I have heard that putting a power conditioner between the wall and an amp will restrict power flow to the amp. I have also heard that some amps have their own power conditioning and surge protection. In the case of the 7700, what should I do? I dont want to spend more than 200 or 300 for high power surge/power but if I can find it at an affordable price does it even make sense? What do you guys think?

Where do you live? Do you get frequent brown-outs or power-spikes? Is lightning common? For example, I live in Southern California, I have never had any problems associated with power. I have never lost any household item to a electrical problem, or know anyone in this area who has.

I'm on Long Island, NY. The house lights dim a lot in the summer when the central AC turns on, but this might just need a call to the power company for a better line or a hard start kit ( in all honesty i probably wont do either). I'm not sure if that would qualify as a full blown brown out. We get lightning but I have never lost anything to it, nor am I aware of anyone else who has. We loose power quite often, probably 4+ times a year.

Protection is just one part of the picture. I also would like to increase sound quality if possible through power conditioning, or not decrease it by leaving out the conditioner. I'm just not sure whats best. I suspect that a properly sized conditioner could not hurt, but a undersized one may be a burden. Also some conditioners have pass through plugs that are only surge protected so maybe those are the best fit.

Not a big believer in cleaning dirty power, kinda like buy-wiring.

Surge protection would be my #1 priority (it's the reason I have power conditioning equipment). Of course, I'm also in tornado alley with overhead electrical service to my home, and so am used to seeing a good number of storms hitting the area with potential for lightning strikes and falling trees. Sonic benefits from power conditioning itself are going to be minor compared to other changes that you can make.

I have seen no real sonic improvement to my ears with the power conditioners I have installed on my systems. Bear in mind that the system can theoretically draw quite a bit of load, but only for short durations. For instance the 7700 could possibly draw all 7 channels into 4 ohms at 300 plus watts per channel. That all by itself is more than 2 KW. In reality though the whole system will only draw a fraction of that power because we don't ever run the amp at full load for very long and likely only the front main channels are drawing significant power. The protection afforded to my systems from those conditioners is what I bought them for and they do that job quite well. I live in South Florida and get a lot of lightning strikes every year. The systems have acted several times to shut my equipment of with out damage. At least once lightning struck right outside the house and took out two 70 foot palm trees by going down one and up the other. That power passed through the ground where my house is grounded and my equipment would have been fried otherwise. The only benefit from improved performance I have noted is that I have more than 10000 hours on my DLP projector bulb and it is still going strong.

As far as amplifiers and other gear having power conditioners, it is partly true because the power supplies in good gear is designed to work with varying voltages during the day and automatically adjusts to the condition at the wall socket. However, that wall socket could be faulty or not supplying the right power which the conditioner can either help overcome or at least tell you there is a problem.

I use a conditioner on everything except the amp. the amp has a factory warning about voiding the warranty if you use one. Ive heard of a few high current amps being damaged by restricting conditioners.

I have never had an issue with my 7500 being powered from the APC H-15 which supplies about 15 amps of current or 1800 watts. Same goes for my 7125 which is also in a HT setup with a big Samsung DLP. By not protecting the amp from a system ground fault, say due to lightning, you are really leaving it open to damage. It could also go back through equipment connected to the amp through the ground and cause damage. Although the XPA-2 is rated at 500 watts into 4 ohms, it is only 2 channels and does not draw any more power than the Outlaw amps at full rating. I sleep a lot better at night and during a lightning storm knowing the APC is on guard.

The day the warranty runs out I will have a protection device on that bad boy...till then I do as the manufacture tells me too.

FTR, I do use a conditioner on my AVP in my livingroom.