CARELESSNESS

[Richard_K]

What about back in the day of vinyl records... How many of us have fallen asleep, listening to a side, and waking to hear that repetitive sound of the needle tracking the last revolution in the morning?

 

[dbase]

You shouldn't leave your amp on all night.. thats very irresponsible young man ... I think I should take possession of said amp since you cant take care of your toys ... I could put it to better use...

 

[higain617]

I accidentally left an amp on for a week once. It had no ill effects.

 

[xnewyorka]

I'm curious. Is this actually true? I didn't think that a solid state amp that wasn't passing any signal would have a dead draw, but now I'm not so sure.

Sure, if you can feel ANY heat whatsoever by putting your hand directly on the power supply transformer, then you are using a little juice to generate that heat.
Do you unplug or shut off power to your laptop computer power supply when not using the computer? If not, you are wasting quite a bit of energy heating that thing up.

 

[countrybass5]

I was doing a little bit of practicing when I had to go take care of a problem. I left the music room and took care of the chore. I forgot I had left my amp on. It stayed on for 24 hrs. Before I remembered it. What kind of damage can I expect for being so careless?

Once again thanks for all he replies and especially the humor...I don't feel so bad now.

 

[Hurricane Jimmie]

If this is as careless as you get, you've lived an exemplary life.​

I r​

ead an article by a studio owner collector/repair/curator amp guru who claimed that once an amp is on, don't turn it off (a little tough on a gig schedule). So there's that... and all your wise-guy buddies here at TB.

 

[mbasile]

The mutations will become noticeable soon.
First, there is dizziness and moderate nausea.
Then, the antlers and a third eye will erupt from your forehead and you will sprout a prehensile tail.
Your temperament will change from meek to homicidal as you grow to the height of a 3-story building.
Soon, all Mankind will prostrate themselves at your feet in abject, quivering terror.

Other than that, no problem...

I've done this before and have never experienced this result. Maybe it is because I mute the amp when I step away?

 

[Rumbledore]

ya ghost played ya amp

 

[Rumbledore]

pro studio not turn off for 3 years

 

[dbsfgyd1]

Wow, that must be some amp!

It was built like a tank.. 1-12 and about 20-25 watts. Kind of expensive back in the day when it was new, but I paid $100 in 68 when I bought it.

 

[Rockbobmel]

My home stereo (3 power amps -2, 3 and 3 channel) stay on all fall/winter/spring. The subs and preamp are on standby(warm) also. All SS. I only shut them down in the hot summer because of the heat.
Have for years and years.

 

[Munjibunga]

And if it did burn down your house, you're golden brown!

... and delicious.

 

[byacey]

There are paging amps in many facilities that are permanently on for years, without any break, except during brief power outages. I don't think leaving your solid state bass amp on overnight is an issue; you probably won't even notice it on your power bill; I doubt that it uses more than 75W at idle.

 

[byacey]

Technically AC is supplied to your house. Tesla juice?

Yes, Edison was a huge advocate of DC power distribution, vehemently opposing AC, which Westinghouse won out on. Tesla wasn't really in the race.

 

[Omega Monkey]

My home stereo (3 power amps -2, 3 and 3 channel) stay on all fall/winter/spring. The subs and preamp are on standby(warm) also. All SS. I only shut them down in the hot summer because of the heat.
Have for years and years.

What a waste.

 

[ashtray]

My son leaves the electric piano on all the times. Sometimes it's days before I notice.

 

[Soonerbldr]

Kids were in the studio before we left for a vacation and they for some reason turned on my GK Combo - found it a week later when we got back. Other than the On button being warm no apparent harm.

 

[BrBss]

Speakers are probably blown from being underpowered

 

[Pilgrim]

I was doing a little bit of practicing when I had to go take care of a problem. I left the music room and took care of the chore. I forgot I had left my amp on. It stayed on for 24 hrs. Before I remembered it. What kind of damage can I expect for being so careless?

I've never left an amp on for longer than, perhaps, two weeks like this.

And of course, there was no damage.

Especially with solid state electronics, there's a substantial argument for never turning it off unless you need to. That avoids current surges from turning it on and off - of course, it doesn't prevent current surges in the power grid. But equipment at most broadcast stations is never turned off, and it runs happily for years.

 

[Omega Monkey]

But equipment at most broadcast stations is never turned off, and it runs happily for years.

And there's stuff that gets turned off and on every day that runs happily for years too, without using electricity.

I think there's probably a tiny amount of truth to this, and then the urban legend machine inflates the hell out of it. I would be WAY more concerned with how you use the item, transport it, store it, etc... than how many times it's turned off and on. Turning something on and off every day for 50 years would be about 18,000 power cycles. If you had it on 24/7 vs turning it off for 12 hours at a time (ie if you were ACTUALLY USING it a significant portion of every single day), over the 50 years you would probably spend THOUSANDS of dollars in extra electricity AND you will still probably have to take the thing in to get serviced every few years anyway because parts also where out due to age (and of course use if you are using it enough to leave it on even 12 full hours a day).

So the extra pointless and environmentally damaging (until we switch to all solar/wind power) electricity cost will probably about cover the cost of servicing the item every so often and replacing any out of spec components. Personally, I'd rather have the money for the services and help save the planet than worry about some phantom power issues, that I'm not sure have ever been conclusively proven, only theorized by internet commentators.

And even if it IS real, if it comes down "if you power cycle this in accordance with normal usage (meaning probably that sometimes it might get turned on and off every day and sometimes it might go weeks), you lose 5 years off a 60 year life span of an item", is that really worth it? And does that mean catastrophic failure, or just that the weakest component or handful of components needs to be replaced (which you could do anyway under regular PMCS routine as needed)? What about speakers? Do I need to keep some current running through my 45 year old JBLs at all times to make sure they don't age prematurely? Now we're getting into underpowering myth territory. Are my 3 way crossovers going to die from sitting dormant when I'm not playing music? And in what time scale?

See, I don't think anyone has any actual hard facts on this stuff, so the concept of heating your studio with the idle power draw of every piece of gear you own seems completely stupid to me. But you will DEFINITELY spend a bunch more on electricity. The choice between that and pocketing the money for potential servicing (if I even OWN the gear long enough for anything to ACTUALLY happen) seems pretty obvious to me. You spending $50 a year on extra electricity or me spending a couple hundred once every 5 years for a service, whose gear do you think will be in better condition?