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I'm a newbie to this hobby, on top of having no electrical skills, but I have read lots about this topic and I'm still confused about the best set up. If I want to install two 20 amp outlets, what are the advantages and disadvantages of running one 10 gauge from the main panel to a junction box (or bypassing the junction box altogether and just having both outlets coming off that one 10 gauge wire) that then leads to these two outlets? So both outlets, then, are being shared by that one dedicated circuit? How is this different (better/worse) than installing a subpanel in which that same 10 gauge wire goes from the main to the sub, which then branches off to each of the separate outlets? And if, down the road, I want to put in one or two other outlets, wouldn't all of them basically be run off the same 10 gauge, whether it is in the subpanel or the junction box?
Ideally, I am thinking, each outlet would have its own separate run from the main panel, but I don't know if this is true or not... And since space is limited in the main panel, and the panel is on the opposite side of the house as the stereo room, how critical is this?
Follow Ups:
I ended up getting 6 dedicated lines. Each line is ~95ft long. This configuration gives me the opportunity to play with different outlets and I can feed each component from a dedicated line. The difference isn't small and well worth the money spent. The drawback of multiple dedicated lines is ground loop. I float my front end and keep my mono blocks grounded. I run my setup single-ended though I can wire everything balanced I just don't have good enough XLRs.
Best way to go is separate dedicated lines for digital and analog equipment.
Definitely for a home computer.... They put filthy hash back out on the AC line.
Dedicated lines will decouple the power supplies from one another.
Digital equipment non linear switching power supplies put a lot of hash back out on the AC line in the form of odd harmonics an AC transients.
Take two dedicated branch circuits that are ,say, 50ft long each. Because of the impedance of the wire the switching power supply transient spikes will dissipate very fast in the branch circuit conductor on its way back to the electrical panel. Even a lot of the odd harmonics will end up out at the utility power transformer and be dissipated in the secondary winding in the form of heat. Not all....
If both digital and analog are fed from the same duplex receptacle from the same branch circuit the two power supplies are basically coupled together.
Good power cords on digital equipment that shield RFI/EMI can help from the hash coupling to the analog equipment.
A Sub panel can be fine provided the branch circuits fed from them are not too short.
It depends on what problems you are trying to solve. One would be the seperation of analog and digital. An other would be to maintain the voltage input to your equipment. A third would be to add more outlets.
The distance that you would have to cover from the breakerbox is also needed as that would determine what size the wire needs to be. Big amps need lots of amperes to cover peaks.
Willis
Installing two AC outlets fed by only a single dedicated line is fine and won't degrade your intent. I would consider the configuration to be no different than plugging a multi-outlet power line distributor into a single dedicated line, which is not an audiophile no-no. Folks who install two dedicated lines for a single audio system tend to do so in order to provide separate lines for digital and analog components. Ask this question in Tweakers' Asylum if you wish to seek further confirmation.
Hopefully others can answer also. But I think that with 10 ga, the long run would be ok. Much better than with 12 ga. That's what I'm using.
Working with 10 ga. solid core is quite difficult. Even to attach the outlets.
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