Power conditioner, yes or nay?

lqdsnddist said:
I've owned most everything on the market at one point or another. Power conditioning does NOT affect the tone with digital processors. Key term here being "DIGITAL". The Axe is basically a computer, and like a computer its all or nothing with regards to its power needs. Its not going to start magically processing those bits, the 1's and 0's differently based on the input current. Your not going to get an output sequence of bits going from 1000100010001.... to 100110001001 because of supply changes during processing. CPU's simply don't work that way.

What it can do however, is model some effects of things like voltage on things like a power amp. There are a number of parameters you can tweak to account for subtle changes in AC current etc.


Think of it this way, ignoring any power conversation strategies your laptop may employee when running from the battery, does it perform any differently when plugged into the wall ? No it does not.

Its not like spell check is suddenly missing every 1 out of 1000th word because its getting "dirty" power. Its not like Photoshop is dropping every ten-thousandth pixel. And its not like your Axe II is going to model an amp any differently. These things either work, or they don't.

Your not going to sweeten your tone by slightly starving the Axe for voltage etc.

Sounds like you've fallen for marketing hype, which is just that, stuff created by folks in a marketing dept. Not engineers, maybe not even musicians. But rather people who's job it is to convince you why you "need" something, even if that "need" is merely a creation of the ad man.

Its modern day "snakeoil". Its selling a pill to prevent people from getting a made up ailment. "Axidosis" could be a made up condition, but sure enough some people would gladly line up to spend $99 a month for a bottle of those pills because they don't want to get "Axidosis", and if you give a list of imaginary symptoms, plenty of people will swear on their lives that they have "Axidosis".

Power supply filtering is beneficial to hardware amps and surge protectors are wise for all digital devices, but no magical power conditioning is going to affect the tone of a digital modeling unit.
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You're right, there's no such thing as digital crosstalk
 
I didn't want to post another topic, I also am living in an Unstable world of electricity and I'm interested in getting one conditioner, plus what it does, I don't really know much about them.

I use Axe FX 2, 7pin Midi cable ( feeding my midi controller from Axe's rear power thingy ) and using Line 6 g50 Wireless.

So I have 3 plugs going into the outlet.

What shall I buy?

Furman M-10Lx E Power Conditioner Would this work for me? If yes, why? If no, why? :)
 
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In my experience, the neutral of the transformer at my block is lifted. And some electronic equipment started behaving oddly. Modem acting crazy and stuff. Probably too much harmonic content of considerable magnitude is looping around and doing some damage here and there to weak signal electronics.
Long ago I took my practice marshall MG30 to a cabin at the beach and the grid was so horribly made there was lots of hum and crackle clearly audible thru the amp. That same week something got blown up inside the amp as ever since that time when I hit a chord hard, the output would drop until the input decays below a certain limit.
Something like exaggerated sagging.

And on a side note, you should grab an osciloscope and check the line. In various cases it's the most impure signal ever. Would probably look like a child's graffity rather than an actual voltage sine wave.

So yeah power conditioners are worth it IMO. It's saved my AXE from a few dangerous transcients too (Surges, shorts and instant blackouts). Money well spent.
 
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Because the AFX2 is quite deep I'm able to mount a Furman in the rear of my rack. I have the AFX2, Line 6 G90, Matrix GT1000FX and a Furman all in a 4u rack.
 
benson said:
Because the AFX2 is quite deep I'm able to mount a Furman in the rear of my rack. I have the AFX2, Line 6 G90, Matrix GT1000FX and a Furman all in a 4u rack.
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I'd suggest getting a 6U.
It's never a good idea to squeeze ventilated electronics into a cramped space.
 
EJ James said:
... All it took for me was losing that one expensive piece of rack gear. I've never plugged another piece of gear directly into an outlet since. Not once, and never will.
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I have used a surge-protection power bar since day one and have yet to have a problem...but with the $ and time invested in my current digital setup, I just ordered a Furman... cheap insurance and the bonus of power filtering. After all, with ~$10,000 worth of equipment, $180 seems like a no-brainer to me as well.
 
It's a small price to pay. Power conditioners are like insurance - expensive and sometimes a hassle, but it sure is nice to have when something goes wrong. Lightning struck a power pole near my brother's house and it fried the fuse box on the side of his house. It also took out his microwave, brand new front loading washing machine, and a few other small items that were plugged in. Fortunately he had is PC and his big LCD TV plugged into to surge protectors and those were fine. If you don't opt for a full blown power conditioner, at the least get a good quality surge protector / power strip. Not one of those little $5 ones from home depot either. Get one that is rated for at least 1000 joules. Many of the good ones have a warranty that will pay for equipment plugged into it if it gets fried. TrippLite and APC are good brands.
 
maschoff said:
You're right, there's no such thing as digital crosstalk
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Crosstalk, be it digital on a DAC or analog in nature, is a totally different thing than tonal differences. Reduction of noise, crosstalk, less THD et al, are all good things, and potential benefits of line conditioners. I have a Furman P-8 myself, and I'm not telling anyone not to buy one. But what I am saying is that its not magically going to make your Axe sound any sweeter. Its not a tone secret, and its not suddenly going to make some amp model sound better, improve the drive block, give an amp more saturation etc.

Its not like a unit is going to sound like a first generation POD, then you give it the magical sweet conditioned voltage and suddenly it sounds/responds/"feels" like a real amp. Digital processing does not work like that

A power conditioner is not like getting a new F/W update with better algo's etc
 
I bought a Monster Pro 2500 last week, I'm liking the simplicity of flipping one switch and turning everything on. And I like the stepped function of the powering up of that unit so my monitors (and power amp eventually turn) on after the axe is starting to power on.

Only thing I need to get are shorter power cords for the Axe and my Korg DTR 2000 once I figure out the lengths.
 
Rich5150 said:
I bought a Monster Pro 2500 last week, I'm liking the simplicity of flipping one switch and turning everything on. And I like the stepped function of the powering up of that unit so my monitors (and power amp eventually turn) on after the axe is starting to power on.

Only thing I need to get are shorter power cords for the Axe and my Korg DTR 2000 once I figure out the lengths.
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Today I ordered a 1ft and a 1.5ft power cables (for Axe and Matrix respectively)to tidy up the back of the rack! Another benefit of using a rackmounted power conditioner? (More $hit to buy!)

Having only three units in my rack I figured I didn't need a power sequencer. Just turn on Furman-Axe-Matrix and reverse sequence to turn off.

I wouldn't join a stupid conversation, why would anyone?:D
 
I like the simple one switch on/off function, extra power outlets plus a little extra security "just in case" thing.
 
Raab90 said:
So how you gonna fit 5 units worth of equpiment in a 4 space rack? Remember they need some air.
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As I already said, in the rear of the rack. So why would anybody mount an AFX in a 2u rack which clearly has no airflow? It's all relative, my Furman and G90 generate no heat so being butted up causes no issue. The AFX and Matrix have as much airflow as they would without the Furman. It isn't rocket science, just a little common sense.
 
benson said:
As I already said, in the rear of the rack. So why would anybody mount an AFX in a 2u rack which clearly has no airflow? It's all relative, my Furman and G90 generate no heat so being butted up causes no issue. The AFX and Matrix have as much airflow as they would without the Furman. It isn't rocket science, just a little common sense.
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Then I'm guessing you're after the small block ones, to just let it sit at the rear with all the cables and stuff.
For some reason the first thing thru my mind when you mentioned the Furman was a PL-8C or some other rack unit. I was still trying to figure out how could anyone put a rack unit inside a coped rack, in reverse dang.

I guess in that case yeah it should be fine. I agree to most people here in that they count as some sort of insurance. They are not going to mess around with your axe soundwise in anyway as it's CMOS/TTL. In order to do so it would have to turn 0s into 1s or something, but then again the unit probably woudn't even do the led testing and turn on blank. It's just not going to work.

Regarding the effects in the sound... Induced and parasitic currents are always a problem, especially if you take into account that PA-Speaker intraction is the product of using a transformer from high voltage to low voltage-High current to drive the speakers.

Now unless the oulet gives you a distorted signal there should be no reason for power conditioners, unless you gig a lot at random places where you know there's some bad quality signal. But I do believe it's never a waste to buy a surge protector as you never really know where your next gig is... or when there's gonna be a surge in the line.
 
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May i know this power strip can replace the power condtioner function?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
I use the Furman AR-1215. Back in the day, we rehearsed at a place that the power would dim when the A/C came on. At least a dozen times I lost all my presets in my old processors, pre-Axe Fx days. I then had to run a sequencer, before laptop backups, to get back up and running. Basically rehearsal was over and I had hours of work ahead of me when it happened.
 
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