What you described is the code requirement currently, as I understand it. The grounding connection is a safety requirement. Barring an electrical issue, it shouldn't be doing anything at all. Again, that's how I understand it.
Lowering House Grounding Impedance
So, I’ve finally gotten to a place where I’m pretty happy with the pieces of gear in my system. I know, I’m surprised too. Recently, however, I read about lowering the impedance to ground as a potential improvement and thought I’d give it a try. I’ve done quite a bit of tweaking to get to where I’m finally happy but I had never really looked at the grounding situation for my house, other than to make sure the utility panel was tidy and connected up right. In reviewing my house’s grounding to earth situation, I found that it didn’t have one! My house was built more than 50 years ago and they relied on grounding to the cold water pipes. This was fine while there was 100 feet of 3 inch copper pipe running to my well but when we replaced that pipe with plastic my grounding was gone. Initially, I drove two 8 foot copper clad grounding rods and bonded them together and grounded the external utility panel to them. I was really surprised that the difference the good grounding made to my system, it really removed a layer of haze that I didn’t know was there. Like cleaning a window that is already fairly clean, just added clarity. As I understand it, the lowering of the ground potential is what is responsible for the increase in sound quality. Has, anyone else experimented with improving their ground situation?