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I just got a new speaker for my Desktop

The charger on first contact in the power strip caused a yellow spark, in the power surge (power strip) I initially thought it was the power strip

I tried to plug the charger directly in the outlet Again a yellow spark on first contact, but never again

Can this adapter be causing the problem, or is it the outlet, or the surge protector Note the surge protector is new, and I never had this issue from this outlet before

Please advise

edited: the country is Canada, if this helps

Regards Ali

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    If you let the charger sit, unplugged, for several minutes and try it again do you see another spark? That is a common issue, typically caused by a high inrush current due to capacitors charging. A short interval unplugged will not allow them to discharge fully, hence no spark. – HABO Feb 22 at 16:51
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    I’m voting to close this question because device usage is outside the scope of this site. – isherwood Feb 22 at 16:54
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    If other adapters don't spark at outlet, then the new adapter is faulty, not the outlet/power strip. – crip659 Feb 22 at 17:03
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    just stop unplugging and re-pluging it, problem solved. – dandavis Feb 22 at 17:12
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    Many devices arc on connect--you just can't always see it because it's tiny. A good example is my laptop charger, which apparently has some fairly large capacitance built in (as also evidenced by the delay in the LED going out after unplugging). This does not necessarily indicate a problem. But, the question is off topic here. – isherwood Feb 22 at 17:44
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Others have tried to explain but the spark is not unusual.

Is there anything you can do to prevent the spark from happening? yes, you could turn the breaker off and plug it in then turn the breaker back on.

The load will still cause a spark but you won’t see it inside the breaker and because breakers snap closed or open the duration will be shorter.

When power adapters sit the capacitors discharge with time and when first plugging in there is a large current draw.

For those that purchased high end transformer based supplies these can also spark because the transformer has to come up and it has filter capacitors also.

The fact that it is sparking means it is drawing current. Lower current devises draw less current and you may not see the spark unless you turn the lights off.

This is nothing to worry about if the transformer powers the speakers and things sound good it probably means that that supply can power a fair size load.

So if it works don’t sweat it nothing is wrong. If your speakers howl with 60 hz you could have a bad filter cap but that’s about it.

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  • Thanks Ed for the reply My main concern was that the spark was yellow not blue And i read online, yellow is never ok Also the speaker was turned off – Ali Feb 22 at 17:41
  • Just energizing a small transformer with no load on it will draw current... – JACK Feb 22 at 17:41
  • It sounds like you may be getting sparks confused with flames. Sparks are typically yellow - that's fine. Gas flames are normally blue - indicating complete combustion. Gas flames that have significant yellow or orange are a sign of incomplete combustion, which is a big problem. – manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact Feb 22 at 18:03
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    @Ali I did a quick Google search and found a couple of people saying that for a car's spark plug, a blue spark is good and a yellow spark is bad. However, a power outlet is not a spark plug! When you read that web page that said that a yellow spark is never okay, was the web page talking about spark plugs or outlets? If it was talking about spark plugs, then you can ignore that advice, because it is irrelevant. – Tanner Swett Feb 22 at 18:04
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    OMG. Don't trust that page at all. They are (trying to) selling electrician services. But a ton of disinformation. Overloads don't cause sparking - they either cause overheating and burning or (if everything is done right) breaker trips. Blue sparks? Never heard of it before this. Plenty of other strange things too - clickbait, sales push, ugh. – manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact Feb 22 at 18:20

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