Impact of AC Distortion and Noise on Audio Equipment Fidelity (Video)

[amirm]

This is a video version of my article on AC distortion and noise impact on fidelity of audio equipment:

Text thread: Impact of AC Distortion & Noise on Audio Equipment | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum

 

[Ismapics]

Power conditioners are a great profit center for brands and dealers. They are simple to make in theory and are good to pay the bills. A guy with spending cash goes to the High end audio store, the dealers tell the un-informed client."You mean to tell me you are buying $9K in amps and you are not going to get the $900 - $1,500 power conditioner". They also say "careful with brown outs", and "the AC mains do you trust them with your new amps", BOOM sold. They may even throw in a discount so you feel even better. At 50% profit that's $700 bucks to the bottom line. Now you have it home, you show to your friends, say "hear that difference, see Darko was right after all". Cycle repeats. Now comes ASR and debunks Thousands if not Millions of $$ in gear sales of these un-needed equipment of what we have suspected for years, they don't do squat. They only empty your wallet. Jajaja Amir M is going to be really popular with McGowan.

 

[Tatr76]

Power conditioners are a great profit center for brands and dealers. They are simple to make in theory and are good to pay the bills. A guy with spending cash goes to the High end audio store, the dealers tell the un-informed client."You mean to tell me you are buying $9K in amps and you are not going to get the $900 - $1,500 power conditioner". They also say "careful with brown outs", and "the AC mains do you trust them with your new amps", BOOM sold. They may even throw in a discount so you feel even better. At 50% profit that's $700 bucks to the bottom line. Now you have it home, you show to your friends, say "hear that difference, see Darko was right after all". Cycle repeats. Now comes ASR and debunks Thousands if not Millions of $$ in gear sales of these un-needed equipment of what we have suspected for years, they don't do squat. They only empty your wallet. Jajaja Amir M is going to be really popular with McGowan.

Agree but while I like exposing these practices don't we run the risk if everyone stopped buying things they don't need especially exotic cables, with huge profit margins, cost of equipment will rise. Another good example is TV's where most profit is made from fancy hdmi cables and in effect they subsidise the actual price of the TV. We need some snake oil buyers to keep our costs down

 

[amirm]

Power conditioners are a great profit center for brands and dealers. They are simple to make in theory and are good to pay the bills. A guy with spending cash goes to the High end audio store, the dealers tell the un-informed client."You mean to tell me you are buying $9K in amps and you are not going to get the $900 - $1,500 power conditioner". They also say "careful with brown outs", and "the AC mains do you trust them with your new amps", BOOM sold. They may even throw in a discount so you feel even better. At 50% profit that's $700 bucks to the bottom line. Now you have it home, you show to your friends, say "hear that difference, see Darko was right after all". Cycle repeats. Now comes ASR and debunks Thousands if not Millions of $$ in gear sales of these un-needed equipment of what we have suspected for years, they don't do squat. They only empty your wallet. Jajaja Amir M is going to be really popular with McGowan.

Absolutely. With main TV or stereo being sold at near cost or even lower, the only profit is in cables, power conditioners and extended warranties. This is why it is a half hour battle to leave the store without them selling you these things. I know because these companies call on us all the time to sell their bits and this is the sales pitch.

 

[Ismapics]

Agree but while I like exposing these practices don't we run the risk if everyone stopped buying things they don't need especially exotic cables, with huge profit margins, cost of equipment will rise. Another good example is TV's where most profit is made from fancy hdmi cables and in effect they subsidise the actual price of the TV. We need some snake oil buyers to keep our costs down

Hello Tatr76: thanks for the comment. Although it may seem a bit sarcastic and real at the same time, I will add my 2 cents. Any business/economic model based on the sale of a subsidiary product at higher margins and not the core line will eventually fail -exceptions are those business that an sell the core at high profits and when needed discount severely, Food Service Industry is like that-.

In the case of audio gear, the accessories do balance out the bottom line but they are often seen as spiffs and profit enhancers. I am sure PS Audio (and others) has priced their gear (Amps, Dacs, Sprout) taking into consideration their name/heritage and the value chain with dealers. They see an opportunity to sell power conditioners they take it. The problem for me is that in selling these, they are not being truthful with consumers, as they are solving a problem that does not exist. You see their interest in making as much money as possible. Add the marketing practice of using voices with a following for hire and its even more disrespectful to me as consumer and I start to question the rest of the products of the same brand. Cheers.

 

[Ismapics]

Absolutely. With main TV or stereo being sold at near cost or even lower, the only profit is in cables, power conditioners and extended warranties. This is why it is a half hour battle to leave the store without them selling you these things. I know because these companies call on us all the time to sell their bits and this is the sales pitch.

Hello Amir M: thanks for the comment. Thanks for taking up the videos again, I missed them for sure. The economics have to level out by themselves. If there is no money in Tv's why be in the business to start. Let Costco sell the next brand. It was Vizio a few years ago, now is TLC. However the Samsung and the Sony still sell for much more. I dont see these products going away we will always need some type of cable or connector, we just need to make these companies sell reality and not fantasies. The worst enemy of these products will always be an informed consumer. Thanks a lot for making it fun.

 

[Doodski]

If there is no money in Tv's why be in the business to start.

Video equipment has historically always been of a lower margin. From the time of early VCRs the retail cost was so high that the retail margins where reduced to capture market share. That reduced margin still exists today for all video equipment. Audio gear has a substantially higher margin most of the time. Audio gear usually required more time and effort to sell and video is usually bought on price and the sales time is substantially less so the retailers rely on volume of sales of video gear. I know I sold the stuff for 9 years before getting a education in electronics.

 

[Yorkshire Mouth]

Another great video Amir, please keep 'em coming.

 

[Stokdoof]

I fully support ASR and hope to enjoy it for a long time. However sometimes I worry how long will Amir be able to keep the lawyers from the big names in the industry away from closing this site?

 

[Lorenzo74]

Seems stereophile reviewers are in good faith.. they bout

Absolutely. With main TV or stereo being sold at near cost or even lower, the only profit is in cables, power conditioners and extended warranties. This is why it is a half hour battle to leave the store without them selling you these things. I know because these companies call on us all the time to sell their bits and this is the sales pitch.

it seems Stereophile reviewers are in good faith, one of them even bought one AC conditioner after reviewing it.
here:
https://www.stereophile.com/content/two-august-2021-followup-reviews

@John Atkinson we appreciate your opinion on this as pioneer and champion in audio equipment measurements.
my best
L.

 

[joeren]

You absolutely nailed this one Amir. I’ve been telling people for decades that power conditioners are a waste of money. It seems like they truly don’t understand the AC-DC power conversion or choose to completely ignore it. They will defend their purchase with a vengeance.
Cheers
Joe

 

[Gregss]

Agree, power conditioners are mostly worthless. If you need spike and overvoltage protection, you can buy a good quality power strip outlet that has that built in for considerably less.

 

[LEFASR160]

This is a video version of my article on AC distortion and noise impact on fidelity of audio equipment:

Text thread: Impact of AC Distortion & Noise on Audio Equipment | Audio Science Review (ASR) Forum

it seems that after seeing your video and reading your testing using your own generator, a power regenerator is a waste of money. Have you tried testing different frequency inputs besides 1khz ? I'm wondering if you used 60 hz and a few different higher order harmonics of 60 hz as test frequencies , there might be some resonances which would be otherwise minimized with a better sine wave from a power regenerator that had lower THD ?

 

[GregManningMusic]

Thank you for the review. There is so much snake oil in the audio industry. Data don’t lie!