Like Homedad, I use a Belkin setup. I never would have paid full price for it, but for the hugely discounted price I paid it was worth it to me for component protection, convenience of switching on the whole system when the receiver is powered up, and yes, the looks. I further added a UPS unit to protect my DVRs from missing recordings during blackouts and for giving my DLP time to run it's fan for the two minutes it would do during a normal shutdown.
I never made any assumptions about improving sound or picture quality, and it's my thought that they're not helpful in that regard unless someone is having some serious ground loop or "kids using the blow dryer" A/C noise....
