John Curl's Blowtorch preamplifier part III

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Sync, I can't get at what you're trying to explain wrt your testing/refresh of your old amp. Verified no oscillations (hopefully the square wave would have shown that), and did you get a frequency performance of the pre-mod? You may have just liked/got familiar with the old sound with dead caps.

DPH, Sorry, late reply. No it didn't work when I got it. One channel marginally worked. This one probably should just burn in for a while before I refresh it. I also had no experience working with SS gear. So I went back to college to learn about it.

Three classes left to earn my little associates electrical engineering technology. I've had disagreements with most of my instructors too. Most of it is grading issues of a factual point of view, but as a student I guess you are supposed to cow down to the power's that be.

My last instructor said the following when I pointed out the OpAmp diagram he depicted was incorrect and that I solved it correctly based upon the faulty diagram. "Your wrong" he told me, "I copied it verbatum from Paynter's test bank."

The Diagram had the Vin to ground, and ground to the - input of the op amp. The + input of the opamp had a resistor to it and terminal but not connected to anything. The only thing I could think of like this might be a dedicated plane in a multi-layer board and the pos might actually be surrounding the isolated signal plane so it wouldn't be detected and free from interference. I solved the problem for an inverting OpAmp.based on what I saw on the test. Instructor said the answer was 1+ my answer.

I made a choice long ago that I wasn't going to be bullied by instructors, I'll fight that in due time. But that is another story.

Cheers,

PostScript - At least no one brought up the research from "The Bell Curve". As long as it only Dunning-Kruger's experiments it is okay to discuss.
 
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Who makes this stuff up? This guy makes a $5900 phono stage that gets high ratings as almost being at the level of the best valve pre-amp at a small fraction of the price. You wonder why the rest of the EE community does not take the audio stuff seriously.

This scheme presents a very obvious problem upon circumspection. All amplifiers introduce some delay in passing the signal from the input to the output and back again to the input to complete the feedback route. During this delay period, a phase lag of the feedback signal in relation to the original signal will occur. It is not until this initial delay period is over, that the circuit begins to exhibit its intended operation. There is therefore a constant introduction of "out of date" information into the amplifier.

Under transient music conditions, this results in the presentation of an error correction signal intended to reduce the distortion of an input signal which has already passed through the amplifier and is either already out of the circuit or well on its way out of the circuit. The signal present at the input, by the time the feedback has arrived, may bear no relation to the previous signal and thus will not be properly acted upon by the regenerated information. The current input signal is then distorted once, through the subtraction of an erroneous feedback waveform, and again by the amplifier.
 
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@scott, A paper in 1963 from Tektronix's wrote about this and identified it as group delay and warned about some of it's measurement consequences.

I think it's based on the work of a German or Russian guy who first mapped/graphed out "Filters". It was one of those "grail" books.

My Bad - I should have read beyond the first sentence of your post and not just scan the quoted paragraphs.

Or, did you edit your original post adding the pricing information?

Enquiring Mindlessness Wants to Know.
 
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My Bad II,

Dates incorrect at least for the Book. Citation follows:

Zverev, A. (1967). Handbook of Filter Synthesis. Consulting Engineer, Westinghouse Electric Corporation. John Wiley and Sons, Inc. New York, New York. U.S.A.

I'm still pretty sure the Tek discussion is from 1963. At least that date is stuck in my head.

Cheers,

Post Script - I just realized mine is the First Edition. :)
 
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Who makes this stuff up? This guy makes a $5900 phono stage that gets high ratings as almost being at the level of the best valve pre-amp at a small fraction of the price. You wonder why the rest of the EE community does not take the audio stuff seriously.

:eek::rolleyes:

Does this comedian have any other material we can read?

I can say that after playing with an amp that has adjustsble global feedback, I can see why so many people enjoy no or low feedback - there are obvious reasons. It is an experience that would be good for everyone.
 
Attached are a couple of the graphs from the citation in post #1407 for your viewing pleasure.

Cheers,

Post Script - So much for steep slopes if we want to minimize group delay.
See left pic, last paragraph in the second column.
 

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Scott, was it just the phono stage or a phono pre amp.
I found this:
At $5900, the E03 is not cheap and—the Flight Phono provides one—still needs a good power cord to show all its colors. This puts the Italian and Japanese phono preamps on equal footing for pricing. In many more modern-sounding systems than mine, the Flight Phono will shine but in my setup, it was a little opaque and veiled compared to the E03. Hence the Japanese came out on top for me. The Flight Phono taken alone impressed me a lot but as stated often by our editor, once you’ve heard a piece of equipment that takes playback to a different level, you can’t "un-hear" it thereafter. That’s exactly how I feel about the E03. In my system, it was clearly superior to force the Flight Phono into second place.


In brighter leaner systems, the E03 might end up being too much of a good thing but in a balanced system, it will unearth the final level of resolution and passion one can expect from vinyl done right. I wish I could compare the E03 to some far pricier offerings available from Boulder, AMR or Walker to name a few but I have a nagging feeling that the E03 sits very high on the price/performance index indeed.

No matter how much I itch to write out a Blue Moon award for the E03, I must restrain myself and wait for the last contender in this series of phono preamp reviews to arrive. It might shine additional light on just how good a value the E03 really is. If the NAT Signature phono with its battery-powered zero feedback triodes is anywhere as good as the NAT Symmetrical line stage was which I reviewed a few months ago, the E03 will receive more than a fair shake at brisk competition. Or the Serbian could walk away with the award. It's something I won’t know for a few more weeks. If you already know that you don’t wish the hassle of tubes, the E03 is without contest my favorite solid-state phono preamp in this review series, ahead of the Audia Flight Phono and way ahead of the ASR Mini-Basis Exclusive.

A component with such a level of transparency that it will give its best with associated components of the highest level. Surprisingly the E03 won't emphasize flaws in lesser ancillaries and cartridges to allow a system to mature around it without issues. The E03 will work better in a tonally dense system but again, superb instrumental textures will be showcased even in leaner chains.
Such restraint, oh my!

And then the Epilogue
Epilogue
Over 2009 I reviewed six phono preamplifiers ranging from $350 (Clearaudio Nano) to $7500 (NAT Signature Phono). Although each review linked to below has far more detail and nuance in its respective assessment, I thought it would not be a waste of time to summarize my impressions while bestowing one concluding award. The Clearaudio Nano, no bigger than an iPod Classic, is the clear winner of this showdown when it comes to value. You'd be amazed by how much this $350 miniature has to offer. It's slightly on the warm side of neutral to make it very compatible with many entry-level systems. And, the Nano has a bold and big sound. There's nothing puny coming out of this little box. Of course compared to the pricier phono stages, it won't image on as large a scale; it can get a little confused on big orchestral masses; and the midrange won't have the magical wetness of the NAT. But on value it remains phenomenal.
 
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Well, I mean, I'm not opposed to listening to new things, but it seems a gross generalization to expect that there'd be some kind of no-gnfb "sound" unless there's a characteristic trend between them (thinking most SE Triode families)

Sync, sadly it looks like you got to experience the effect I described (D-K effect) to its fullest extent. Reminds me of my statics teacher in undergrad (most of my profs were good, sorry yours weren't!) where we repeatedly fixed his errors in class, then he'd defend himself in-class only to slap up a revised solution (the parts we brought up) the next lecture and claim that's what he said the entire time.
 
and here is the answer to one of Richards questions regarding
Gaussian filters:
There is a demand in pulse communication systems
and other related areas for filters whose impulse
responses have the two properties:
(1) freedom from ringing or overshoots, and
(2) symmetry about the time for which the response is a maximum.
A filter that satisfies the above is called a Gaussian filter.
(Zverev, p67)
 
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Sync, sadly it looks like you got to experience the effect I described (D-K effect) to its fullest extent. Reminds me of my statics teacher in undergrad (most of my profs were good, sorry yours weren't!) where we repeatedly fixed his errors in class, then he'd defend himself in-class only to slap up a revised solution (the parts we brought up) the next lecture and claim that's what he said the entire time.

Strangely familiar some how......... Oh! Prez Trump !


-RM
 
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Who makes this stuff up? This guy makes a $5900 phono stage that gets high ratings as almost being at the level of the best valve pre-amp at a small fraction of the price. You wonder why the rest of the EE community does not take the audio stuff seriously.

Well you read this here all the time, so it's no wonder that it seeps through to marketeers. The problem is that what he writes is very intuitive, while real understanding needs an effort put in. Intuition is so comfortable in comparison.

Jan
 
Professor, do you realize that the feedback 'automagically' adjusts the closed loop gain to minimize the effective input signal on the input pins to be just enough to support Vout through the open loop gain?
I'm not sure to have understood what you said Or, may-be it is you ?
The question was extracting the error signal of a device witch has gain using a comparateur connected to input and output pins.
What feedback are-you talking about ?
 
Well, I mean, I'm not opposed to listening to new things, but it seems a gross generalization to expect that there'd be some kind of no-gnfb "sound" unless there's a characteristic trend between them (thinking most SE Triode families)

Actually it is fairly easy to take a guess at the sound... but these are comments with one specific amp, one where no one prefers over 30% gnfb, and most are at 0% or 10%.

No-gnfb, how about ngf for short... Consider that in an SS device this can mean that the higher hz phase can be stumbling around like a drunk. This may enhance 2HD, but it at least encourages a similar blur effect as purposely introducing high RF (like a grounding box). So it is beneficial to mask moronic mix/mastering mistakes like raw hard left/right panning that make you think a guitar player suddenly lives in your speaker cabinet. It also makes bass warmer and more realistic. Its more realistic because a dampened speaker and room doesnt vibrate, but ngf makes it sound like stuff is vibrating sense it isnt so tight in sound, and gets that blur effect on the higher hz information that accompanies the lower hz fundamental...

It does not seem to expand the soundstage like you would get with a grounding box.

Using hgf (100%) suddenly can make the bass sound defined, powerful, but small and isolated. It literally takes you out of the music, and makes you feel like you are examining something. Mistakes in the mix/master shout out "over hear, isnt it great how I sound shitty like I am half a reflection from a wall in the studio" or many others, that make you want to faceplant into palm. You may also find out just how tuned in a particular direction speakers or such could be, like higher tweeter levels...

Obviously this would be different on some hot tubes, and hot classA SS may not exhibit as much difference. I suspect with tubes the character changes may be pretty different. From the tube stereos I have heard, it would seem a little apple to orange for what gnfb sounds like.
 
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