Leaving your hifi powered on

[drummerman]

I dont subscribe to theory that hifi should, ideally, be left on. No particular reason other than a habit of just switching things off at the end of a day. I have, on occasions left it on but probably didnt notice any change either way.

I had a look at some electrical components for a little project and noticed manufacturers quoting a life span for some, measured in thousands of hours. I would assume that these are cautious ratings, probably further complicated by perhaps using maximum component stress figures which, in real world, conditions, is not really relevant.

I have no idea if this finite life time of a component means it will fail suddenly but I somehow doubt it. More likely, the part will produce less and less of its initial quota and slowly deteriorate, at least with items such as power supply capacitors. This will probably not be noticeable in a week to week or even month to month usage but may well would be if say a new, unused version of your hifi component would be compared side by side after a couple of years or more. I am not talking about total failure and also exclude tube products from this as they certainly have a limited life span.

There is the other argument that switching things off and on repeatedly may cause more stress to the circuit and could result in failure before individual parts reach the end of their useful lifes. I dont think, as far as I know, anybody has made any useful research in that respect which would show that this is indeed the case though I may well be wrong.

I'm not going to change my habits. Electricity costs money, I dont notice much difference by leaving things on and its my little bit to save the polar bear.

Perhaps you think differently ...

regards

 

[steve_1979]

Hello ducky.

I've read that the power up stage is generally the most stressful part of system operation for the electronics. So long as your hifi only uses a minimal amount of electric when on 'stand by' you might as well leave it tuned on.

As for leaving your hifi turned on to warm it up before listening to it? I don't actually know the answer to that but it sounds like audiophoolery to me. Personally I've never noticed any difference between a warm hifi and a cold hifi.

 

[oldric_naubhoff]

As for leaving your hifi turned on to warm it up before listening to it? I don't actually know the answer to that but it sounds like audiophoolery to me. Personally I've never noticed any difference between a warm hifi and a cold hifi.

capacitors change their working characteristics with time as they warm-up. so if you have capacitor coupled output you might hear a difference in sound (provided your kit will enable you to hear it). also power supply capacitor will be able to store more energy so your amp may sound "more powerful" after warm-up.

not to mention output devices, tubes or transistors, need to reach their optimal operating temperature to work to spec. not so much audiophoolery as you think it is. but you need to have transparent enough gear to experience it. I never could hear any change in sound after warm up from my Creative I-Trigue computer speakers back in the days...

I never leave my gear on all the time. it's no point accelerating the death of certain components, mostly caps and tubes. besides warm up period doesn't take that long anyway.

 

[Covenanter]

As for leaving your hifi turned on to warm it up before listening to it? I don't actually know the answer to that but it sounds like audiophoolery to me. Personally I've never noticed any difference between a warm hifi and a cold hifi.

capacitors change their working characteristics with time as they warm-up. so if you have capacitor coupled output you might hear a difference in sound (provided your kit will enable you to hear it). also power supply capacitor will be able to store more energy so your amp may sound "more powerful" after warm-up.

not to mention output devices, tubes or transistors, need to reach their optimal operating temperature to work to spec. not so much audiophoolery as you think it is. but you need to have transparent enough gear to experience it. I never could hear any change in sound after warm up from my Creative I-Trigue computer speakers back in the days...

I never leave my gear on all the time. it's no point accelerating the death of certain components, mostly caps and tubes. besides warm up period doesn't take that long anyway.

I've never heard of silicon transistors needing to warm up to operate properly. In days of yore, when we had germainium transistors, they did need to warm up. I remember an Elliot 803 computer we had at college that took 1/2 hour to get to operating temperature. Silicon devices are pretty temperature independent at usual household temperatures I believe.

Chris

 

[steve_1979]

I never leave my gear on all the time. it's no point accelerating the death of certain components

Does leaving your gear on all the time accelerate the death of certain components?

I thought that the opposite is true. Turning your hifi on is generally considered to be the most stressful part of operation for the electronics.

 

[Hi-FiOutlaw]

I turn every thing off when i go to bed, even from stand by, as stand by of a tv spends 2/3 wts and amps, and tv boxes.

Electricity is expensive in Portugal.

And i dont turn nothing on from mid night, 1am into 5 pm, when i get home!

But i do notice very smal differences, but not every time... :?

And here we go, for another marathon...

 

[gregvet]

Its not something I have first hand experience of, and Cno is still out of action otherwise I am sure he would let us all know, but my understanding is that pure class A amps often need to warm up before sounding their best. I dont notice anything like that on my lowly class AB amps tho.

I turn my living room stuff off at night, but leave my bedroom stuff on standyby so that I can listen to music in the morning wihtout getting out of bed

 

[oldric_naubhoff]

I've never heard of silicon transistors needing to warm up to operate properly. In days of yore, when we had germainium transistors, they did need to warm up. I remember an Elliot 803 computer we had at college that took 1/2 hour to get to operating temperature. Silicon devices are pretty temperature independent at usual household temperatures I believe.

Chris

I'm pretty sure others know better or would explain more but AFAIK the main reason for transistor amps harmonic distortion is thermal fluctuations due to varying current flow. if you can make them work in more or less stable temperature they will distort less. therefore transistor will run hotter than room temperature.

 

[oldric_naubhoff]

I never leave my gear on all the time. it's no point accelerating the death of certain components

Does leaving your gear on all the time accelerate the death of certain components?

I thought that the opposite is true. Turning your hifi on is generally considered to be the most stressful part of operation for the electronics.

I know where you're coming from Steve. but what I mean is that lifespan of tubes and caps is measured in working hours. less working hours/ day means more days in total of joyful working of your gear, IMO.

 

[Sabby]

From the Plinius website:

Electronic components must work in their 'linear' range when amplifying music. When switched on from cold the correct point in this linear operating range won't be reached until the temperature inside the equipment stabilises. Once this point has been reached the sound will be at its optimum. In addition we have found that leaving the equipment on for an extended period of time further improves the sound produced. As a guideline you should allow our amplifiers a day to settle and expect further subtle improvements for up to a week beyond this.


Is it necessary to leave all my audio equipment on?
From a sound point of view it is definitely worthwhile leaving equipment on as discussed above. In addition, with properly designed solid state amplifiers, avoidance of on-off switching will actually enhance the product's life as the stress of the on-off cycle is avoided. Power usage at rest is negligible, typically being no more than a low powered lightbulb per piece of equipment. Of course the SA series Class A power amplifiers should be left in Class AB when not being listened to in order to minimise their power consumption. They may be switched into Class A about 15 minutes before any serious listening session with no sonic penalty.

 

[shafesk]

I think it differs from components to components a lot. In my experience it is the amp that is effected the most. I know my Cayin sounds much better warmed up for about 30 mins but that doesn't stop me from turning it off (tube amps use a lot of electricity particularly class a or a/b ones). By keeping it on I'll be using up tube life not to mention the fact that all electronics have a finite lifespan and I'll be wasting precious listening time.

 

[chebby]

I must admit I no longer turn the hi-fi off any more.

My M-CR603 only uses 0.4 Watts when in standby.

That way it remains connected to the network. So when I select it with AirPlay, it comes on automatically (and quickly) and starts playing.

By contrast, my old Naim seperates (amp + CD + tuner) used to consume about 35 Watts - between them - if left idle but powered on. (About a tenner per quarter - or £40 per year - I seem to remember calculating at the time.)

Even with the energy price rises over the last couple of years, I think my Marantz would still use much less than £1 a year in standby consumption.

 

[andyjm]

Electronic components generally fail at swtich on. Rush-in current or thermal stress are the two main causes.

To extend the life of your equipment, it is best to leave it switched on. It was policy at all of the professional data and broadcasting companies I have worked for to leave equipment powered up at all times.

This is also true of valve amps. It is more likely the valves will fail with repeated on/off cycling than through heater or cathode degradation due to long use.

All electronic components are subject to thermal effects, so it is possible that the performance of the amplifier will change as it warms up. It isn't certain that this willl lead to an improvement however, that depends on how good the amp design is.

Just as a FWIW, having the amp on standby doesn't count as being switched on. Just powering a subset of the control circuity and leaving the power amp stages unpowered is no different than the power amp stages being switched off.

 

[dragon76]

I do not buy into the statement that equipment should be left on for best performance. It might have been true some time ago and also with tube equipment (in fact good tube components warm themselves up to 1-2 minutes anyway). I work in the energy sector and know exactly how people misuse and abuse energy, even if we talk about few watts consumed by your hifi equipment. It may be pennies for you, but when you multiply it by year (or several years) and then multiply it by the number of people in your neighborhood who also do not turn things off, and them look at the whole country, etc, the losses now become quite substantial.

In one of the prior posts you can see a statement from the Plinius website that states that the equipment should be on all the time. Funny enough, but I own Plinius integrated and never noticed any drops in the sound quality regardless of whether I turn it off or not

 

[hoopsontoast]

I do not buy into the statement that equipment should be left on for best performance. It might have been true some time ago and also with tube equipment (in fact good tube components warm themselves up to 1-2 minutes anyway). I work in the energy sector and know exactly how people misuse and abuse energy, even if we talk about few watts consumed by your hifi equipment. It may be pennies for you, but when you multiply it by year (or several years) and then multiply it by the number of people in your neighborhood who also do not turn things off, and them look at the whole country, etc, the losses now become quite substantial.

In one of the prior posts you can see a statement from the Plinius website that states that the equipment should be on all the time. Funny enough, but I own Plinius integrated and never noticed any drops in the sound quality regardless of whether I turn it off or not

Yes, I agree.

Everything gets turned off at the plud when not in use (Kettle, Hifi, Lights etc).

There is no logical reason to leave stuff on, especially with valve amps.

Just a complete waste of energy.

I think my flat uses around 80w power draw at idle (middle of the night) with just the fridge and Internet Router left on. It went up to around 300w with just the valve amp on when I had that. (rough measurements from a British Gas power meter)

 

[eggontoast]

There is no logical reason to leave HI-Fi powered up really. Most amplifiers reach their quiescent operating conditions within 20 mins of switch on (less time if you play music through them), valve amplifier in about 5 mins. Leaving amplifiers on just shortens their usable working life because your not using them for 80% of the time but they are still constantly degrading. Amplifiers which I have serviced which have been left on all the time get in a right state, dried out caps, scorched PCB's etc, it ruins them and you are just wasting electricity.

Standby, which Chebby mentioned is a different story though as most functions are disabled in Standby.......unless you own a NAD C315BEE !

 

[Anonymous]

My amplifier (a venerable Harmon Kardon HK1200) sounds a little harsh when first powered up, but hits its stride within half an hour. I've never been in the habit of leaving kit switched on when not in use, but my CD player only goes to standby unless you unplug it, and my Graham Slee headphone amp doesn't even have a standby mode. They're both unplugged if I'm away for more than a day or two.

 

[DeadBee]

I left my Cyrus 2 on from 1993 to 2011. It worked perfectly for 18 years (and still does).

 

[Richard Allen]

Just a thought.

If you had a fire and the fire officer attributed it to the hifi being left on, would your insurance cover you for repairs??.

If it's got an off switch, then surely we should use it shouldn't we or am I being just stupid:doh:

 

[Covenanter]

I've never heard of silicon transistors needing to warm up to operate properly. In days of yore, when we had germainium transistors, they did need to warm up. I remember an Elliot 803 computer we had at college that took 1/2 hour to get to operating temperature. Silicon devices are pretty temperature independent at usual household temperatures I believe.

Chris

I'm pretty sure others know better or would explain more but AFAIK the main reason for transistor amps harmonic distortion is thermal fluctuations due to varying current flow. if you can make them work in more or less stable temperature they will distort less. therefore transistor will run hotter than room temperature.

That doesn't really make sense! Transistor based devices will run hotter than room temperature because they are heat sources but the amount of heat they dissipate is pretty small (unless you have a Class A amp

) so they won't generally speaking get very hot. I think the main reasons for harmonic distortion in all circuits, transistor or otherwise, are (a) poor design and (b) poor components. If you keep your equiment well ventilated I doubt there is much temperature effect.

Chris

 

[oldric_naubhoff]

That doesn't really make sense! Transistor based devices will run hotter than room temperature because they are heat sources but the amount of heat they dissipate is pretty small (unless you have a Class A amp

) so they won't generally speaking get very hot. I think the main reasons for harmonic distortion in all circuits, transistor or otherwise, are (a) poor design and (b) poor components. If you keep your equiment well ventilated I doubt there is much temperature effect.

Chris

well, if you could get hold on open loop THD measurements you'd see that class A measures better than AB. class AB measures well on THD mainly due to excessive use of negative feedback. in class A power stages drain maximum amount of current at all time and excess is dissipated as heat but in this state transistors operate in more stable (thermally) environment. hence lower harmonic distortion. that's how I understand it works like. that's how I can now explain in my own words what I red somewhere else.

 

[Andrew17321]

While not wishing to take sides here, can I point out an inconsistency. Some would leave their amp on to keep the components at an ideal temperature yet leave it in stand-by using 0.4 watt – maybe enough power to melt a snow flake, but not enough to keep components at a working temperature!

In most cases, a system in stand-by removes the voltage from almost all the working components. So switching from 'stand-by' to 'on', in effect, turns on the components, so stressing them (if it does) as much as switching on at the wall socket.

So, the two views are: leave fully on, or put off (either at the socket or in stand-by for convenience).

As regards class A amplifiers, if you want to keep them at working temperature you will need to play music through them all the time to keep the output transistors hot.

There is always a fire risk in leaving equipment on stand-by.

Andrew

 

[eggontoast]

As regards class A amplifiers, if you want to keep them at working temperature you will need to play music through them all the time to keep the output transistors hot.

?????????? what

 

[Andrew17321]

Sorry, not thinking straight! What I said would be the case for class A/B, so that the output transistors for the class A operation are kept hot. A full class A would naturally pass a high current through its output stage and stay hot. Not very wise or economically to leave a class A amplifier on all the time.

Andrew

 

[Anonymous]

All very interesting. Has anyone's ears been completely offended by the sound coming their 'cold' hi fi equipment?