Re: OT: an unpleasant buzz

[Bill Fox <billyfox@soundscapes.us>]

info at zoekeating wrote:
> do furman power conditioners really do anything? i thought they were 
> just glorified power strips.
> i've got an el cheapo furman that the speakers are already plugged into.
>
> the intermittent time is the curious part. if the buzz were constant 
> i'd be more suspicious of the speakers themselves.
> but the fact the are quiet outside of 3pm-11pm....?
My studio is powered from a power conditioner.  It actually regulates 
the voltage delivered so that brown outs and over voltages on the power 
grid do not get delivered to my studio gear.  They see a nearly constant 
120 VAC.  Power strips do not regulate voltage and, at best, filter out 
voltage spikes if advertised to do so.  Warning: a good spike will take 
out the protection elements (usually just a few MOV devices-Metal Oxide 
Varistors, iirc) and you will never know it.  Replace such units every 
few years of switch to a power conditioner.

My laptop power supply blasts noise into everything via its ground pin.  
I use one of those ground adapters from Radio Shack or any home 
center/hardware store.  These are meant to allow you to plug in three 
prong power cables into older two prong (ungrounded) wall sockets.  
You're supposed to plug these into only the upper portion so the the 
adapter's tab can be screwed into the screw that holds the outlet cover 
plate to the wall.  This connects the ground.  Only I (and everyone 
else) use these to LIFT the ground by not connecting the screw tab to 
anything.  That prevents my lappy's power supply from spewing noise into 
the power cords of other gear.

3 to 11 pm indicates human activity.  Something in your house / 
apartment building / neighbor's house is being used during those hours.  
Try moving your monitors to the other end of your house and see if 
anything changes.  Try feeding them a signal from a portable, battery 
powered CD player / iPod / minidisk player using as short of a signal 
cable as possible.  Does this change anything?

Cheers,

Bill