kaneda preamp

[arthur]

please comment these phono stage and line stage

[Elso Kwak]

Originally posted by arthur
please comment these phono stage and line stage

Hi arthur,
You tried to upload a schematic picture?

[arthur]

circuit :
http://www.bonavolta.ch/hobby/en/audio/kaneda_p.htm

[peranders]

I think the whole amp is rather normal, nothing weird or bad but you can always have opinions about component choices and values. Personally I try to avoid trimming points.

A special fetaure is the "low boost", typical "pre-CD" design.

[halojoy]

Originally posted by arthur
please comment these phono stage and line stage

This is a picture of one "amp-module"
This is used BOTH in RIAA and LINE.

Normally one adjusts each stage, so that it does an optimal job.
The needs of an RIAA is Quite different
from a LINE-amp.
For example OP-amps used in HIFI Phono & MIC-input amps
must have special qualities.
WHILE LINE amps will need other Qualities, such as LINE-driver OUTPUT,
for eventual multiple low loads.


This Stage is a SIMPLE diff JFET input amp - OP amp style.
We can see what transistors are used.
Output is not PUSH-PULL.
But a single Emitter-follower Output transistor.

This stage is exactly copied into 4. Providing Stereo RIAA/Line amps.
Voltage supply is +-35 VOLT. This is probably Max, for the JFETs used.

/halo

[UrSv]

Originally posted by arthur
please comment these phono stage and line stage

As far as I know this is pretty much the same as what I recall was commercially called "La Solstice" or something similar which I built in the mid 80's. It was originally published in Europe in L'Audiophile in France AFAIK. The exception is that that one did not have the low boost. My particular implementation was published in the Swedish magazine Audio & Video (long gone since) and the components were sold by a company called Tesserakt Media Förlag (previously something else and long gone since) in Stockholm (Previously Nässjö, the owner, Anders Edenholm, now occasionally writes for the Swedish magazine Hifi & Musik). They used (as I have mentioned in another thread) tantalum resistors everywhere and the famous Shizuki capacitor as interstage de-coupling. The RIAA caps were copper foil/polystyrene (I think polystyrene). The difficult part to build this amp is the selecting and matching of the transistors. They need to be carefully selected and matched according to the circuit requirement. The trimmers are there for offset adjust and which is somewhat tricky as both trimmers affect eachother and need to be trimmed together while the amp heats up which takes about half an hour. The trimmers were Cosmos low thermal drift and the volume pot was Cosmos (or Copal maybe) as well I think. The PSU was quite chunky for a pre-amp and existed in many version (at least 3 I recall) and they all used (in Sweden) a Schaffner line filter (model 632 in the 80's maybe?) a dual C or R core transformer (much like the trafos sold by Selctronic in France http://www.selectronic.fr/), some special diodes and some very nice caps and a choke or resistors depending on version. One version used a LT317AH/LT337AH pre-regulator (not the ordinary LM317/337 but the AH (AFAIK) which was much better version and now discontinued). Switches were normally ELMA and internal wiring was done with Isoda multi-metal wire.

As far as sound goes I am convinced that this is the best pre-amp I have ever heard or built so far. I used all the recommended components and I used it with different amps (among others a pair of KlangFilm 18 W mono-blocks from an old theater in the south of Sweden. I refurbished them and they played extremely nice, later sold to a friend of Josef Svalander). I also took the pre-amp to the Hifi-Klubben shop (a chain of shops in Sweden once very good with reasonable prices) and compared it to the top-of-the-line Denon and Nad available at that time. The guy in the shop (not the owner Ivar at that time but his young helper) and I both got the same impression (which is unexpected since he was selling ready-made stuff) and that was that the difference was huge and that is was the brand stuff that was the looser. IMHO the sound from this pre-amp was SO much more relaxed and easy going than the comparably sterile and industrial, cold and mechanical (?) sounding Denons. It was not just a small difference but VERY big.

I say, if you can find details on the matching/selction criteria for the transistors then build it. If not then try, it is just a handful of components of which none are very expensive. Start with the amp and if you get that working build a very nive PSU for it, it is needed to get the best out of it. All the transistors in each diff pair should be glued together and preferably fitted with a small piece of copper. The original used a small piece of copper tube I seem to recall and this was squeezed around the pair.

I later sold it to a guy from Norway on an ad in Hifi & Musik. He called me early in the morning and asked if it was still available, I said yes and he replied that he'd be at my place in 10 hours. He arrived in a rusty old Porsche and listened to the pre-amp for a few second paid the cash and left for home. He came from Bergen in Norway which was just about 1000 kilometers away. He did 2000 kilometers in one day to buy it so he probably also thought it was good amplifier...

Sorry for the irrelevant information.

[peranders]

Originally posted by UrSv
My particular implementation was published in the Swedish magazine Audio & Video (long gone since)

OK, we have someting in common. I wrote for this magazine too.

http://home5.swipnet.se/~w-50719/hif...tsida_qro.html

Norwegians are cool! 2000 km (1250 miles) in one day!

[UrSv]

Originally posted by peranders


OK, we have someting in common. I wrote for this magazine too.

http://home5.swipnet.se/~w-50719/hif...tsida_qro.html

Norwegians are cool! 2000 km (1250 miles) in one day!

Yes I know ;-) I HAVE visited your homepage...

Yes, definitely. Norwegians are cool. That in my book would be not very unlikely for a Norwegian but very unlikely for a Swede. I once had some friends that went on a bus trip to the alps for skiing with a Norwegian that brought nothing but a toothbrush and a VISA card.

Audio & Video had loads of nice projects.

[halojoy]

And very nice friends, too

Not only Sweden & Denmark (Vifa, Peerless, Scanspeak)
Danish Sound Technology - DST

but Norway has a lot of good Audio-links

Andiha audio - A Norwegian GREAT audio amp site
------------------------------

This Kaneda Amp is interestingly as an Discrete Amplifier.
I imagine it will benefit from good regulated/filtered Power Supply
as it does not use ANY active current source

Only uses Resistors to set the currents and workingpoints.
Simple - but good!


halo - has almost got the material at home
to build his own Kaneda-clone

[AuroraB]

Hmmm..

Built this one a couple of years back, just for the kicks....
The RIAA section used the dual 2SK30, and the line section used singles, as this was the original idea. The different transistor types were claimed to have sonic differences optimized to the job.
The RIAA section balanced out perfectly, but even after several sessions of matching and rematching again, I never got the line section into DC balance....
It is still sitting on that shelf.........


BTW--Norwegians ARE cool, and the further north, the cooler they get.....