SmartHomeUSA.com Home Automation

[dpfaff]

Hi, folks! I recently purchased an SCG5 SmartStrip from SmartHomeUSA to use in my home entertainment system.
It's been acting "flaky" for lack of a better term.

My SCG5 is plugged directly into the wall outlet for maximum current availability.
The control outlet on the SCG5 feeds a JoLida 502 tube
amp, which draws a maximum of 450 watts. When switched on, this
amplifier then triggers the switched outlets in the SCG5 SmartStrip.
The switched outlets feed a Yamaha M-35 4-channel power amp,
a Yamaha DSP-1 6-channel Dolby Surround Processor,
and an AMC DAC-8 Digital-to-Analog Converter.


I have set things up so that the JoLida vacuum tube amp, sitting on top
of my oak stereo cabinet, would switch on the rest of the 6-channel
surround sound system, all fed from the digital signal converted by
the DAC-8. The solid state components are inside the glass-fronted
cabinet, so it is very handy to simply turn on the big vacuum tube amp
on the top exterior of the cabinet and have the rest of the system
turn on. My problem is that when I turn on the big JoLida amp,
the switched components briefly turn on, then shut down.

I can hear the internal relay in the SCG5 SmartStrip click out when
this happens. I must repeatedly switch on and off the big vacuum tube
amp about 6-8 times before the switched components remain on.


Adjustment of the potentiometer in the SCG5 doesn't help matters much.
If I turn it enough so that the rack system stays on with just one
operation of the main amplifier's power switch, then the system won't
turn off when I switch off the JoLida's power. A tiny correction of
that potentiometer in the other direction, and I'm back to square one
- it's almost too sensitive an adjustment.



I theorize that my vacuum tube amp is drawing too much current from
the SCG5, which also has to feed power to the associated amps and
signal processors when the control outlet tells it to. By switching
the power on and off repeatedly on my JoLida amp, I believe I'm
letting the tubes warm up, reducing the wattage draw through the
control outlet until the SCG5 can actually handle ALL of the components' power requirements.



Am I not using the right SmartStrip for my particular application, or
is there a better way of trimming the potentiometer to enable all items to turn on and then turn off concurrently? Perhaps there's a SmartStrip that can better handle what I'm attempting to control?

Thanks for your assistance!