How much power does your setup consume?

I now live in an old building. My LL saw my studio today and said "you need to be careful about how many amps you're pulling."

I told him most if not all of my of my equipment uses less than a lightbulb. But that got me thinking I should calculate the total, which got me reading about electricity. So yeah, ohm's law is Current (amps) = voltage/resistance (ohms), and power (watts) = amps * volts.

Most of my gear states the max amp draw, and many list the wattage, but I had to calculate for some (such as the tempest, which uses 16.5 watts).

With my laptop and monitors I total 351w.

I'm assuming all the outlets are on the same breaker, so that is 120V at 15 amps, which is 1800w. Figure in old wiring which may raise the resistsnce (ohms), and lower the current, so a safe ceiling could be 1500w total.

Now I know I could have everything I own plugged in and not even be using half of my safe limit.

There is a spectacular lightning storm going on as I write this...

interesting thread, i have no idea to be honest...i'll have to have a look and report back

Not on much hardware here, biggest consumer must be the desktop & monitors here running all day, every day. Maybe you gear hoarders can use one of these gadgets;

Yeah I was thinking about getting a kill-a-watt at some point.

I dread to think. I turn on some old synths even if I don't use them just to keep them warming up and alive.

I can see the nuke plant from my house. Should be no worries here.

It's been gradually less since i started.

I was blowing the circuit breaker to my parents place at least twice a week when I was young with 2 power bars and an audio supply unit.

Nowadays a 5 port USB hub and the audio unit are all that I need and the hydro bill is pretty low.

  On 3/25/2016 at 7:55 AM, saltykraut said:

I can see the nuke plant from my house. Should be no worries here.

lol

Related to this subject is surge protection/suppression.

Anyone producing music likely has a minimum of $1000 of equipment. If you add an upgraded computer, mixer, interface, synth/drum machine, effects, monitors, etc., you will begin to approach $10k.

So at what point do you invest in protection?

Most surge protectors use MOV components which only channel a surge into the ground, therefore it still passes through your equipment, just in a way that CAN be safe (but may still cause damage). Also, the protection eventually wears off.

Then there are series mode (SM) protectors, which never wear out and completely filter out surges. Those are around $200 and up.

$200 seems like a good investment to protect a few thousand dollars worth of gear, but It's still a purchase few people would make, I suspect.

  On 3/27/2016 at 8:41 PM, sheathe said:

Related to this subject is surge protection/suppression.

 

Anyone producing music likely has a minimum of $1000 of equipment. If you add an upgraded computer, mixer, interface, synth/drum machine, effects, monitors, etc., you will begin to approach $10k.

 

So at what point do you invest in protection?

 

Most surge protectors use MOV components which only channel a surge into the ground, therefore it still passes through your equipment, just in a way that CAN be safe (but may still cause damage). Also, the protection eventually wears off.

 

Then there are series mode (SM) protectors, which never wear out and completely filter out surges. Those are around $200 and up.

 

$200 seems like a good investment to protect a few thousand dollars worth of gear, but It's still a purchase few people would make, I suspect.

I had no idea the protection wears off. How long is the lifespan of a surge protector on average?

Depends on the joules rating, but there is another factor: clamping voltage.

The protector won't even activate until the clamping voltage is reached, so the lower the value the better. 300V is good. Once it clamps, you start running down your joule protection.

Most outlets are 15 amps and 120V. Multiply those to get the watts, and watts multipled by seconds equals joules.

Better protectors are rated above 3000 joules.

A 500V spike will kill a 3000 joules protector in less than half a second.

Bottom line: MOV surge protectors are good for only one surge. Other than that, manufacturers recommend replacing them once a year due to normal power spikes produced by household appliances.

I run a 8kw light setup and my studio + having two other power consuming roommates in my house and have had a electrician sign off on it being safe to do with the current setup of the house... And it was built in the 1940's. So you should be fine.

Either that or I'm one piece of gear away from blowing my house up.

You need a (serious) lot of (serious) gear to pull enough current to worry about it. Think many-many-channel analogue desk + tape machines + + + + + +

We have run all of this off one 13A plug before. No worries. In fact, in the below video, I think we were only running off 3x 13A plugs:

Well it's just math innit, you add up the max consumption of each device and that should be safely below your breaker's limit, which is usually around 1800 watts.

My fists pack one million volts

  On 3/29/2016 at 2:01 AM, bubbhasdance said:

cum

true