Powerline noise on hifi linear power supply ?

[diegooo1972]

Hi all

I'm new to this wonderfull world of audiophile.
I'm an IT technician with some knowledge of elettronics.
I was wondering if power line adapter are well isolated and what Powerline carrier can do vs Power Supply.
They work usually in frequency between 20 and 200Khz.
As far as I know using the plug behind the powerline nearly suppress all the noise from powerline carrier.
I prefer to use the plug on the Powerline instead of a neighborhood plug.
That's because using the powerline I have this 20-200khz carrier on the line.
Now the question.
Will this 20-200Khz carrier can influence power supply ? Like 5v or 12v linear PS for example that are so important to a good DAC ?
Of course ethernet cable is always the best choice but not always possible.
Wifi may introduce problem in connection stability and disturbance under a variety of circumstances. My last favourites connection always.
Considering that as IT technician power line is the second best choice. If it work without problem.
For example there are some cases here in Europe where 220v AC came from phases of 380v. In that case Powerline may have problem.
Can someone make a test on a linear power supply behind Power line ?
Or this is not a problem for some specific electronics consideration i'm not able to do ?
Sorry if this is not an important question.
I just can't evaluate that.

Thanks for your attention.

 

[yigitboy]

I am also curious about the answer

 

[solderdude]

SMPS should have a mains filter inside which prevents HF generated by the SMPS not to enter the mains.
When that SMPS has a relatively high capacitor on its input this could attenuate the carrier used for data transmission.

Fortunately, in the vast majority of cases none of this is a problem... but depends on type/brand of both power supply and the equipment.
Unfortunate combinations are rare but exist.

Whether or not powerline variations become a problem also depends on the converter itself.

 

[diegooo1972]

Thanks you very interesting.
I have 230v and not seeing or hearing any kind of problem ATM.
Was just curious about tech involved.

 

[dkfan9]

I have no technical answer but some practical experience. In a rented house, the router was placed near the AVR (Denon X2100W). Powerline adapter was run to a printer and/or second router upstairs. I don't remember if the router, adapter, and AVR were on the same or different outlets. No noise resulted. Later, in a rented apartment, the router was in one room, connected to powerline adapter, which ran to the powerline adapter receiver unit near the home theater setup in another room, connected via ethernet to the TV and AVR. Audible noise resulted, which was still present with all reasonable combinations of outlets used near the HT, even with the powerline receiver unit disconnected from ethernet. Only unplugging the powerline receiver from the wall socket fixed the issue. Same powerline adapter in both cases, non-wifi unit.

 

[diegooo1972]

That was my doubt in the beginning.
In my configuration I have all audio equipments connected to the power plug on the power line and no probelm at all.
I also have an osccilloscope behind that and I see no strange behaviour.
I may suggest to always use powerline with power plug out and possibily to connect everything on tha power plug.
I think that can be good to consider to by one more power line to act as a filter even if you don't connect the ethernet.
Better to verify that before to buy additional power line.
Thanks guys. That was pretty much what I was looking for.

 

[trl]

I'm adding https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...s/laptop-source-cheap-bad-power-supply.10401/ to this thread, just in case the info might be helpful for the OP. Basically, I was able to replicate PSU noise coming from laptop, then via the USB cable into my DAC, amplifiers, then speakers.

A passive EMI/RFI filter did nothing, but an isolation transformer did helped and the background noise added disappeared.