Hi everyone - about to have a play with a Synergistic research passive ground block with the new foundations cables . Wondering if anyone else has played with the Active or Passive units and what they have found with the PS Units
Audio bacon / Steves review certainly seems interesting Synergistic Research Active Ground Block SE Review - Going Low to Get High - Audio Bacon.
Also looking for grounding point advice on the DSD DAC and the PS20 as well if anyone has had experiences
thanks G
I’ve never used one before but I’ll be curious as to how your experience goes. I’m trying out their Tranquility Pod and I hear absolutely no difference. I’m still in the 30 day trial period and I’m pretty sure this thing is definitely going back.
I have used many of the SR tweaks and really like them, however, for their ground boxes, I will pass. I have been using the Entreq ground boxes for 7 years now with great success. Especially their newest Infinity line of products (ground boxes or cables) are huge improvement over the original models. Highly recommend them.
One thing about the SR ground boxes is you have to buy their ground cables and there is no other choice. For the Entreq ground boxes, you can buy the ground cables from Entreq or you can use your own wires.
The new Entreq entry model starts at only about US$400 and you can connect two components to it.
I own the Active Ground Box SE and find that they make a noticeable difference, but this is true mostly because I have a full Synergistic Research loom. All of their cables have mini banana-like connectors which expose the ground. So if you have RFI or other unshielded elements nearby, those cables can pick it up through the exposed mini banana if the ground cable is not plugged in. Granted, these cables do come with their own ground plugs, so at a bare minimum, use that.
With the ground box, though, there is for sure an added sense of noise reduction that is evident. In addition to grounding my cables, I do run ground wires to each component, either through an unused RCA input or available ground tap. The result is a blacker background, more resolution, tighter imaging. This was true especially with my vinyl rig, my streamer, and preamp.
Regarding the comment about having to buy the expensive ground cables, this is untrue. If you have DIY skills, these cables are easy to build. Personally, I bought long lengths of 14awg silver-coated copper wire - mine were from DH Labs at $4,50/ft:
I then soldered these connectors on each side using WBT solder:
I’ve also soldered quality spades, rca connectors, etc onto these wires, all available from DH Labs, to assemble the different types of ground wires I needed.
Honestly given the quality I don’t think the SR grounding cables would be much better. Hope this helps.
thanks @thiefoflight for the feed back - i ended up purchasing one recently and totally agree with the blacker background, more resolution, tighter imaging - and it surprised me the changes on certain components my P20 and Gryphon Diablo amp made some of the biggest improvements. Certainly for the $ this cost me its a great add. Now i am impressed with the DIY recommendations - i did do some re termination of some of the leads that came with the block and i did purchase a couple of Syn new leads as well but wouldn’t mind going right thru my system, so think I am off to amazon 
next because i didn’t think you could purchase the mini bananas.
really for its price its a great upgrade and mine is staying in
Awesome @Gareth - so glad to hear! Feel free to PM if you have any other questions on it.
Can you also buy spade or regular banana adaptors and attach the SR mini-banana plugs into them to convert their termination to one that is more conventional? Is that a solution at least for the 6 SR ground leads that come with the SR Active Ground Block SE?
Are these SR Ground Blocks still worthwhile if you are powering your rig with a PS Audio PowerPlant?
@RRJ welcome to the forum. Certainly even with the power plants - The idea is to improve the ground across all attached equipment - My going in position was i didn’t expect improvement in my P20 but I was wrong - we aren’t talking game changing massive changes but the background is certainly cleaner across my system. For the P20 I just got a furutech spade (they make a smaller one for power connection that works well with screws) and changed over one of the Syn leads i did this to all 6 of the supplied leads terminate one in RCA one in XLR and the rest in spades.
I did also get some of the new HD leads - i ordered the old ones the new ones came out and Cable co managed a switch for me. The HD cables don’t add significant change. I tried the standard lead on my Gryphon Diablo 300 and the HD one and there was a slight change but its slight and maybe the mind goes i paid 150 for that so i should hear a difference
Across my system I applied to the following
PS20 - Improvement noticeable cleaner
Server (input power earth) - Improvement slight
PS DSD DAC - improvement medium
Gryphon Diablo 300 - improvement medium Melody Gardot certainly sound better / more depth
Maratnz HT receiver - no improvement
cable box - no change
Rel Subwoofer - reduced a HUM when feeding from both amps
Oppo 4K player - no change
That being said my wife who can walk into a room and go yes better or not also gave the tick of approval to the Syn block for the money it a good play and made improvements - would i would go up the line into active - probably not at this point
Hi DTS , which model of the Entreq is the you have? Thanks
I have a few. Olympus Tellus, Poseidon, Olympus Minimus, Tellus 2 Infinity with Infinity Apollo ground wires almost everywhere.
You can PM me for more detail if you like.
I do agree all grounding method do work, just a matter of which is going a better job.