Sherwood AM9080 amp - power on? (1 Viewer)

[Philip Hamm]

Is there any way to set up my Sherwood 9080 amplifier to turn on when my Outlaw 950 preamp turns on?

If not (which I expect)....

Is there a problem leaving the amp on all the time? Will it suck up a lot of electricity? Be bad for the speakers?

 

[Yogi]

Amps can be left on all the time without doing any harm to speakers or any of the other electronics they are connected to. Also they dont draw a lot of current @ idle (200 watts at the most) except the Class A ones which draw 4-5 times more current than their max rating. So dont worry about a thing and leave the beast on.

Also if your amp has a remote trigger feature then even if the Outlaw doesnt have a trigger out you can connect any 12V DC adaptor from the back of your preamp (if it has switched outlets) to the trigger in on your amp. This way anytime you swith on your preamp it sends a DC signal to your amp to turn it on automatically. In case your amp doesnt have the remote trigger feature then you might have to buy one of those timed-on power strips or a power conditioner with timed-on feature to turn on your amp after your preamp has been turned on.

Best of luck.

 

[Gil D]

Also if your amp has a remote trigger feature then..

It does but it's not a simple DC voltage from what I understand. Someone was looking into adapting to it electrically here but I don't know what ever came of it.

 

[Philip Hamm]

It does but it's not a simple DC voltage from what I understand. Someone was looking into adapting to it electrically here but I don't know what ever came of it.

Exactly. And the idea of leaving it on just rubs me wrong. I grew up in the "energy conservation" 70s and couldn't think of leaving lights on - the idea of leaving the amp on.. I don't know..

 

[Yogi]

My B&K amp specifies a DC voltage between 5-12 volts and 100 to 500 mA (I think) current will trigger the amp. I have used a Ratshack AC/DC adaptor with 1/8'th lead into the B&K amp and it works perfectly well. When I turn on the 3802 the amp comes on. I just dont like to cycle my amp thru 30-40F everytime I shut it off and on. I leave my downstairs down to 60F when I go to bed and when the amp is playing it gets very toasty and goes upto atleast 100-120F. So I figured that cycling the amp thru 60F of heat plus the inrush current through the devices everytime the amp is turned on and off would be more detrimantal to the amp than leaving it on all the time. So now I leave it on all the time. It consumes 150W of power at idle but I am sure that is paying itself off in energy savings as it gets really hot and doubles as a room heater. It is almost too hot to touch when its playing at reference levels and when I put a computer fan on it I can feel the warm air coming out of the chassis with my bare hands so I am sure its contributing to my home heating. So I am not even worried by the increase in my electric bill due to the amp being on all the time.

Now in the summer that would be a different story. Then I can probably adapt it to remote trigger as there won't be as much thermal cycling going thru the devices.

Exactly. And the idea of leaving it on just rubs me wrong. I grew up in the "energy conservation" 70s and couldn't think of leaving lights on - the idea of leaving the amp on.. I don't know..

I can understand the feeling of wasted energy. But in this case think of it this way: once the amp has reached thermal equilibrium with its surroundings there is no other dominant mode of energy loss except heat dissipation at the output devices, unlike a bulb that has energy loss as light. So leaving an amp on can only dissipate heat that will go into your home heating and reduce the load on your home heating. So you are not losing anything in energy costs by leaving your amp on, IMHO. It just adds another source of heat to your home heating that consumes power and turns it into heat. So until the summer arrives keep your amp on and dont worry about a thing. During summer you can implement a remote trigger and I am pretty sure a plain 12V DC will work. you can try it and if it doesnt work just return the adaptor. You have nothing to lose in either case.

 

[Philip Hamm]

Pretty inefficient heating device I'd say. The S/N 9080 amp doesn't get very hot really.

I don't think that the 12v trigger will work but I already have the appropriate cable (mini-plug on one side and RCA on the other - the amp trigger input is RCA).

 

[Yogi]

The S/N 9080 amp doesn't get very hot really.

Then it isn't drawing a lot of power at idle. All the more reason to not worry.

 

[Jeff Hipps]

In the dark ages of Hi-Fi, the Phase Linear 400 power amp did not have a power switch. Our service tech made a small business by purchasing army surplus relays. Now I don't know which one or exactly how it worked, but when he was done, there was one power cord with a male plug to go into the wall coming from the enclosure that held the relay and two power cords with an outlet on each. The preamp plugged into one cord, the Phase Linear into the other. Turning on the preamp pulled enough juice to close the relay and that powered the Phase Linear.

This might be harder, now, as today's preamps often go into standby instead of turning off, but the principal might still work.

Jeff Hipps