How to Avoid Power Disasters in Your Studio

If you’re going onstage and the lights go down, that just means you’re ready to rock the house. But if the lights go down in your studio during a session (along with everything else), it means you have a crisis on your hands. What was going to be a creative production session becomes an exercise in panic control, as you wait for the power to come back on so you can see if any of your data remains (or if your session files are corrupted). After you get out the matches and sit by candlelight waiting for the lights to come on, you may wonder to yourself, is there anything that could have prevented this turn of events? Yes, there is. Read on to learn how to avoid costly studio power disasters by implementing power conditioners and uninterruptable power supplies.
Buying Time with a UPS

Figure 1: The APC BR1000MS UPS will keep your gear running long enough to save your work and safely power down.

What’s a UPS? It’s an Uninterruptable Power Supply, a battery-based piece of gear that will provide power in the event of a power outage. A UPS plugs into a wall outlet and offers power outlets that will power your sensitive computer equipment. In the event of a power outage, the UPS makes an immediate transition to battery power, allowing your gear to stay on even though the main power is down. In other words, a UPS gives you time to save your work and properly power down devices like your computer. Without a UPS, your computer and other digital devices would shut down instantly, losing any unsaved progress and potentially corrupting your files. When the lights do go out, you don’t want to be thinking, “When was the last time I hit Save?”

What Will a UPS NOT Do?
A UPS is not a generator — don’t expect to have your entire studio (speakers, amps, mics, console, lights, outboard gear, etc.) running through a UPS and simply keep a session going in the event of a power outage. When the room goes dark and you realize it’s a power failure, your next steps should be to properly save your work and any device settings that you need to recall later, and then power everything down properly. When power is restored, you can power up your studio as you normally would, and you should be able to pick up where you left off in the session. Basically, a UPS will buy you the time you need to save your settings and files if you need to shut down everything with little warning.
What Should Plug into My UPS?

Figure 2: The Furman F1000-UPS is equipped with voltage regulation and power conditioning in addition to battery backup.

The rule of thumb is if a piece of gear needs time to boot up when powered on, it should probably be protected by your UPS. The most obvious example is the computer running your DAW — and don’t forget your computer monitor too, otherwise you won’t be able to see your desktop to save your work and shut down properly. Obviously, any drives or recording devices need to be protected as well. You may decide it’s advantageous to protect network gear like routers with your UPS too so that you can maintain network connectivity (this is especially important in larger multiroom facilities).
So why not plug all your gear into a UPS for maximum protection? The main reason is that most of your equipment — such as your monitor speakers, mic preamps, analog EQs and compressors, and so on — isn’t threatened by the prospect of a power outage. After all, you won’t lose the settings on your analog equipment rack or guitar amp just because the power goes out. What threatens the rest of your equipment are power issues like surges, transient voltage spikes, and voltage drops. Which brings us to…
What Is a Power Conditioner?
In short, a power conditioner protects your gear against damaging voltage spikes and other power anomalies. It would be technically accurate to call a power conditioner a type of surge protector, in the same way that you could call Fort Knox a bank vault — it’s a bit of an understatement. A professional power conditioner resists transient voltage spikes with ease, clamps down on errant voltages reliably, and will sacrifice itself if necessary (like in the event of a catastrophic lightning strike) to protect your equipment. Most power conditioners also employ some type of EMF/RF noise filtering to prevent noise from “dirty” power leaking into your audio system. Some even offer sequenced power cycling to turn your gear on and off in the correct order.
Protecting your equipment with power conditioners:

Figure 3: The Furman PL-PLUS C protects against dangerous surges and voltage spikes that could damage your gear.

What Will a Power Conditioner NOT Do?
A power conditioner will not keep your gear running after a power outage like a UPS will; it will only protect against surges and spikes associated with the initial outage. And it’s important to note that a power conditioner will not actually correct or stabilize irregular voltage levels — that is a job for a voltage regulator and is outside the scope of this article. Basically, a power conditioner is there to deliver clean power to your gear, to protect against surges, and in the event of a power surge that the power conditioner cannot completely absorb, to sacrifice itself to protect whatever gear is plugged into it.
What Should I Plug into My Power Conditioner?

Figure 4: The Furman PST-8 Power Station combines advanced power conditioning with the familiar floor-based power strip design.

Anything not already plugged into your UPS, like your computer and monitor, should be plugged into a power conditioner. Things like analog mixers, mic preamps, keyboards, and guitar amps typically won’t suffer in the event of a power failure, but they are susceptible to day-to-day voltage irregularities and transient spikes. A power conditioner offers protection against these dangerous voltages, while also offering a better way to power on or turn off multiple pieces of equipment simultaneously.
So What Do I Need to Protect My Studio?
Hopefully this article answers some questions you’ve had about how to power and protect the gear in your studio. Ideally, you would employ a combination of UPS and power conditioning solutions for maximum protection against electrical issues. Even more ideally, you will have an emergency shutdown procedure in place to quickly and safely power down your studio when it’s running on a UPS. At Sweetwater, we know how power issues can cripple a recording session, and we’ve helped countless studios design power solutions tailored to their needs. If you’d like some help identifying the right solutions for your studio, give your Sweetwater Sales Engineer a call at (800) 222-4700!

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