during a thunderstorm, lightning entered the ground wire and burnt equipment. In one case it was a friend's expensive hifi system. He told us he was reading the newspaper in the hifi room, and the plug was not even in the socket but lying nearby but he could see the lightning JUMP the gap from the socket to the plug and burnt his CD player. The other case was 25 years ago in my first job, where a shitty earth connection allowed lightning to somehow get into the LAN circuit and burn every single high-end workstation (at that time, VERY high end workstation as it was used for CAD) connected to the LAN. It was a very expensive repair bill for the organisation.

So, do take care !