Customer Reviews for Smart Strip SCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology

Smart Strip SCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology

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Tools and Hardware Reviews of Smart Strip SCG3 Energy Saving Power Strip with Autoswitching Technology

Customer Review: Nice product, but beware with amps
Summary: 4 Stars

There has bee a recent trend in eliminating switched power outlets on most current stereo receivers, for reasons I don't understand.

I have a CD player that has a push-button type power switch. I used to plug it into the switched receiver outlet so that it came on and off with my stereo receiver. Since most newer receivers don't have these outlets, I decided to use one of these to power my CD player on and off with my receiver as the triggering device. That works well and I'm happy with it.

I was also hoping to use this power strip to turn my subwoofer on and off, rather than putting my subwoofer in the 'auto' mode, to save a little power. It worked ok and would power the sub on and off but I ended up not using it for the sub. There was a loud 'thump' from the subwoofer some of the time when the power strip turned on. This is common with amplifiers when the power comes on abruptly. So, I don't recommend using this to switch any kind of amplifier on/off as it could damage your speaker (subwoofer) long term. This is not really a defect in this power strip. The way to avoid this is use some power source that ramps up slower (like a power conditioner, but they can be costly).

The default setting on the power strip worked with my device too.

Customer Review: No Better than "OK"
Summary: 3 Stars

I bought this strip about two and a half years ago. It worked OK for the first year and a half. It was a bit finicky and hard to set correctly, but it did the job almost all of the time. About a year ago, it got so it wouldn't shut things down reliably. I started having occasional brown outs in the equipment I had plugged into it. Then it started making noises. After two and a half years, it needs to be replaced. I'd like to get a bit more than that out of a strip I paid $40 for.

Customer Review: Not for laptops or low power computers
Summary: 3 Stars

This seems like a terrific device to use when your controlling device draws a fairly steady amount of power, say, a desktop computer or a TV. However, it didn't work well for me and my low power computer. My computer is a Mac Mini G4, which is basically a laptop sans monitor, very low power usage. While using the computer, the power level drops so low that the device thinks it's off, and shuts down all the controlled outlets. I would expect that this would happen as well if you are using a laptop computer as the controlling device, as the laptop could start drawing power from the battery and nothing from the outlet.

The device does have a sensitivity switch, so you can set how sensitive it is to power drawn by the controlling device. This is a good thing, as many devices never really turn off completely, drawing a small amount of power to power a clock, for example. So, you do need a sensitivity switch so that you can set it to something higher than zero so that it will work properly with these devices. Unfortunately, even at the highest sensitivity setting, it is not sensitive enough for my computer.

Customer Review: Not-so-smart power strip
Summary: 4 Stars

Although smarter than the average power strip, this device has only limited intelligence. The instruction manual, page 5, states "The Smart Strip will work with the following equipment: * All home entertainment equipment ... ". Not exactly. The adjustable switching threshold doesn't work with devices having small differences between the "on" and "standby" states. This includes lots of my home entertainment equipment. My application is a Logitech Squeezebox receiver as control device, and a ZERO class D amplifier as switched device. The Logitech receiver doesn't effectively switch the power strip, no matter how finely I tune the threshold adjusting switch. Neither will my Pioneer receiver trigger the switch. A lamp works - but not practical.

Switching devices triggered by audio signals are built into some self-powered speakers and amplifiers, and I do have these deployed elsewhere. But finding a standalone switching device for my ZERO amp is not that easy, although there are schematics freely available on the web if you're a DIY type.

Another option was to leave the amp on 24/7, since it is low power. But, there are sufficient electromagnetic fields present to generate noise in the speakers.

Well, the 60's style toggle switch on the amp does work well.