[Test-Equipment] OT: Good Ideas web page (was: tantalums)

[Brooke Clarke]

Hi Dave:

Classical power strips have the socket blades parallel to the centerline of the 
power strip.  This means that a wall wart will have it's output wire also along 
the center line of the strip and also the body my partially cover up the 
adjacent outlet so it can't be used.

There are newer outlet strips where each socket is turned 90 degrees and the 
spacing between sockets is a little more than on conventional strips.  This 
allows cheek to jowl wall warts to be installed on them.

California has a recent energy conservation law that regulates the power 
consumed when a device is "off".  For older equipment with a real on-off switch 
that power was zero.  But modern digital equipment with remote on-off controls 
consume some power when "off".  One of the results of this is that the 
classical transformer based wall wart is a thing of the past.  The new wall 
warts are much smaller and narrower and so fit outlet strips better.
See:  http://www.prc68.com/I/KPC350.shtml#DC

Have Fun,

Brooke Clarke
http://www.prc68.com

davec wrote:
> On another test equipment list a member listed the URL to his web 
> page of great tips and ideas:
> 
> <http://www.prc68.com/I/HaT.shtml#CF>
> 
> It got me thinking about an idea I want help with. I'd like to tap 
> the collective brain power of this list.
> 
> How can I get most of the wall warts that litter my work bench and 
> computer station into one place? I want to maximize the density of my 
> "wall warts" onto one power strip / surge protector. Most of these 
> WWs draw minuscule watts so overloading is not an issue.
> 
> Take a power strip. Any generic power strip (w/ or w/o surge 
> protection -- your option):
> 
> <http://tinyurl.com/bt7x5o>
> 
> Plug in some version of this into each outlet:
> 
> <http://www.mattcutts.com/images/tripletap-ac-adaptor.jpg>
> 
> (it's the cube, on the right in this photo).
> 
> The idea is to plug a cube into each of the outlets in the PS such 
> that outlets are now available on *the sides* of the PS. Into each of 
> the side outlets (probably not the top one, if there is one), plug in 
> a WW.
> 
> For example, with this 7 outlet PS and a cube plugged into most of 
> the outlets (it's probably not practical to plug in WWs adjacent to 
> each other -- physical limitation rules), potentially 14 WWs can live 
> here. Practicably, less than that.
> 
> But you get the idea.
> 
> Improvements on the basic idea?
> 
> Thanks,
> Dave
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