Capacity of Home Circuits Amps (1 Viewer)

I have the following equipment that is connected to a 15 amp dedicated power supply home circuit:

1. Two Sunfire Power Amplifiers - 1800 watts power consumption each
2. NAD 2700 Power Amplifier - 970 watts
3. NAD 2400 Power Amplifier - 390 watts
4. NAD 902 bridged - 240 watts
5. Sunfire Grand IV Pre-Amp - 40 watts
6. Cable Box - 55 watts
7. Apple TV - 19 watts
8. DVD - 24 watts
9. Sony DLP TV - 240 watts
10. CD changer - 10 watts
11. 2nd CD Changer - 15 watts
12. XM Radio Station - 10 watts
13. Misc other - 50 watts

That is a total of 5600+ watts which, if I understand correctly, would amount to approximately 47 amps?

I am having the house circuit upgraded and wondering if anyone can tell me what amp circuit would be recommitted to handle the above power consumption needs? Obviously I am not an electician and do not want to rely totally on the electrician's advise given that he may not be that familiar with home entertain needs.

You'll never come close to utilizing that about of power. The 15amp circuit is good enough, maybe change it too a 20amp if your worried. I have a Denon 4806(10A), cablebox, 40"LCD, Paradigm Servo 15 all running off the same line and never tripped the breaker. Everything but the sub is hooked up too a PS Audio P1000 power regenerator that displays the wattage used. Highest I've gotten it was 500w while listening to music. And this was only because I'm running a full range signal through my LRC only.

Thank you for the response. I have tripped the 15 amp breaker once and that happened upon turning on the system, all running through Panamax surge protectors. It has only happened once so far but happened shortly after adding the Sunfire 5X425 power amp (15 amp), thus the reason for my inquiry, trying to determine what the best solution would be. Sounds like you are suggesting an upgrade to 20 amp? Would that still be your suggestion based on the one breaker trip occurance? Note that I have started the system up probably a total of 20 times since adding the above amp.

Thanks,

As Kevin says, the specs listed are worst case scenarios. Otherwise, a single Sunfire would pop the circuit every time it was turned on. If the 15 has been meeting your needs and only failed once, upgrading to a 20, assuming the wire in the wall is appropriate, would work. If you've got the money, running a second dedicated 20 would guarantee peace of mind.

-Brent

Brent,

Just had an electrician over and he suggested two dedicated 20 Amp lines, one for each Sunfire. That sounds like overkill but I may do that just to have the peace of mind that you mentioned. I would then have three dedicated lines 1 - 15 amp and two 20 amp, plenty for anything I will ever do.

Again, thank you for the input.

Gary F

I'm certainly no electrician, but can't you run into ground loop issues when you're talking about using 3 separate circuits for your audio gear? That shouldn't stop you from pursuing this, but I would have the electrician be there when you plug in all equipment to ensure if there are ground loops he can help resolve them.

There exists the possibility, but the three circuits *should* be grounded at the same place via the panel. Ground loop problem exists when two components have different ground reference voltages...voltage may not be the technically correct term...usually resulting when the two devices are grounded at physically separate locations. That's the main reason CATV feeds are such a big culprit, they're often not grounded at at the residence, or they're only grounded via the nearest piece of metal, not the ground for the house's electrical feed.

I wouldn't think it's a huge concern unless we're talking older construction where codes either didn't require outlets to be grounded (just found an attic outlet in my 1994 built house that's only 2 pronged...makes you wonder sometimes, don't it) or allowed grounding to a nearby source and not a common locale.

But, I'm not an electrician either...blah, blah, blah...

-Brent

I hope you are recommending changing the guage of wiring as well.
Putting in a 20 amp breaker using NMD 14/2 wire is begging for a house fire.
I would recommend changing to a 20 amp "split" outlet if you are going to change the wiring as well. This way you will have 2 20-amp circuits. More than enough. I do the same thing in my workshop for a 10-amp router table and a 10-amp monster shopVac.

single 20 amp will be fine if it is dedicated, use 12/2 wire (romex, not speaker wire).