Surprised at Low Household EMI Readings


I picked up a Trifield EMI100 meter to check for EMI noise around the house. After watching a few YT vids I was expecting some pretty high readings. Surprisingly almost everything was low. The unfiltered outlets where my system is plugged in measure less than 10 milllivolts with all equipment powered on. The worst was the bathroom GFCI outlet at around 65mV. I use a 10-year-old Blue Circle power conditioner, and that output is a few mV less than the wall outlet. The house was built around 1970, and outside of a new fuse box installed a few years ago, everything else is original.

Very happy with these readings as I was considering a power conditioner upgrade. The $150 Trifield meter seems to have saved me a few thousand bucks.

jaybe

Not sure what the correlation you are seeing comparing low EMI with the challenge of dirty 110v power.

EMI is something that I never noticed.... until it wasn't there.  Probably my 70 plus year old ears.

I too don't see any correlation to the need or not for power conditioner. I have Triifield meter, most useful in audio systems to measure for RF and EMF. I my case in which I have modem and router close to audio system, extremely high levels of RF led to me disabling wifi for what now serves as my audio only router, adding a second wifi enable router located  some distance from audio system serves as whole house router, RFI leakage or contamination of other equipment is a concern. EMF leakage from  transformers is another concern, these should be shielded so as to not contaminate sensitive circuits in equipment.

 

AC circuits are noisy for a whole host of reasons, much due to the many switch mode power supplies on modern electronic devices, thus, the reason for dedicated circuits for audio. Dedicated circuits alone generally not enough, most find noise floors further diminished via power conditioners. I don't believe any Trifield meter is going to serve as qualified arbiter as to whether you will benefit from power conditioner or not.