Do you guys leave your solid state Integ Amps on all the time?

[CleanSound]

Most lab instrumentation isn't stable for several hours, particularly those with ovenized oscillators.

Well, then I am glad that HiFi audio aren't lab instrumentations that requires such temperature stabilization, otherwise, my electric bill will be very high.

All, power off your audio electronics, leaving it on does absolutely nothing except help peddle the false snake oil narrative of electronic warm up time and ring up your electric bill.

 

[DonR]

Well, then I am glad that HiFi audio aren't lab instrumentations that requires such temperature stabilization, otherwise, my electric bill will be very high.

All, power off your audio electronics, leaving it on does absolutely nothing except help peddle the false snake oil narrative of electronic warm up time and ring up your electric bill.

Undoubtedly one of the selling points is that it is such a precision piece of equipment it needs a prodigious warm-up period just like top-shelf lab equipment - a sort of defect association if you will. Of course, even in the lab it varies greatly. A multimeter is ready to go in a second but an RF oscillator with internal reference may need to be kept on for an hour before accuracy is guaranteed. My GPSDO stays on 24/7 because it has an ovenized oscillator and getting satellite lock can take a while. Most other stuff is ready in less than 10 minutes so a thumping great power switch turns the lab off overnight. Where you live is also a consideration. I pay C$0.11/KWh (about 8c USD).

 

[pinger]

Well i definitely appreciate all the replies. I think I read somewhere that its best to leave the amps on all the time. Dont remember and thats why I asked the question. One system is in living room and one in bedroom. I guess I will turn them off when not in use. I will miss the blue lights though

 

[CleanSound]

Well i definitely appreciate all the replies. I think I read somewhere that its best to leave the amps on all the time. Dont remember and thats why I asked the question. One system is in living room and one in bedroom. I guess I will turn them off when not in use. I will miss the blue lights though

Audiophools believes in leaving an amp on all the time because somehow it makes it sound better. There are no engineering nor scientific reason why it would.

 

[pinger]

Audiophools believes in leaving an amp on all the time because somehow it makes it sound better. There are no engineering nor scientific reason why it would.

Yeah i know it wouldnt affect sound quality just a thought it might be better for the amps longevity if left on. I see that is not the case.

 

[ahofer]

Yeah i know it wouldnt affect sound quality just a thought it might be better for the amps longevity if left on. I see that is not the case.

In fairness, it could be. But in a consumer setting probably not a big deal.

 

[rdenney]

I have some stuff that is left on all the time, and some that gets turned off and on routinely. And I have had some stuff fail and some stuff last the ages. There doesn't seem to be any correlation between those two conditions.

Software-based stuff seems to me more likely to get zapped by incoming power issues, even though I have had generations of whole-house surge suppressors and no few surge-protecting power strips. I just had to replace a washing machine because the software-controlled parts got zapped, and this time--finally--I was unable to source a replacement for a reasonable sum of money. I had replaced the control boards in the washer and dryer several times. The dryer, in particular, is on a 30-amp circuit, so that whole-house protector is the only option there.

I don't turn everything off at night. Too many switches, and time is worth more than the cost of 100mW of residual power draw. But classic amps draw a lot of power just sitting there, so I only have one of those that I keep on (the one in my office). What I leave on might add up to 1% of the power I use for cooling in the summer, and I sure as heck don't turn that off.

I leave computers on because Windows seems to need to contemplate afresh whether it's going to let me use the computer every time it boots.

Rick "knocking on wood" Denney

 

[ahofer]

leave computers on because Windows seems to need to contemplate afresh whether it's going to let me use the computer every time it boots.

LOL.

I have a "sofabaton" remote from Amazon that bricked itself so badly with a software update that it won't even turn on.

 

[solderdude]

Switches off everything.
Certainly when leaving the house or going to bed.
I suggest to have a talk to firemen some day and you'll understand why.
In my repairdays I have seen too many devices that caught fire or were switched off before it was too late.

 

[CleanSound]

I have some stuff that is left on all the time, and some that gets turned off and on routinely. And I have had some stuff fail and some stuff last the ages. There doesn't seem to be any correlation between those two conditions.

Yeah i know it wouldnt affect sound quality just a thought it might be better for the amps longevity if left on. I see that is not the case.

@rdenney is 100% correct.

If the electronic is designed to be on all the time, it will last as long as it's designed life. For example, server computers and even desktop computers.

I have a desktop computer that I use as a file server and media server, it's an used and refurbished product from Amazon, it has been on 24x7 for over 3 years now. The only issue I got is louder fan noise as the ball bearing on the fans of the computer is getting worn out, it is more likely that the fans on the computer will fail before the electronic.

For home electronics, they are not designed to be on 24x7, although the standby mode is; while some home electronics are left on 24x7 and still would not have any issues, just keep in mind, it wasn't designed for that. Also, keep in mind heat is generally a bad thing for electronics, and by leaving the electronic on 24x7, it'll be generating heat ,albeit at a low level that is negligible when there is no load.

There are no scientific nor engineering reasons that I know of that keeping electronics on will prolong it's life with the few exception of perhaps power related issues, such as inrush current as stated by others. But that simply means that the electronic is poorly designed or it's coming to the end of its useful life and therefore I said, it deservers to be fried at that point.

The other thing to keep in mind is electricity waste. For example, I am now contemplating if I should even keep my file/media server on 24x7 after doing the math: average load of say 80/wh; x 24h x365days x $.12/kwh = $84/year, at least I am using it most of the day. But for audio electronics, it is not being used most of the time if you keep it on 24x7, therefore, completely wasteful for no good reason.

Software-based stuff seems to me more likely to get zapped by incoming power issues, even though I have had generations of whole-house surge suppressors and no few surge-protecting power strips. I just had to replace a washing machine because the software-controlled parts got zapped, and this time--finally--I was unable to source a replacement for a reasonable sum of money. I had replaced the control boards in the washer and dryer several times. The dryer, in particular, is on a 30-amp circuit, so that whole-house protector is the only option there.

Perhaps do some investigation on this, how do you know for sure it's power surges? Sometimes, dirty power (i.e DC offset, extreme levels of AC line noise, poorly regulated power that aren't necessarily considered surges) can damage electronics. There's got to be some sort of device you can plug into your wall to log the quality of power, if that is the case, then I would contact your utility provider.

EDIT: After I made this post, I remember hearing of peoples' electronics would get fried at their house and the cause was power transients within their own home.

A quick google search yield this: "Electrical transients are momentary bursts of energy induced upon power, data, or communication lines. They are characterized by extremely high voltages that drive tremendous amounts of current into an electrical circuit for a few millionths, up to a few thousandths, of a second."

"A range of equipment creates internal transients: from copiers to coffee makers, vacuum cleaners to variable speed drives, and from fluorescent light ballasts to furnace igniters. Studies have verified that approximately 80% of transient activity at a given facility is internally generated. Copiers and laser printers are notorious transient generators as are heating and air conditioning systems. Any time an inductive load is either powered on or off it generates a low magnitude surge impulse that propagates back through the electrical system."

Source: https://alltecglobal.com/es/what-is-an-electrical-transient/

 

[rdenney]

Switches off everything.
Certainly when leaving the house or going to bed.
I suggest to have a talk to firemen some day and you'll understand why.
In my repairdays I have seen too many devices that caught fire or were switched off before it was too late.

Nearly every electronically controlled item in your house has a standby circuit keeping it alive enough to respond to the remote. And that means the power supply is energized to power that standby circuit. This includes most modern consumer electronics devices.

In addition to that, quite a lot of stuff can't meet its mission without being left on continuously. This includes, for example, UPS devices, which are obviously designed to be left on, and are probably riskier than most simply because large batteries are involved. And appliances, where turning them all the way off requires a trip to the breaker panel. Appliances that require or at least assume continuous power include stoves, cooktops, refrigerators, microwave ovens, wall ovens, dishwashers, clothes washers, and clothes dryers. Most of those do not have master power switches at all.

But it isn't just the big stuff. What about clock radios? Watch winders? Burglar alarms? Electric clocks? Motion-detecting (or timer-controlled, or dark-detecting) porch lights? The HVAC system? The phone chargers? The dehumidifier in the basement? The Radon removal fan? The garage-door openers? The doorbell transformer? The FM-radio antenna amplifier you didn't even know you had? The power supply for the incoming phone and computer network equipment you didn't even know you had? Routers and switches? The list is very long indeed. Turning all that stuff off either violates the purpose of having the stuff or is simply unreasonable.

An amp one way or the other doesn't seem like it moves the needle much, unless it's an audiophile amp that eschews common consumer safety design. Which some do.

Rick "not buying that anybody who isn't Amish in the modern western world can or would switch off anywhere near close to everything" Denney

 

[ehabheikal]

I am on 12v trigger from streamer that is connected to a the amp and subwoofers. Works well most of the time.

 

[ahofer]

Nearly every electronically controlled item in your house has a standby circuit keeping it alive enough to respond to the remote. And that means the power supply is energized to power that standby circuit. This includes most modern consumer electronics devices.

In addition to that, quite a lot of stuff can't meet its mission without being left on continuously. This includes, for example, UPS devices, which are obviously designed to be left on, and are probably riskier than most simply because large batteries are involved. And appliances, where turning them all the way off requires a trip to the breaker panel. Appliances that require or at least assume continuous power include stoves, cooktops, refrigerators, microwave ovens, wall ovens, dishwashers, clothes washers, and clothes dryers. Most of those do not have master power switches at all.

But it isn't just the big stuff. What about clock radios? Watch winders? Burglar alarms? Electric clocks? Motion-detecting (or timer-controlled, or dark-detecting) porch lights? The HVAC system? The phone chargers? The dehumidifier in the basement? The Radon removal fan? The garage-door openers? The doorbell transformer? The FM-radio antenna amplifier you didn't even know you had? The power supply for the incoming phone and computer network equipment you didn't even know you had? Routers and switches? The list is very long indeed. Turning all that stuff off either violates the purpose of having the stuff or is simply unreasonable.

An amp one way or the other doesn't seem like it moves the needle much, unless it's an audiophile amp that eschews common consumer safety design. Which some do.

Rick "not buying that anybody who isn't Amish in the modern western world can or would switch off anywhere near close to everything" Denney

hmmm.

-Andrew "not buying that we should forsake an easy marginal effect because the base effect is still large" Hofer.

 

[rdenney]

...


Perhaps do some investigation on this, how do you know for sure it's power surges? Sometimes, dirty power (i.e DC offset, extreme levels of AC line noise, poorly regulated power that aren't necessarily considered surges) can damage electronics. There's got to be some sort of device you can plug into your wall to log the quality of power, if that is the case, then I would contact your utility provider.

EDIT: After I made this post, I remember hearing of peoples' electronics would get fried at their house and the cause was power transients within their own home.

A quick google search yield this: "Electrical transients are momentary bursts of energy induced upon power, data, or communication lines. They are characterized by extremely high voltages that drive tremendous amounts of current into an electrical circuit for a few millionths, up to a few thousandths, of a second."

"A range of equipment creates internal transients: from copiers to coffee makers, vacuum cleaners to variable speed drives, and from fluorescent light ballasts to furnace igniters. Studies have verified that approximately 80% of transient activity at a given facility is internally generated. Copiers and laser printers are notorious transient generators as are heating and air conditioning systems. Any time an inductive load is either powered on or off it generates a low magnitude surge impulse that propagates back through the electrical system."

Source: https://alltecglobal.com/es/what-is-an-electrical-transient/

In the case of the washing machine, it was pretty simple: Washer worked. Thunderstorm rolled through, with some brief outages. Washer didn't work. The times I've replaced the control boards on appliances in the past were similarly obvious.

I have scoped my incoming power, and it's not super clean but neither is it nasty. It is certainly within the range of what I would expect from a power company. My power from their transformer is underground and the transformer is only about 80 feet from the house. My shop is also powered from that transformer on a separate meter can, but me and myself are the only customers on that transformer. The transformer is fed from about 1000 feet of underground cable, so any direct strike on the service network upstream from that has a lot of opportunity to bleed off into the ground on its way to us.

What I notice with damage is that one leg of incoming power or even the neutral will get interrupted differently from the others, and that can have some interesting consequences vis a vis apparent voltage.

(My professional expertise is traffic signals, so dealing with environmentally caused surges has been a work requirement. Those devices are microprocessor-controlled and their power environment is often a lot worse than residential power.)

Rick "gets power from a 'rural' cooperative" Denney

 

[solderdude]

Nearly every electronically controlled item in your house has a standby circuit keeping it alive enough to respond to the remote. And that means the power supply is energized to power that standby circuit. This includes most modern consumer electronics devices.

Yep.

In addition to that, quite a lot of stuff can't meet its mission without being left on continuously. This includes, for example, UPS devices, which are obviously designed to be left on, and are probably riskier than most simply because large batteries are involved. And appliances, where turning them all the way off requires a trip to the breaker panel. Appliances that require or at least assume continuous power include stoves, cooktops, refrigerators, microwave ovens, wall ovens, dishwashers, clothes washers, and clothes dryers. Most of those do not have master power switches at all.

yep

But it isn't just the big stuff. What about clock radios?

Have them, all very low power stuff that usually, when it fails does not go up in flames.

Electric clocks?

All on batteries.

Motion-detecting (or timer-controlled, or dark-detecting) porch lights? The phone chargers?

All low power devices that usually don't go up in flames.

The doorbell transformer is disconnected ? bell runs on batteries.

The HVAC system? The dehumidifier in the basement? The Radon removal fan? The garage-door openers? The FM-radio antenna amplifier you didn't even know you had? The power supply for the incoming phone

don't have those.

computer network equipment you didn't even know you had? Routers and switches?

yes, have those, all fed with low power SMPS that usually don't go up in smoke and just stop working (and that happens more often than I would like)

The list is very long indeed. Turning all that stuff off either violates the purpose of having the stuff or is simply unreasonable.

Yep, that's why my entire AV system works on a single switch that I throw when on vacation and when going to bed.

Its the higher power consumption devices that might start fires such as power amps, TV monitors etc.

The firemen I spoke to claim most electric fires start there, but... most domestic fires starts by smokers (in bed) and candles and dodgy lamps, heaters etc.

An amp one way or the other doesn't seem like it moves the needle much, unless it's an audiophile amp that eschews common consumer safety design. Which some do.

Yep they consume little power on idle. That is not the issue though. The problem is that there is potentially a lot of power available and when semiconductors fail they usually short and huge currents (heat) occurs.

Rick "not buying that anybody who isn't Amish in the modern western world can or would switch off anywhere near close to everything" Denney

Not Amish but switch off the most dangerous appliances which happens to be AV systems and chargers.
For that reason we have 1 charging station all in one switched mains distributor which is off when no one is home and when going to bed.

 

[rdenney]

hmmm.

-Andrew "not buying that we should forsake an easy marginal effect because the base effect is still large" Hofer.

Hmmm, indeed. Why can't equipment manufacturers build stuff that doesn't catch on fire even when a component fails?

I suspect most fires from stuff being left on are plugged into undersized extension cords or into receptacles that are worn out and making poor contact. (And let's face it, American-style receptacles are not designed for repeated plugging and unplugging, which any hotel receptacle will reveal: It's rare the bedside-table receptacles in hotels rooms firmly grip what I plug into them, and I do 60 hotel nights a year on average.) Or the cord is slammed in the door and partially cut. Or 15 wall warts are sharing one strip with six splitters on it, pushed into the back of a cabinet and covered with a 2" layer of flammable dust. (No, I am not looking behind the monitor on my desk. No. Uh-uh.)

And then there are the holiday lights on Christmas trees, but that's a whole other topic.

I routinely turn off the amp on my workout-room system (a B&K that probably consumes 60 watts even quiescent), and the amp on my main stereo system (a Buckeye). The amp on my TV system is a Yamaha AVR, and it's usually in standby when not being use, but it certainly isn't turned off. The Adcom 535 amp for my office system (where I was NOT looking a moment ago--you hear?) stays on, though I do turn it off when I think of it (which is nearly never). I use that system constantly in my office. But I don't usually turn off the other devices in my sound systems simply because they are on standby.

Rick "would like to see some real causal statistics" Denney

 

[solderdude]

Go to a fire station and ask one of the fireman, or the one that gives fire prevention courses.
Statistics will tell you very, very, very few homes burn down due to electronic appliances breaking down.

The problem is there is a small chance and you'd be real down when it happened in your home or the home from a loved one.

So statistics say the chances are very slim.

At Christmas time I happen to have a filled bucket of water in the living room and Christmas lighting (candles) are not left unsupervised (cats you know, they like to drink from that bucket as well).

 

[DonR]

I think that if you are worried about a component failing because of repeated power cycling you should also consider what continuous use endangers. Older equipment built at a time of less restrictive standards and with well-aged components must be treated with utmost care and never left energized unsupervised. Modern standby circuits often use an isolated power supply to control the main supply.

 

[CleanSound]

In the case of the washing machine, it was pretty simple: Washer worked. Thunderstorm rolled through, with some brief outages. Washer didn't work. The times I've replaced the control boards on appliances in the past were similarly obvious.

I have scoped my incoming power, and it's not super clean but neither is it nasty. It is certainly within the range of what I would expect from a power company. My power from their transformer is underground and the transformer is only about 80 feet from the house. My shop is also powered from that transformer on a separate meter can, but me and myself are the only customers on that transformer. The transformer is fed from about 1000 feet of underground cable, so any direct strike on the service network upstream from that has a lot of opportunity to bleed off into the ground on its way to us.

What I notice with damage is that one leg of incoming power or even the neutral will get interrupted differently from the others, and that can have some interesting consequences vis a vis apparent voltage.

(My professional expertise is traffic signals, so dealing with environmentally caused surges has been a work requirement. Those devices are microprocessor-controlled and their power environment is often a lot worse than residential power.)

Rick "gets power from a 'rural' cooperative" Denney

And you mentioned surge protector. So surge protector didn't work? Have you tried a whole house surge protector install right next to the panel?

I have a whole house surge protector installed right next to the panel, but only recently and I don't get lightly strikes often here.

 

[rdenney]

And you mentioned surge protector. So surge protector didn't work? Have you tried a whole house surge protector install right next to the panel?

I have a whole house surge protector installed right next to the panel, but only recently and I don't get lightly strikes often here.

I was between surge units in the panel. (Hangs his head in shame.) I've replaced them in the panel a couple of times, now. They can take a hit pretty well but they will give up their lives in a big surge and they need to be checked routinely.

My panels (two 150-amp panels next to each other) were made by GE back in the day and I use the SurgePro THQLSurge in each one of them. It clamps at 500V L-N and 900V L-L and can resist surges up to 10 kA. So, not the greatest but the best I can get for these panels. I had tried units made by ham radio guys Industrial Communications Equipment that were rated at 50 kA, but those released their magic smoke within weeks of installation. They were wired into 60-amp breakers as specified by the manufacturer. I took those breakers out and the SurgePros went in their place. But one of them was blown when that extra storm passed through. I keep them in stock, but I don't take off the panel cover when I'm in a hurry and just hadn't gotten to it.

I have Homeline (SquareD) panels in my shop, and I use the HOM surge protectors in those panels--I doubt it's any better than the stuff above. But the shop has a Ufer ground that is just plain better than the copper ground rod my house uses. Those are still showing protection after a couple of years.

In both cases, these don't mount next to the panel. They mount in the panel, in the place of a two-pole breaker, with a pigtail that takes the shortest path to the neutral bus.

I've been tempted to install Edco 1210's, like we used in traffic cabinets in stormy areas like Texas and Florida. Those have a current rating of 20 kA, but the clamping voltage is only 350 V, so less stuff gets fried on the way to protection. But I doubt the installation in a residential panel would be suitable--the wires need to be really short. And it wouldn't meet code.

We have clay on top of granite here, so soil grounds are always a little shaky and that's true for pole bonding used by the power company, too. That's why I built the shop with a Ufer ground.

Rick "grounding on limestone was even worse when I lived in Austin" Denney