Power conditioning for Ayre components?
 

I'm looking at a listing for a PS Audio PPP, essentially a device that generates a 60 Hz sinusoid, to power my QX-5/20, KX-5/20, and VX-5/20. It seems a clever idea and reviewers praise it, but I wonder if it would add any value, given reviewers typically remark about the darkness of the background Ayre power supplies provide.

I would go with Torus Power RM 8/16. Noise free/black background and emotional peaks. I would also conaider good power cable. I have PAD Dominus for VX-5/20 and Siltech Ruby Hill 2 for KX-5/20.

All I want just only the second VX-5 for bi-amp. Ayre terrific gear

I’m using Synergistic Research PowerCell 12 with Synergistic Research Galileo power cords to power all my Ayre gear. I have dedicated 10 gauge AC lines to the stereo and at first powered my Ayre mono blocks directly into their own dedicated AC line, but much to my surprise, the amps became more dynamic through the PowerCell.

Transparent Gen 5 Reference Cords and Isolators all the way. Great investment.

Please convince me why added conditioning is needed when Ayre has world class EMI and RFI filtering built in to their products already.

Exactly. I'm not knocking those who have spent extra on external conditioning. I just want to hear the rationale.

Will,
I can’t. Ayre is very well designed gear already. Depending on your power quality a conditioner may or may not make a difference.

The only way for you to know is to try one out for a period of time to see if it makes an improvement.

Hopefully your dealer can let you audition one.

Tom

Power conditioning for Ayre components?
 

The notion that Ayre gear or the Ayre conditioner has immunized Ayre products from the effects of after market cables and conditioners is just wrong. Ayre never made such a claim, and the fact that they felt the power issue was important enough to build filtering into the device itself militates in favor of the potential efficaciousness of after market solutions that do even more, better filtering. Think of it as an upgrade to an already great power supply.

I have never heard Ayre gear sound better than when paired with some or the best power accessories.

I can say from my view, having owned the KXR and then the KXR Twenty, the two things that brought a % increase in sound enhancement performance was using a QX4 by Nordost , Qkore Nordost and HiFi Tuning Fuse Ag. Had the Ayre through about 5 different systems A-B-ing with and without.

Thanks for your responses. I appreciate them. Tom you're right. The only way to know is to audition in my system.

You're exactly right there. While I obviously believe the built-in filtering in our products is second-to-none, there's no such thing as a perfect brick wall when it comes to incoming voltage. We even make the L-5 to provide additional power filtering using similar technology to the built-in filtering for that reason (and to help the non-Ayre gear). Depending on how much noise is on the line, you can certainly hear an improvement by adding a filter, though oddly, sometimes removing them helps too.

At our old building, we were in the center of a pretty industrial area and had to have everything hooked into L-5s to get the room to sound its best. Our new area is in a more remote location and doesn't have to share with as many neighbors. Suddenly, reserving the L-5s for only the non-Ayre pieces in our system provided a better sound than having everything running through them. The difficulty is that each room and each listener is different, so some experimentation is involved. The only constant we've experienced is to stay clear of power "regenerators". They almost always end up causing more problems than they are meant to solve for us. We feel the less active the filter is, the better job it will do. Of course, your mileage may vary.

My (strong) recommendation would be to get a Shunyata Denali 6000 or Triton. I’ve tried the PPP regenerator before, and my entry level Hydra 4 significantly surpassed it with respect to sound quality. A Denali or Triiton is at least another order of magnitude beyond that; if not more, and I mean that empirically (as in actual data, I haven’t done the math on it, but if I need to, I will! :D)

:thumbsup: Bang on.

It's NOT needed. All amplifiers have some filtering and regulation built in. High performance amplifiers from brands like Ayre already do a satisfactory job taking care of power idiosyncracies. Adding an external type conditioner would be redundant in most cases and detrimental in others. However, it may benefit other lesser performing devices as Ryan alluded to previously. For people that choose them... so be it, for people that don't... no worries!

I have (2) Shunyata Alpha HC power cords for my Ayre MXR amps, feeding into a High Fidelity Hemisphere power conditioner (powered by a High Fidelity PRO power cord).


https://live.staticflickr.com/7848/3...dc119baa_b.jpg

It’s worth noting that a good power system (cables and conditioner) doesn’t just filter the power being delivered to the amplifier, but also should filter any noise generated by the amplifier which might affect other components. See the Component-to Component Interference section from Shunyata’s technology guide page here: https://shunyata.com/technology-guide/

Bingo. Also any EMI generated by unshielded power cords, e.g. for lamps, CD players, music servers, or the high bandwidth CPUs in tablets, phones, music servers, computers, Squeezeboxes, etc.

Although you make an important point it is outside the scope of this thread. To reitterate Ayre equipment will not directly benefit from an external line conditioner. Now lets examine your point.

Enthusiasts tend to care about what's "on the line"? So it's unlikely that anyone here would knowingly drop their expensive gear on the same circuit that is shared by other non-compliant devices. So what is a non-compliant device? Anything that is not part of the audio system. The optimal way to achieve that is to run a dedicated circuit (aka "line"). This is a far more cost effective way to get clean power than any line conditioner on the planet could provide for component-to-component interference.

One could still argue that a separate line may improve the quality of the signal but that alone will not gaurantee that it will be clean (free from noise). True, but there is a very important point being overlooked here. Companies like Shunyata are looking on the AC side of power NOT the DC side. Power is isolated, filtered and recified when it is converted from AC to DC. Power conditioners do absolutely NOTHING for the DC signal that is generated within. But even well made equipment like Ayre can still generate inherent interference. Again true, but that's why companies like Ayre have the reputation they do because they take measures to isolate and shield those interferences thereby preserving the quality of the signal that is being manipulated and amplified.

Power conditioners do what they advertise but then so do companies like Ayre and they don't advertise it, they don't need to. It would be HIGHLY unfortunate if Ayre, and the like, had to depend on external line conditioners to make their products sound just as good at home as they perform on the bench. The fact of the matter is they absolutely do not!

Can you please tell us if you've actually made these measurements? If not, how can you be sure that what you state is factual?

In Post #11 didn't Ryan Berry, Ayre CEO, just say that under certain conditions the sound of their Ayre gear was improved through the use of additional external filtering (i.e., 'no perfect brick wall')? I am no expert, but one thing I think I've learned in this hobby is to stay away from 'absolutes.' In other words, YMMV.

My experience is that Ayre products sound great without additional power conditioning and can sound better with good power conditioning. Ive had positive results on my KX-R Twenty with both the Shunyata Triton v3 and Denali 6000/T.

In science the burden of proof lies with the entity making the claim, not with the entity that contradicts it. If the claim cannot be proven then all you have is theory.

I have not personally measured the signal post the power supply stages of any Ayre equipment (with and without external conditioning) and NEITHER has any third party power conditioning company either. I doubt that even Ayre has done this but they are in the best position to do so. However, I have seen experiments comparing types of power supplies and the net effect interference had on sound quality. The results were telling.

Ryan has to tread a fine line here, afterall the company is selling a line conditioner.

He also stated that there were "neighbors" but he did not specify in any detail what that meant. He also mentioned "non-Ayre gear" again leaving much to the imagination. The information is too sketchy to draw any solid conclusions from. It would have been more helpful had he furnished some objective data that supported his statements.

Well isn't that what the power condition companies are doing? They aren't going around saying their equipment MAY make your system sound better now are they? ;)

In the engineering community we call that a placebo effect.

Crawl back in your little troll cave.

I believe it is almost impossible to design a power supply that does not benefit from extremely pure power and yes this means top quality power conditioners and cords. With my Niagara 7000 I get isolation transformers for every source. With my dedicated Niagara 5000 to each power amp and Dragon power cords I get a high current power reservoir of 90 amps. But it doesn't stop there: even your sources need a dedicated 20 amp line with no power amps plugged in so that you have one conditioner dedicated for your sources apart from your amps.The only amp I would not use conditioning with would be a Relentless but I would use the highest quality power cord and pay great attention to my line and to my wall outlets that would be of the very highest quality. Unfortunately, whatever conditioner you decide to use if it is well designed, it will very significantly improve your sound. Good sound begins at the light pole. When I installed my Transguard Tg60 whole house surge protector meant to stop the lightning if it hit the power line, the first time I turned my system on it was like a veil had been removed that I didn't know was there. I went downstairs and got the OM out and there it was: the Tg60 had very significant filtering that I was unaware of. You want to begin with the cleanest power possible going into your conditioner. This optimizes it and allows it to do its best in providing your component with the cleanest and best current possible. In the case of sources an isolation transformer for each source is the ultimate and for each amp a dedicated (no sources) conditioner with a 20 amp line and current reservoir is the ultimate. Any hum or hiss at all indicates you have a problem. That's why I use fully balanced equipment and no equalization or tone controls. On the forums in general there are many discussions about DAC's etc. folks going to tremendous expense to get the best "one" when the issue is actually dirty power going into the power supply.

____________________
Charles Updated System
Most recent update: AQ Diamond USB replaces AQ Coffee
Amps: McIntosh 1.25KW’s (3) set on floor on custom made cultured marble slabs
Preamp and DAC: McIntosh D1100
Sources: McIntosh MCD1100 SACD player, MVP881 BR player, MVP851 DVD player, MR87 tuner, Marantz 510LV Laser Disc player, ASUS laptop USB (JRiver Media Center 23)
Speakers: Wilson Audio Specialties Alexx
Sub-woofer: Wilson Audio Specialties Thor’s Hammer (1) horizontal lie and Wilson Watch Controller (abbr: WC)
Cables main system: Audioquest Wel Signature speaker cables and balanced IC (preamp to amps); Wel Signature AES/EBU balanced digital IC for CD playback; Audioquest Diamond optical (1) for tuner, (1) for BR player, and (1) for LD player for total of (3); Diamond USB cable; McIntosh MCT cable for SACD playback; Dragon power cords (5 HC cords and 3 source cords for total of 8); Thunder HC power cord for tuner; cables for DVD player not listed
Cables subwoofer system: Audioquest Redwood speaker cable (1); Wolf balanced subwoofer IC from WC to amp; Wind balanced IC from preamp to WC; Hurricane HC (2) and Dragon HC (1) power cords
Power conditioners: Audioquest Niagara 7000 (1) and Niagara 5000 (3); (4) dedicated 20-amp lines with no. 10 wire straight out of fuse box
Cabinet: Double Custom Woodwork & Design (CWD) solid walnut cabinet on large casters; holds all sources and preamp; also, Niagara 7000; 11 feet minimum distance from speakers
Acoustic Treatments: Room and Echo Tunes enough to turn the room into a virtual anechoic chamber if desired; however, at present my room is significantly reflective giving me a bright, vibrant, dynamic, highly resolving, smooth sound free of harshness and grain and perfect for my taste; zero slap echo; gorgeous midrange
AC: Dedicated to this room only, an ultra-high efficiency and quiet Trane split system 2.5-ton heat pump with 4 returns; active electrostatic filter and top-grade digital thermostat
Room (mancave): 40’L x 15.5’W A-frame; max ceiling height 8’ min 5’; wall within wall construction built of 2 x 6’s; built over garage with custom hardwood floor with gym seal with over 40 Lowes stiffened wooden I-beams supporting floor; complete isolation from rest of house

Before arriving at that conclusion, wouldn't you want more information? For example, wouldn't you want to make some assessment of his AC power quality? Wouldn't you want to be sure there's nothing defective about the equipment in use? Further, are you suggesting that the entire engineering community agrees with you?

You are quite passionate about your beliefs but they belie the truths. This is not voodoo science it is applied science. What power conditioners do to the mains line is no different from what audio grade amplifiers do and using them is redundant at best and detrimental at worse. You said you wouldn't use them on the Relentless but if you were steadfast in your beliefs you would. Why the contradiction? Do you think Dan D'Agostino is the only audio engineer that builds amplifiers that "reduces transformer noise to near zero and protects the audio circuitry from the transformer’s magnetic field" or includes protection mechanisms in "non-invasive but comprehensive defense against any external system faults"? He's not.

As for power cords, the ones included in the box may not look as pretty as boutique brands but they are all you need.

Open your mind neophyte.

You may have overlooked that this is the "Friendly Forum for High End Audio." Please consider that as you draft future posts.

Perhaps if he quantified his statement a different conclusion could be drawn, but he didn't, why? As a member of the engineering community I am saying how we see it.

In the real world science has yet to explain everything. It’s good to keep an open mind to things that others experience but may not yet be explained by measurements, and not to be too dismissive of others. To paraphrase Shakespeare, “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your science.”

So what do you think he was insinuating then? If you are going to be the fora police act equitably.

I simply made a friendly request. I'm not here to police anything. Please remember that this is "The Friendly Forum for High End Audio." Anyone here is free to disagree with you. That is all.

In the scope of this topic the science has been explained. Perhaps the technically unaware should keep an open mind to that. It's a two way street, right?

I am saying if you are going to make the assumption start with the preceding post.

Indeed there will be disagreements especially by those that do not understand and that is unfortunate.

So then you know for a fact that everything related to power distribution in audio is fully known and explained and therefore any other opinions or experiences are “voodoo” and that’s open minded. Got it.

Indeed, otherwise the products wouldn't exist. Again, power conditioning is not theoretical science, it is applied.

Isn't it liberating to have such smart people like Rebel to steer us in the right direction - even though he has never even listened to, tried or experimented with actual applications.
Sheesh....

As opposed to what, self-absorbed elitists that are misleading people into the abyss of audio gospel? Clueless...