Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Power Surge protection.

Hi all,

My downstairs neighbour had his DVD player trashed last evening by a power surge. He believes there was lighning in the area.
I was very lucky I guess none of my system got damaged.
Any idea for surge protection for DSP5.5Ks, DSP5000C. The rest of the system is on an olson block which I believe offers minimal protection.

Regards,

Harry

fwiw, i've never experienced a detrimental power surge in my decades of a/v experience. i have experienced lots of voltage drops (brown-outs) and black-outs.

my homeowner's insurance (Chubb) covers damage to electronics that stems from power surges like lightning strikes. so that's my protection plan (which I hopefully will never have to use). you might check your insurance to see if they cover this. the price is right - you're already paying for it :-).

i run ac regenerators to deal with brown-outs.

of course ymmv - maybe your building has some problematic setup re: lightning or other things that can cause spikes.

fwiw,
doody.

Some of the protection devices designed mainly for use with computers (but also other electronic equipment) have practically proven their usefulness against surges, overvoltages and brownouts.

I can suggest
http://www.apc.com/products/family/index.cfm?id=67 (go for the 1200VA model)
or the simpler, but less capable
http://www.apc.com/products/family/index.cfm?id=176
these are relatively unexpensive.

Using Home Owner's insurance can be expensive when renewal time comes around. Besides, I'd rather have everything survive a surge or sag rather than have to deal with the consequences even if they have a satisfactory outcome.

I use an all-in-one APC S-15 which is a sine-wave output AVR/UPS that also includes surge filters for all the signal lines coming into the system (CableTV, phone, broadband, etc.) along with programmable power on/off delays for particular devices.

Our line voltage sags to 107-110VAC in the late morning and the S-15 bumps it to 120VAC as needed.

Kal

Right Kal, I've worked with the SURT series ( http://www.apc.com/products/family/index.cfm?id=223 ) but I would NOT recommend these for plugging in power amps or active speakers. They work superbly for displays, though, under most circumstances.
I guess the simpler surge protection is best for a power amp or active speaker, but then that's only my personal take

Hi,

Just pull the plugs,

Regards

"Just pull the plugs"

Right, as long as you know when.

Kal

Hi

Our house took a spike or something a few years back. It took out two Philips TVs and a cable box but the Meridian gear was as right as rain. I suppose you get what you pay for.

I can second that- living in central Edinburgh, we had a surge that took out several streets.Our power stayed on though. It happended while I was listening to my D5k's- they just switched themselves to standby. I was very impressed!

You don't have to be hit by lightning to have a power surge. A few years ago, my house along with 2 others got nailed by a huge power spike. The surge was so intense that it tripped a breaker. I lost a surge strip made by Monster Cable and that was it. Monster went ahead and replaced it free of charge. They asked if they had to start a claim for any attached equipment that were damaged. Fortunately, the strip did its job so no claim was needed. The strip got nailed so hard you can smell burnt electronics inside of it.

My neighbors didn't do so well. One of them had a sat receiver box hit so hard it was smoldering. All in all they lost thousands in damaged electronics. I contacted the power company as they've been providing some pretty unstable power and this was the final straw. They opened up a claim for me and investigated. I got a letter a few days later stating the surge was due to someone's work truck hitting a utility pole. The power lines crossed which caused a spike on the feeding circuit to my cul de sac. The power company provided the insurance information for the owner of the truck. My neighbors tried to claim against the insurance company but was rejected. I forget the reason.

After that episode, I installed a whole house surge suppressor. The one I got is from SquareD. Installation was pretty easy. Now I have blanket protection for everything in the house.

With regards to filing a claim against your home owner's insurance. I wouldn't do it. I would save it for something really huge. The current state of home owner's insurance is not like it used to be. Insurance companies are cracking down on people filing claims. One claim probably won't affect your coverage but if you happen to have another, you definitely will be at risk for higher premiums or even being dropped altogether. If you are dropped, good luck finding reasonable insurance. Claims histories follows the home. Insurance companies have a database they can view to see if a particular property has had any history of claims. I've heard of house sales not going through because the buyers couldn't get the home insured due to past claims history. Also, inquiries to your home owner's insurance also count against the home's claim history. So don't even think about asking about a potential claim unless you are serious about putting it all the way through. All this information relates to insurance policies in the US.

Just some FYI.

Before the event I was thinking of combining anti surge protection and power conditioning, when I could free some funds. I think I might go ahead and get some sort of surge protection (monster etc) and decide later about power conditioning. A bit away from the surge story but my system sounds better in the morning just before I go to work. Dont know if it has to do with "cleaner power" or my ears hear better in the morning.

The item of gear which appears to be most sensitive to power glitches is my CRT projector. It will blank at the slightest brownout and has to be restarted. This happened the other night when a local power cut occurred (not to me) and I didn't notice as I was sititng in the dark. No effect on the G98/G68.