Finally, an affordable CD Transport: the Shigaclone story

johnm said:
Hi Kevin!

Thanks for the explanation.

The cable is fairly flexible - about the same flexibility as any old standard solid-core coax really.

Just been looking at my board, and the bridging cable on Okapi's PDF between the + pin of C916, to JW906. I'm having trouble tracing this on the circuit diagram - does this bypass C952 by any chance? (therfore making my 'upgrade' of an Elna Silmic 470uF in this position a waste of time?)

Thanks,

- John

Hi John, as far as I know, the the bridging cable isn't necessary and bypasses nothing.
It is only needed if you break a track when removing the smd cap under the heat shield, (which I did :bawling: )..
 
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Re: RC-EZ31 availability in Canada

Dennis Hui said:
First, a big thanks to Peter for sharing with us this
wonderful find and his modifications.

I just checked the bestbuy.ca site and it looks like the
RC-EZ31 is available again. You may be able to find it in you
local Best Buy stores as well. (The Toronto area stores
seem to have them.)

Dennis

Thanks for the heads up. I went to my Whitby Bestbuy (just east of Toronto) and picked up my RC-EZ31 yesterday.

Regards,
Dan


:smash:
 
Puffin said:
I tried to fit some resistors previously and ended up with a lot of buzzing for some reason.

Can I just check that R1 goes from the board to the centre pin of the BNC and R2 intersects R1 and goes to ground at the board end and the BNC (i.e both ends) ?


Connect ground at the board to ground at the BNC. Connect R2 100R, between centre pin and ground of the BNC. Connect R1 300R, between d-out at board and centre pin of BNC..Think that's right..
 
Audio1st: I'll try desoldering that bridging cable on one end and see if it all still works then. I had a hell of a time removing that SMD cap, so it wouldn't surprise me if the track was damaged actually :cannotbe:

Has anyone any educated guesses as to a 'perfect' value for that C906? JVC use 0.1uF. Sanyo recommend in their test circuit 0.068uF. However they they go on to show a sample application circuit (using a LC7822E microcontroller chip) and that capacitor is then listed as 0.22uF !!! AGHHHHHH! :bawling:

I have some Wima 0.068uF FKP 2 (PP film) which I shall try in this position and record my results.
 
Just installed the 0.068uF cap in the C906 position. Initital impressions are of a bright sound (which I expect will calm down after a few days burning in), but extremely open - panoramic soundstage. Hyper detailed as well.

Tried disconnecting that bridging cable, and the unit was a dead as a dodo. Reconnecting it and I had power again.
 
Interesting article!

I'm no engineer so haven't really got a clue what I'm talking about (!), but couldn't a diode be implemented at either the transmission or receiving end, which would stop any chance of a reflection when using shorter lengths of cable? I'm currently using 2 meters so it's not really a problem, but even so it would be nice to implement something which would stop any chance of these reflections taking place.
 
Now all i need is PS :p

Another newb question...if i remove choke (R4) ,will it be unable to use stock JVC-s PS then ?
 

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chakija said:
Well ,what i actually want to ask is will it work without needing to solder anything-just plug in PS socket and play ?
:) .
I suppose it wont then :clown:

I'm assuming that the reason you are asking this question is you don't have an iron or can't solder?

Unfortunately the stock wiring is pretty marginal, and bypassing all of those long traces and eliminating the choke and making a direct connection back to a low impedance power supply is part of the process in unlocking the "magic" in this hardware.

Additionally the other mods listed in the pdf make a large difference in the performance of the mechanism/board - without them the full potential of this thing as a transport is not realized. The stock RCEZ32 is just ok unmodified, and really improves substantially with a few simple mods, and I assume the RCEZ31 based player most people here are messing with is much the same in that regard.
 
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johnm said:
Interesting article!

I'm no engineer so haven't really got a clue what I'm talking about (!), but couldn't a diode be implemented at either the transmission or receiving end, which would stop any chance of a reflection when using shorter lengths of cable? I'm currently using 2 meters so it's not really a problem, but even so it would be nice to implement something which would stop any chance of these reflections taking place.


No... The amplitudes present in this transmission protocol are low enough that the diode may not conduct, plus even if it did most diodes take a finite amount of time to turn on and off and would introduce additional distortion in the transition time. (Very fast diodes are available) I suspect that when the reflection hit the diode as it was turning off it would just be reflected right back where it came from and at the receiver end this would make the problem even worse.

Forward drop of most diodes is a bit of a problem as well, gobbling up most of the available amplitude. (Not that this really relevant as it would not work for the reasons cited above anyway.)

The best approach is to try and minimize reflections where possible and when not to place them in a part of the time domain where their mischief causes no degradation. The previously cited PFO article provides some excellent information on this issue. (Disclosure: I am a technical editor at PFO and contribute sporadically.)

Since spdif is biphase ac coupling is generally used somewhere in the signal path. I thinking of trying ac coupling on the output and see what if any effect that has on the performance driving typical cables, currently the net dc value is about 1/2 the pp swing on the output. I'm not sure it has any effect at all. I have noted some transports have ac coupled outputs and others don't. (By definition anytime you see a transformer that is AC coupling.)
 
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RCEZ32 Update

Last night I changed C950 (C952 to those of you with RCEZ31 based transports) from the stock 1000uF/10V cap to a 100uF/25V silmic, and there was a small but audible improvement in the performance.

The BG in this mechanism had been previously installed in the other mechanism and had been run in to some extent. Installing them in the newer mechanism did not result in exactly the same sound, however like the first one the sound seems to evolve with use.

I am planning a fairly wholesale replacement of most of the remaining electrolytic caps, and the deletion of a few as appropriate, but will do this in a piecemeal fashion when I can replace them without disassembling the mechanism. All that are inaccessible without mechanism disassembly will be replaced at one time to minimize handling.

When reading data sheets for normal use ignore the "Test" circuit values - these are intended for use on ATE DIBs for automatic testing and are values intended to work with typical high speed testers like the ones made by my employer. They aren't optimum for use in application circuits.

In many cases you can fine tune with excellent results using Peter's approach - most of the original component values were chosen so that until absolute end of product life minimum capacitance, and esr values are maintained to allow at least adequate circuit function. When using better parts it is often the case that they do not deteriorate as rapidly or at all (film caps) and a consistent level of performance is maintained with much lower and possibly more optimum values. Minimum acceptable values will differ significantly from device to device as well so Peter's optimum value may or may not be optimum for the chip in your device - tweaking is required. I think this is also where a lot of the fun of working with this stuff comes from, that and the idea of making a giant killer out of a $2 piece of hardware.. :D