NeoMagick said:
i agree, it's a very good idea to figure out how many circuits are in the room (most likely one), and what it's breaking point is. If it's a 20a circuit, and you're also running desk lamps, computers, monitors, amplifiers, /and/ all this gear, you ought to be calculating for 20 amps total, not just whats in the rack. In that case, you can either replace the breaker in the panel (but that may also need a change of wiring, depending on how old your house is), or run an extension cord from another circuit.
It's unlikely that an interior residential outlet circuit is 20 amps unless done for a specific reason (a bathroom, kitchen, or the 20 amp circuit I put in my studio, for example). It's gonna be 15 amps.
You absolutely CANNOT replace the breaker without rewiring. It's extremely dangerous to have a 20 amp breaker on a 15 amp circuit.
However, i differ on opinion in one scenario. If you're fortunate enough to have a 35/40+ amp circuit in the room, or at least a circuit wide enough to give you some headroom with all your gear running, I'd still go with 2 power conditioners in the 20u rack, rather than daisy chain them, or run a johnny bar.
There are no 35 or 40 amp outlets, unless you are talking about a stove or dryer circuit, and good luck plugging your gear into that
I would not daisy chain conditioners, I would buy a single unit with adequate capacity for the whole rack. Honestly, 20u is not that big of a rack. If you had 40u, I'd split the rack in two and get to power supplies, yes.
The conditioners also clean the power running to the gear, and a johnny bar (esp. a cheap one) in the line would dirty it up again. Not by much, and it's a little bit of semantics, I know, but in the long run, clean(er) power can arguably save power supplies and transformers from crapping out. Just as you want as few hops as possible in the signal path going from mic to deck, the same applies to the power.
We're talking about what, another 6' of power cable? I highly, highly doubt you could measure any difference.
And if I'm gonna invest in $5k or howevermuch worth of gear (or enough to
fill 20u anyway) another $150 or so in a power conditioner to get /all/ of it the cleanest power I can, is beyond a worthwhile investment in my mind.
Well I use voltage regulators and UPS, which does a lot more than conditioning. Isn't that worth it?
FALKEN said:
pc interface
tube preamp (2)
compressor (2)
reverb (2)
patch bay
eq (3)
furman
That isn't much, figure 50W per item, a little more for the tube pres (actually the power consumption is probably much less than that), so maybe 600W as an extremely conservative estimate. I suspect it's really closer to 200W.
outlet 1- the rack, and my reel to reel
outlet 2 - pc, mixer, monitors (the half not connected to the lightswitch)
outlet 3 - amplifier if recording guitars.
outlet 4 - unused. behind the couch.
Maybe 1200W total max draw (dunno about the reel to reel, but look on the back, all this stuff should be labeled), which is 10 amps. That's plenty of cushion for one 15 amp circuit.
maybe the outlet connected to the lightswitch is on a different circuit?
It could be, but it's not likely. To find out, turn the light on, and turn everything else off. Get a nightlight or something else you can quickly plug in to check an outlet.
Go to your panel, and turn off circuits until you find the right one (they are supposed to be labeled, so it should be pretty easy. When you have the circuit with the light off, turn all the other circuits back on. Go to the room, and plug the nightlight into all the outlets. If it doesn't work, then all the outlets are on one circuit. If it works in some outlets, those outlets are on a different circuit.