Dedicated power and outlets

Overhang, I don't judge your finding and I DON'T buy on mag. recommendations. I am NOT saying there aren't any other options. There are others but I simply don't have any experience with them (by exp. I mean that I never had a chance to evaluate it in my system). I could recommend - Furutech or Wattgate 381 or 381Ag but those are a expensive alternatives and I think Jamesk58 is looking for the best bang for his $$$. I can also add Signal cable - MagicStrip (about $100) 4-outlet Power Extension with Marinco hospital grade AC plug or Hubbell 4-Plex High Quality 20A Outlet Box. But he still needs good quality outlet(s).

If I post a recommendation or opinion, it is strictly from my own experience. If you want, you can check my posts about tweaks and such. You will find out that I am not a big fan or a user. But these did bring some improvements. There were big enough for me to notice it. I also got them from M-Direct. With money back guarantee, I could have return them easily but I did not.
I own Vandersteen Quatros. Stereophile wrote great review about these spks. In general, I agree (90%) with Michael Fremer, July, 2006 review but if for any reason, after a year or two he changed his mine about Quatros - it would definitely NOT affect my own judgment.
P.S
I got 4 PS Outlets, 2 Furutech and 1 Wattgate 381.
PS outlets - show special, NY HE SHOW 2002 - I am not selling. Sorry.

Hi,

I can attest that addding dedicated power lines is one of those best tweaks to do for your system. We are moved into our new house and I added 5 dedicated lines, all with 3 strand 2.5MM thick cables in dedicated pipes in the walls. At the end, I am using HMS gold-rhodium power outlets and in the fuse box, I have a mix of silver or copper 500VA/16Amp AHP fuses with AHP Gold III fuse block for each fuse. The basement circuit is totally isolated from the top floor with the use of a electric splitter (I not sure what it is called) and I have noticed that any other appliances that are run, either sauna, fridge, lights, washer, dryer, have no impact at all in the listening room.

I also used the SST stuff on the advice of Rushton and have used it with great reults. I used only a sparing amount on my mono amp power cords only for experimental purposes and it seemed to add some sparkle to the system, this was almost 1 1/2 years ago. I will try to redo some of the connections in the new room to see what will change, right now with the new room and lines, the system is more alive and dynamic then ever before, so I will proceed slowly before doing some of these other fine tuning tweaks. Good luck,
Audioquest4life

Mrjstark,no hard feelings :)
This hobby is frustrating as it is.You're right,if you upgrading from stock Home Depot outlet,even the besr ones they sell (Levitton $9=74)PS Audio outlet is an upgrade.

Yes Overhang, you nailed it.
Any one of above AC outlets will be better
then Home Depot stuff. Quality of audio outlets might be questionable, but these are still way better then your regular wall outlets. So...lets agree that dedicated line, audio ac outlets and ac-cond. will benefit any system.
Cheers.

One last thing. While debating which power conditioner to use I've also read where some prefer plugging their amps directly into the dedicated outlet- no surge protection or anything. They feel with the dedicated line there is no need for power conditioning. Without the surge protection is that wise?

If one just used a surge protection strip only, any recommendations?

I normally plug my amp into the switched port in my pre so the amp kicks on with the pre. The pre plugs into a surge protector strip like a Belkin. I have also plugged a power strip into the pre's unswitched outlet for the cd and the subwoofer AC adaptor feeding it's integrated amp.

I have been using decent quality Belkin power strips between the wall outlet and the pre and other gear. Never ran any comparisons so don't know what effect they may have on sound quality