Stupid question of the day: Should I leave Amp on?

There are a few amps whose mfg'erers recommend leaving the amp on at all times. The Sim-Audio Moon W-5 could actually take a full 3 days to warm up.

But in my limited experience it seems that the majority of amps only require between 30 minutes and a few hours to warm up.

For sake of fire and/or lightning, I prefer to shut it off every night and depending on the season, even unplug things.

-IMO

Dweller: What "experts" are you speaking for? While i'm no expert on anything other than running my mouth, in my opinion, Class A or very rich AB amps benefit the most from constant power. This is primarily due to the wide temperature swing and stabilization that takes place when cycling the amp off and on. Lower bias designs with less of a temperature variance tend to show reduced benefits from constant power.

One can find quite a few threads on this subject in the archives. From what i can recall, every single person that has posted a response about this subject has experienced sonic gains by leaving their high bias amps on 24/7. In most instances, the amps reach their plateau after appr 72 hours of being powered up non-stop. Sean
>

Not a stupid question at all - we're all here to learn. My gear stays on unless I am away from home for an extended period, or there is a thunderstorm - in either case it gets turned off and unplugged. I agree with Sean; most of the equipment I have owned during the last 15 years needs a couple of days to get spun up.

IMO it depends on the gear. To use my own for an example, the preamp is designed to be on at all times, so it is; the amp has a stand-by feature, which I use. I put the amp in stand-by every night and then turn it "on" every morning. I do believe there is other gear that does benefit from being left on all the time, like my friends Plinius.

Both manufacturers of the amps I've held on to for a while--Bryston and now Meitner--recommend that you leave the amp and preamp on all the time unless you're out of town or there's a thunder storm.

It's certainly my experience that most solid state amps sound better when always powered up.

My question is: does the same apply to CD/SACD players? I've never seen that recommendation in a disc player manual.

Regards,

Joel.