Friends who are aware of my passion for physics frequently ask me why human beings cannot travel at the speed of light. I generally give them the simplest explanation that makes sense: The closer an object gets to the speed of light, the more mass it gains, which makes any further incremental increases in speed substantially more difficult and costly. At the speed of light, an object’s mass would be infinite; hence, acceleration to light speed would require infinite energy.

It’s a wonderful analogy for the cost of audio/video gear, when you think about it. A $5,000 amplifier doesn’t sound five times better than a $1,000 amplifier—it’s just that, past a certain level of performance, you pay a hefty premium for any modest increase in fidelity. And no matter how close we get, perfection always seems just out of reach. That’s why I’m skeptical when representatives from Richard Gray’s Power Company tell me their PowerHouse power delivery system can drastically change the quality of my A/V system, giving my TV blacker blacks and a much more three-dimensional image, and my audio system way more dynamic range.

Richard Gray’s Power Company (henceforth RGPC) offers products designed to clean up the power delivered to your home and others that isolate your A/V rack from electrically noisy appliances. Bringing these functions under one gargantuan roof, the RGPC PowerHouse takes power from its own dedicated 240-volt line—the same sort that supplies power to an electric clothes dryer—and delivers more than 6,000 watts of clean, continuous, balanced 120-volt power to 21 commercial-grade electrical outlets. RGPC created the PowerHouse in response to requests from installers who needed a power conditioner capable of handling large-scale home automation systems. According to RGPC, the product’s balanced design makes it immune to lightning strikes. The company’s newest creation, the PowerHouse 3X, adds support for triple-phase power, which is normally reserved for commercial applications.

But will it make my system look and sound better? That’s the question on my mind as I uncrate 300 pounds of heavy metal and roll it into place beside my A/V rack. I read the literature and don’t understand how cleaner, more stable power will give me a "more dimensional image." Regardless, I plug all my components into the PowerHouse, and at the request of RGPC, I wait a few days before evaluating the system.

After those few days go by, I can’t help but notice that my blacks aren’t any blacker than before. How could they be, though? They were already about as black as my CRT projection system is capable of delivering. I pull up some display patterns from a calibration DVD, though, and notice that I’m getting slightly better contrast in the nether regions of the value scale. With contrast and brightness set to their proper values, there’s just a bit more difference between black and its next-door neighbor. That should equate to better shadow detail, but I discern no difference with my favorite movie DVDs.

I then turn off my DVD player and turn on my high-definition cable box—and nearly jump to light speed all on my own, powered purely by shock. It’s as if someone replaced my inept rented cable box with a bona fide piece of videophile gear. Inky shadows that I have never been able to coax out of cable broadcasts without washing out everything else give new weight to the images rolling across my display. Highlights leap off the screen. If not for the excessive compression introduced by my cable company, the image from Discovery HD Theater would compare favorably with Blu-ray.

Concluding that my cable box has a lackluster power supply and happy to see the problem fixed, I turn my attention to audio. This is a trickier task than video assessment because aural memory is notoriously unreliable—you can’t accurately remember what you heard three days ago. I pick a handful of recordings I know best and sit back for a critical listening session. I cannot tell you the PowerHouse improves my audio anywhere near as much as it did my cable box, but I definitely notice a difference in comparison to the sound I heard using my old power conditioner. The high frequencies to which I’m particularly sensitive sound smoother and cleaner. Horns and strings reach further into the room, but at the same time sound more effortless. The result is a noticeably different soundstage—not a big difference, but enough to put a smile on my face.Obviously, I cannot tell you what difference a PowerHouse would make in the quality of image and sound delivered by your system. It may solve egregious problems, as it did with my cable box. It may impart subtle but agreeable differences, as it did with my audio system. Or its effects may go unnoticed. But there is no question that the PowerHouse will allow every component in your system to operate at its full potential—potential for which you probably spent an appreciable premium over lower-priced components.

DESCRIPTION
Power delivery system. Transforms 240-volt power from a dedicated circuit into balanced 120-volt power for A/V devices. Isolates A/V gear from ground loops and power-line interference.

CONNECTIONS
Back: 20 commercial-grade power outlets
Front: single commercial-grade power outlet

DIMENSIONS
12.2 x 17.3 x 22.5 inches (hwd)

PRICE/CONTACT
PRICE: PowerHouse $8,999, PowerHouse 3X $9,395

CONTACT: 800.880.3474, richardgrayspowercompany.com