Dan, I live in a medium sized city where I seldom hear noises such as acs going on. The voltage is an almost constant 124.3 volts.
I have always been attracted to the speed of components, especially speakers. Unlike many how, as judged by a recent piece in TAS, my whole focus is on realism of the reproduction, not just how musical it is. To me it cannot be musical unless it closely enough corresponds to the real thing.