To Power Condition or not?

Harleyhawk, I wholeheartedly agree with Timo. I CANNOT recommend the separate 20 amp lines more highly after my recent experience. I have Lamm monoblock amplifiers which have very good power supplies. I had two dedicated lines put in a number of years ago before the benefit of all that I have learned and studied (many as a result of the fine people on this forum - Bob Bundus and Subaruguru in particular on this one). Those two lines were 12 gauge Romex with no conduit or twisting of the conductors. They were used with various power conditioners over the years mainly on front end and preamps but not my amps (didn't have long enough cords to reach the amps). I recently put in four more 20 amp dedicted lines (on the same phase) of 10 gauge THHN solid core wire with the three insulated conductors twisted and placed in Greenfield conduit with Watt-A-Gate outlets (two duplexes that I had) and two ACME cryoed outlets.

I have my CDP on one, each Lamm amp on one, and my preamp on the fourth (with my subs and ESLs on the old ones). The Lamms are straight into the wall with no power conditioning.

Total cost of the lines (excluding the Wattagates) including labor - $450.

All I can say in that if I could get the kind of improvement from a $450 upgrade like this every time, I would have a whole lot more money in the bank. My system is pretty resolving and I have very good PCs and cables/interconnects on my stuff so I thought the improvement would be subtle at best. NOT! I won't go into too much detail here except to say that the bass was deeper, tighter and more articulate, the highs were clearer but less strident, the overall presentation was more resolute while less analytical and the noise floor went down so much that I finally could understand Graham Nash crystal clearly on a passage that I have never understood before.

Thus, if you want a cost effective upgrade, you should consider this as an option. Subruguru was very helpful and he sells some Belden 83802 (I believe that's the one) which I was interested in due to its ease of installation (before I decided on the 10 gauge for other reasons).

Hope this helps!

Wow, thanks for the rec!
Yes, two years ago I installed dedicated lines and made my own PCs from the magical belden 83802, and have never looked back! Incredibly low noisefloor from the full shielding, nice current delivery from the 12AWG, and utter transparency from an ultralow loss all-Teflon dielectric.
I recently discovered that Schurter redesigned their old fragile solder-only IEC connector, now making a really great, heavy contact, screw-clamp design! Thus the idea of giving something back to the Audiogon community by assembling DIY PC Kits of this 83802 and fine connectors for only $35. I sell the 83802 raw for lines at $2.50/ft first 20', then $2.25 longer length. I'm thinking about duplicating the junction boxes I use. They comprise the great, cheap Pass & Seymour duplexes (silver-plated by Acme at $35 is PERHAPS cost-effective. Not sure.), set in all-aluminum junction boxes, hardwired to the brteaker panel.
I made one small one for digital (EMC-1 MKII and Alesis Masterlink), one for analog (MD100 tuner and Aleph P pre), and one with a 30amp switch for the monos in the basement (Aleph 2s). No conditioners, no surge protectors, no Wattagate-modified Marincos, just solid engineering, Teflon and 12AWG. Incredibly low noise floor! Sorry to wax on, but I believe that essentially hard-wiring your components to the breaker with good copper and all-Teflon is a cheap no-brainer. Let me know what you need. And don't think you'll need 10AWG unless you're running kilowatt monos more than 50 feet away.... Ern

Harleyhawk, I would recommend several dedicated 20 amp circuits and cryogenically treated outlets. See below:

Here is some information from several of my posts on Audiogon (another similar topic).

“I have experimented over the last year with various wires to use for dedicated 20-amp circuits. I have the following wire in use in no special order:
1) 10 gage Romex
2) 10 gage UV
3) Belden 83802
4) Virtual Dynamics 10 gage BX Cryogenically treated with Cryo’d circuit breaker. *

I have not tried the following but I’m sure it works, 10 gage solid THHN (white/black/green) manually (electric drill) spiral twist and snake through conduit.

To my ears on my revealing system I hear NO difference between (1-4)! I think simply using a dedicated circuit with 10 gage copper makes the biggest difference.

* There might be other positive factors to using cryogenically treated wiring besides sonics. It might lower the operating temperature of equipment.

I have also experimented with many outlets regular/cryogenically treated. My last purchase was the Acme silver plated/Cryo'd outlet which finally settled in and sounds good.

At the present time my favorite outlets are as follows: Hubbell 5362, Hubbell 8300, Wattgate 381, all three sound very good, I think I like the Hubbell 5362 just a bit more (a smoother more musical, dynamic presentation)
but I rank all three together. A person could buy three Hubbell's fully treated by Alan for the cost of one Wattgate 381!

Next in line I would rank the Acme silver plated/Cryo'd and the FIM (cryo'd) which I had Alan cryo/cable-cook.

The best looking put together, solid, built to last outlet I have seen and have in my possession is the Hubbell".

Pixie dust. Oops, wrong thread. Not!
Charlie