Wow, great replies – and even more varying opinions than I thought there would be. My hobby (although it is fading a bit I must admit) is racing my car and when I first started I had lots of questions and would get a similar amount of different replies. I’ll do now what I did then – read them all and consider them all, do more research and do what I think will apply the most to my situation and be the most beneficial with the budget at hand (that is unclear after spending a whole lot over the past 6 weeks on the new house) and limited time I have to listen - that is for another thread but hifi room is the living room and is open to the rest of the house and wife really doesn’t like loud anything or more importantly what she perceives to be loud. I’m looking forward to her finding her new hair salon, yoga studio etc. which is the only time I can go much above 70 db (if that) for any length of time. In the old house I had the basement and even though it wasn’t sound proofed well I could listen to music hours on end w/o issue. I told her I need to start home shopping for a second home nearby so I can listen to my stereo. Anyway….
Good point on the full space vs. tandem breaker (and I have no idea what those are but will google). The stereo took the last available breaker in the box so probably a tandem or split. This is a good time to learn more about this and will go down this road to see what the deal is. Thanks bikeboy.
Tennisdoc – Even though I had clean power in my old house it was inconsistent and we had brownouts often. I kept all of my electronics on these: https://smile.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FBK3QK/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&th=1 , which, on a youtube vid somewhere saw it had a clean sinewave, esp compared to other UPS’s. The (apparently worthless) EMI meter was only 2 points worse but did take some of the sparkle out of listening so I started unplugging all my gear (not much really) when I stopped a listening session and plug in when started back up the next day or so. Maybe there is a lesson there. Someone mentioned whole house battery back up in this thread (vs a generator which I had at the last house which I’m pretty sure was dirty power but also there was a 20 second delay) so I’ll also look at that but that power could be not-so-great also. hmmm.
Theaudioamp – good questions. I have done very little listening so far – mostly because of the wife-factor but also time – I haven’t had time to set up my cart yet so only have CDs. I have a Ruby K1 which I read is a good cd player but my vinyl blows away 90% of my CDs. I did just listen to Murder by Numbers (just found out this song was never released on vinyl) fairly loud so I could pay attention. I should have picked a different song or CD rather because there aren’t any extended quiet sections (silent passages). I’ll have to report back after I mount and align my cart and then will put on the Wall which has lots of quiet time. Right now I’m prepping the room as much as possible…doing what I can.
I didn’t search out the Rhodium – I just searched for outlets with good reviews. Maybe not so great but IIRC at $250 ea. I doubt I will be replacing them.
GHD – I’ll post some pics tomorrow in userID. Still have to unpack all of my records and cds (except a few), curtains just came today (not hung – 3 glass sliding doors on the front wall) and although I have a rug pad, I’m still waiting on the rug. After I get power straight (and maybe there isn’t much to do) I will start work on room treatment but also getting resistance from wife there also. Sigh. There is an echo, echo, echo here w/ an open floor plan and tile floors – and sliding glass doors.
I have read that more than a few people were able to plug their amps into their Puritan 156 so again with the 45 day trial period I think I may give it a shot.
I’ll do more research on what I have now in the breaker box/line and then will think about another line. As mentioned above the hifi outlets (2) were the last breaker anyway. However, the pool is getting a heater in a few months so that will have to go somewhere.
Sorry if I didn’t address everyone’s posts. I’ve read them all and will again – and again.