Cleaning up the Electricity

[Queso]

I'm turning my apartment into a recording studio, in a nutshell.

 

The electrical signal here is so dirty!

 

What can i use to filter out all of the nonsense in my electrical signals?

 

to kill the buzz?

 

I know there are boxes you can run your electricity through to clean it out...but does anybody have any information on these things, for instance what are they even called?

 

are there any small enough to fit in a satchel and walk out of a store with? (in theory! i don't steal or anything...)

 

THANK YOU

[BluesMan]

To clean up 30 cycle interference in sleep labs they run the data cables through shielded conduit.

[alexander]

here is some info on electrical filters in general:

http://www.ibiblio.org/obp/electricCircuits/AC/AC_8.html

[Tormod]

I'm turning my apartment into a recording studio, in a nutshell.

 

Lucky bastard. You'll be famous as "that guy with that unique electrical buzz in his studio". :hihi:

[alexander]

i think the best choice for you would be to buy a ups with a filter and run your systems through it, first you dont have to go crazy filtering, secons it has a secondary benefit of protection in a power outage, you are working in your house, lets say recording, and power goes out, normaly, you are screwed, because chances are your HD was writing the captured data to the disk and it all of the sudden stopped, concequences of that can be diar, HD failure=loss of your work, so UPS would be a wise investment of money....

[infamous]

Lucky bastard. You'll be famous as "that guy with that unique electrical buzz in his studio". :hihi:

He may discover a whole new style of music. I can just imagine the headlines: Orby starts a new craze in the music business....................Infy

[alexander]

lol, probably turn true too.....

[Drip Curl Magic]

I'm turning my apartment into a recording studio, in a nutshell.

 

The electrical signal here is so dirty!

 

What can i use to filter out all of the nonsense in my electrical signals?

 

to kill the buzz?

 

I know there are boxes you can run your electricity through to clean it out...but does anybody have any information on these things, for instance what are they even called?

 

are there any small enough to fit in a satchel and walk out of a store with? (in theory! i don't steal or anything...)

 

THANK YOU

 

You can borrow my electrical surge box- if you please. Although, you'll probably need more than just one, it'll be a start. It's not like I'm using it for anything. My electricity is very clean and very stable. I never have to worry about power surges.

[alexander]

you could, design and build your own power plant, you know?

[Turtle]

___UPS's (Uninterrupted Power Supplies) require batteries which you may charge with your noisy line or photovoltaic panels. Panels currently run in the $100-$150 per 15 Watt panel range. (Bigger than a satchel:rant: )

___Rock on!:hihi:

[CraigD]

I'm turning my apartment into a recording studio, in a nutshell.

…

What can i use to filter out all of the nonsense in my electrical signals?

to kill the buzz?

In my house (not a recording studio - unless you count 4 track 1/4" tape - just a humble place where a band can play), I use this UPS, but only to protect against power outages. Although I’ve no “inside the case” experience with little UPSs like this one, I do with some larger units, which I suspect are similar in basic operation. Most UPSs have a high-speed switch that detects a drop in supplied voltage, and quickly (in much less than 1/60 sec) switches to battery power. Until such a voltage drop is detected, it just passes line current directly to its outlets, so offers no more power conditioning than a good quality surge suppressor. It shouldn’t reduce induced 60 Hz “hum” at all, or any other weird harmonic stuff.

 

Whenever I’ve had problems with audible hum in any of my home audio equipment (a simple 8-in/4-out mixer, PA amp, some instrument amps, microphones, speakers, lotsa cords, and various consumer electronics), the problem has always turned out to be some sort of ground fault in the device itself, resulting in some power-side current getting into signal current, or bad cord management, where a power cord gets bundled up with a signal cord (sometimes even an expensive, well-shielded one). Ground faults have sometimes been unfixable (or, in one case, fixable only by taking the offending power supply out of an amp cabinet and putting it in its own grounded box!)

 

95+% of the time, I’ve been able to clean everything up nicely by tracking down the offending power cord, and making sure to keep it well away from any signal cords. I’ve found that avoiding close-backed racks/cabinets in favor of large tables set away from walls makes cable management much easier.

 

I’ve read adds for power-conditioners that make sure your input AC power is a nearly perfect sine wave, but to my understanding perfectly conditioned AC power can induce hum as easily as unconditioned power, so even with such a nice device, defect-free in-cabinet equipment and neat cables are still a must.

 

In case it doesn’t go without saying, you should be sure your AC outlets are actually grounded, and that there’s no stray voltage on the ground wire, especially if you share wiring with another apartment or building. A plug-in tester (available at a hardware store) can detect a bad ground. Stray voltage on the ground is trickier to test, requiring a good ground (eg: a cord to a stake in the ground) and a voltage tester.