The PS Audio Regenerator Thread

[realysm42]

I don't understand how these work, do you charge them up and then let them convert what they've absorbed? I read on one of the sites Mark linked to they are seperate from the mains?

[Reid Malenfant]

I was wondering if there is an audible improvement with a mains regenerator over a properly implemented dedicated mains and balanced transformer.

My next question is do these things have a life expectancy and if so how long?

A regenerator will out perform a dedicated mains spur with a balanced transformer - yes. Though why not still have the dedicated mains on top of that The PS Audio P300 - 2000 output balanced mains, I'm not sure if this has been mentioned... I couldn't tell you about the new P5 or P10 or the earlier PPP.

I guess the life expectancy in the case of my P600 will be about the same as any other high quality, or should I say fairly expensive 300W RMS per channel stereo amplifier. Effectively that is exactly what it is with both channels in a bridge driving the output transformer.

[Welder]

Cheers Mark

I might be moving so this needs thinking about. It will be one or the other in the short term at least.

[Reid Malenfant]

I don't understand how these work, do you charge them up and then let them convert what they've absorbed? I read on one of the sites Mark linked to they are seperate from the mains?

Noooo... What they are effectively is a dirty great big power amplifier, or in the case of the PPP onwards a smaller amplifier that corrects the mains.

Just like a loudspeaker is fed music via your amplifier it could also be fed a clean sine wave. Now that is exactly what these things do - they output a clean 50Hz (or up to 120Hz) sine wave so your stereo equipment is fed clean power rather than distorted & noisy power which you'd get from the mains.

You often hear it said that your stereo sounds best in the early hours of the morning. This is because just about everyone else has gone to bed in the neighbourhood & switched all the stuff off that generates noise on the mains. Well these things give you that clean (if not cleaner by a wide margin) mains at all times of the day

Cheers Mark

I might be moving so this needs thinking about. It will be one or the other in the short term at least.

In all honesty I'd never want to be without one for feeding my front end again! Given a budget I'd reduce it for the normal kit just to make sure I could buy a regenerator to power the stuff

[realysm42]

Thanks for the explanation.

Mark, would you use the same logic as you would with a conditioner of filter here; you mentioned getting one that's vastly over specced for the units it's supplying the power to?

[Reid Malenfant]

No, it's not needed in this instance You see any conditioner will increase the impedance of the mains supply, so to lessen this evil you need to really seriously over spec a conditioner so as not to impact in a negative way...

These things can lower the impedance of the supply, so as long as it can supply all the power your kit needs you don't need to go overboard.

[realysm42]

Is this an item that will have a different effect depending on your location?

I've read a lot of people saying these are solutions to problems they don't have, or would it benefit everyone to have in their system do you think?

[StanleyB]

That's just it Mark - noise causes issues further down the line as power supplies never have infinite rejection ratio. It can manifest as vibrations in the transformer or noise on the DC lines of the components - it can never be completely smoothed away. .

It can be smoothed away, but it does require a bit of lateral thinking .

[Reid Malenfant]

I'd say that it would vary depending on where you live, but only to a certain extent

I'm assuming you have a refridgerator & possibly a freezer? You obviously have some form of PC, be it a laptop or standard PC, I'm guessing a TV as well & just about everything that goes along with that... Well they all generate a significant amount of mains interference, from the compressor on your fridge switching on & off to the high frequency noise that an SMPS will inject into the mains All modern flatscreen TVs use SMPS, so do most other things that go along with them. They all generate random noise as all the SMPS will be working at slightly different frequencies

That's just the tip of the iceberg, if you live in a village, town or city you have everyone elses garbage on your mains line as well... Ok, maybe not everyone, but definately everyone fed from the same substation as you! That could be a thousand houses

[Reid Malenfant]

It can be smoothed away, but it does require a bit of lateral thinking .

Oh, without reducing the supply impedance? If so you are the only person on the planet that knows how to do this