I don't understand the general fascination with CRC myself when CLC is better in all technical respects. I guess there is the fear and ignorance of coils underlying this...
I have done many times the CLC with my own cored chokes and do work very well. The last one was for the FW F5, and might applay this type to these PC audio thingy but further on the way.
Thanks again, Antonio
now come on, just take a moment.
you can never ever turn the tipical pc stereo speakers bought for a few bucks into anything even remotely usable. like it or not, that is the truth.
but, you can change the psu, the amp, the pots, the case and the drivers to get a decent sound.
yup, you got it, do not purchase the junk in the first place, if you need something better.
instead, get some better drivers in the first place, and make a proper cab for them.
we aren't supposed to shoot for absolute fidelity in such case.
that's done, so back to amp question.
supposedly, we can get away using the psu the pc already has.
tda8560q can run from anything between 6 and 18 volts,
so adding a regulator to the pc 12 volt rail to attempt to remove some noise is not that hard, a 9 volt regulator will do the job. the tda8560 is a BTL chip, despite the utterly low voltage, it will still have some grunt. (given 4 ohm drivers, or one can choose to go down to 2 ohms , it will not hurt the ic)
a simple delay circuit would be needed in order to protect the chip from pc turn on spike voltage, but i would risk that the regulator could deal with that.
I'd suppose that even full range car speakers would do a better job than the usual cheapo few buck pc speaker sets.
so why on earth would anyone just remotely think of "upgrading" them plastic things anyways? utterly pointless, it will never sound good, not even close to anything that is not unacceptible.
you can never ever turn the tipical pc stereo speakers bought for a few bucks into anything even remotely usable. like it or not, that is the truth.
but, you can change the psu, the amp, the pots, the case and the drivers to get a decent sound.
yup, you got it, do not purchase the junk in the first place, if you need something better.
instead, get some better drivers in the first place, and make a proper cab for them.
we aren't supposed to shoot for absolute fidelity in such case.
that's done, so back to amp question.
supposedly, we can get away using the psu the pc already has.
tda8560q can run from anything between 6 and 18 volts,
so adding a regulator to the pc 12 volt rail to attempt to remove some noise is not that hard, a 9 volt regulator will do the job. the tda8560 is a BTL chip, despite the utterly low voltage, it will still have some grunt. (given 4 ohm drivers, or one can choose to go down to 2 ohms , it will not hurt the ic)
a simple delay circuit would be needed in order to protect the chip from pc turn on spike voltage, but i would risk that the regulator could deal with that.
I'd suppose that even full range car speakers would do a better job than the usual cheapo few buck pc speaker sets.
so why on earth would anyone just remotely think of "upgrading" them plastic things anyways? utterly pointless, it will never sound good, not even close to anything that is not unacceptible.
Sorry, that's not how it works ... it may not do everything brilliantly well, but the reproduction in various areas that's meaningful to long term satisfaction can easily outdo sloppily assembled, pricely gear.
A couple of days ago I listened to a set of Scan Speak drivers costing well over $2,000 assembled in a DIY 'box' - that's the raw retail price of the units - driven actively, with full blown equalisation. And only after a solid warm-up and good thrashing was I hearing a clear superiority in the sound, courtesy of the driver quality.
If one does the right things, it is truly remarkable what cheap equipment will do; it's an excellent learning experience, appreciating what is important, and what isn't.
Last edited:
i did not mention to purchase expensive gear.
in fact the 8560q chip and the parts needed to make it work cost pocket money.
correct drivers are cheap too.
no part did i mention costs 2000 usd, nor did i say get something exotic and expensive.
but, i did mention, that a 10 usd speaker set will never sound right,, no mather what you do with it.
the chip it self is like 2-3 usd, and you can spare the psu too, as you would be using the computer psu. can't get any cheaper than that with the amp section.
most other parts needed to run it can be salvaged for free, i see no reason to not go that route. If i say 10 usd for the amp it self, then i'm overshooting quite a bit.
then, why bother "upgrading" something that will never work well ?
it is not that costly to make something decent...
in fact the 8560q chip and the parts needed to make it work cost pocket money.
correct drivers are cheap too.
no part did i mention costs 2000 usd, nor did i say get something exotic and expensive.
but, i did mention, that a 10 usd speaker set will never sound right,, no mather what you do with it.
the chip it self is like 2-3 usd, and you can spare the psu too, as you would be using the computer psu. can't get any cheaper than that with the amp section.
most other parts needed to run it can be salvaged for free, i see no reason to not go that route. If i say 10 usd for the amp it self, then i'm overshooting quite a bit.
then, why bother "upgrading" something that will never work well ?
it is not that costly to make something decent...
Hi Arty,
I most agree with what you say, most PC speakes are just rubish as you point, But there are some better options too on this category. In this case we are talking on one that has its own Psu and only the signal comes from the PC. The model is Pleomax S2-300B from Samsung.
Out of the box sounds ‘nice’ but with several sortcomings which I atributed to the amp itself and not the speakers. I’m preparing some notes on the first round of tweaking and several interestig things found on the topology.
In the mean time lets see if I can add a pix of the kit for those who are not familiar with it (from internet).
Antonio
PS sorry no image but you can look at the third pix on this site...
Samsung Pleomax S-300B, S-500B e S-600B - MEGAMODO - Magazine Online
I most agree with what you say, most PC speakes are just rubish as you point, But there are some better options too on this category. In this case we are talking on one that has its own Psu and only the signal comes from the PC. The model is Pleomax S2-300B from Samsung.
Out of the box sounds ‘nice’ but with several sortcomings which I atributed to the amp itself and not the speakers. I’m preparing some notes on the first round of tweaking and several interestig things found on the topology.
In the mean time lets see if I can add a pix of the kit for those who are not familiar with it (from internet).
Antonio
PS sorry no image but you can look at the third pix on this site...
Samsung Pleomax S-300B, S-500B e S-600B - MEGAMODO - Magazine Online
As Antonio says, it's not too hard to find parts that are outright defective, a bit of experience allows one to distinguish those, and not bother to proceed further. A key phrase he used was "Out of the box sounds ‘nice’" - that's a giveaway that the potential is there, the "niceness" means that there is no glaring fault that may be difficult to bypass.
The process is then to "tune" the "niceness" into "impressive", and then "convincing" - this is an evolution of the inherent decent quality of the parts. It may not plumb the depths of everything that is on a recording, but it will become something highly satisfying to listen to - and as Antonio is suggesting, refining the electronics is the heart of the matter.
The process is then to "tune" the "niceness" into "impressive", and then "convincing" - this is an evolution of the inherent decent quality of the parts. It may not plumb the depths of everything that is on a recording, but it will become something highly satisfying to listen to - and as Antonio is suggesting, refining the electronics is the heart of the matter.
Most of you guys are quite new to these DIYaudio forums and don’t know much history about, but a few years ago this chipamp forum didn’t exist, nobody gave a dam about it but took a wise guy named Peter Daniel (and others) to give a new perspective on this type of amps and he mostly resided on the Pass forum building class A behemoths and not even getting near class AB.
Not saying that this thread will be a big hit but is an interesting exercise at least for me and some others maybe, so don’t get excited.
Not saying that this thread will be a big hit but is an interesting exercise at least for me and some others maybe, so don’t get excited.
First, a brief description of the kit, cable with a 3.5mm plug for connection to your source that goes to a small box with a vol control and jacks for cans from there a cable connects to the woofer box that contains, besides the speaker, a small transformer that will connect to the mains via cable and plug. The woofer box has two knobs one is a second vol control and a bass level control. Inside is the pcb where the electronics are, all through hole parts which is easier to work but parts are close together besides two sheet metal (berilium?) heatsinks that are glued to the two multileg chips, the bigger one is a DIP 16 pins presumably a TEA 2025 since I discovered that it has the same pinout config. The second chip is still unknown to me, an 8 legged DIP.
The 2025 is connected directly to the woofer (no caps) and working in a bridge configuration. The smaller chip feeds the 2 satellites.
PSU has a discreet full wave bridge and the diodes are bypassed with small ceramics. The main smoothing filter is one and only 2.2mf cap, some rudimentary EMI filtering at the AC side and in some other place a small through hole ferrite on DC side.
I have been working without a schematic so identifying function on commponents aint easy so if someone has ideas or know similar circuits it will be of great help.
BTW, this is my first time on chipamps so be patient.
Antonio
The 2025 is connected directly to the woofer (no caps) and working in a bridge configuration. The smaller chip feeds the 2 satellites.
PSU has a discreet full wave bridge and the diodes are bypassed with small ceramics. The main smoothing filter is one and only 2.2mf cap, some rudimentary EMI filtering at the AC side and in some other place a small through hole ferrite on DC side.
I have been working without a schematic so identifying function on commponents aint easy so if someone has ideas or know similar circuits it will be of great help.
BTW, this is my first time on chipamps so be patient.
Antonio
99 times out of 100 the issue with stuff like this is with the loudspeakers. Almost all budget chip amps, even in their most basic configuration, if implemented as is suggested by the datasheet, will sound great when partnered with properly designed loudspeakers.
Those loudspeakers look like your basic two way, which is already a step up over the usual dross you find in computer speakers. They will however only have a very basic crossover. Maybe even no crossover at all on the woofer and only a single cap + resistor on the tweeter.
If you give the loudspeakers the attention they deserve, with a competent crossover redesign, it will probably make them sound 10x better than they already do.
I mean if there's something defective in the analogue section, such that you're getting unpleasant amounts of buzz, hiss or hum from the loudspeakers then that needs fixing, as it should not be. But beyond that really it's the drive units + xover that will be dictating the fundamental sound quality of the design.
Those loudspeakers look like your basic two way, which is already a step up over the usual dross you find in computer speakers. They will however only have a very basic crossover. Maybe even no crossover at all on the woofer and only a single cap + resistor on the tweeter.
If you give the loudspeakers the attention they deserve, with a competent crossover redesign, it will probably make them sound 10x better than they already do.
I mean if there's something defective in the analogue section, such that you're getting unpleasant amounts of buzz, hiss or hum from the loudspeakers then that needs fixing, as it should not be. But beyond that really it's the drive units + xover that will be dictating the fundamental sound quality of the design.
Thanks for that info, Antonio - a simple first assessment I would do would be to shut off the drive to the subwoofer circuitry, IOW work out a simple way to null any current demand to that area, which is easily switched back. Use a track which has plenty of meat for the subwoofer, and compare, at the highest volume which is reasonable, how the satellites perform, in treble clarity say, with and without the subwoofer driving - this will be a strong indication as to how much work has to be done on upgrading the power supply situation.
Obviously, for a 'perfect' system there will zero audible difference, but ...
Obviously, for a 'perfect' system there will zero audible difference, but ...
Matt,
You maybe looking to the wrong image from my link. The image is the lastone (3rd).
This is a 2.1 arrangement, so one woofer an two satellites and powered by separate chips so no need for xover, just compenation at the input of the chips, Satellites is composed of only one small speaker somewhere 2.5" dia.
The chipamp the one feeding the woofer is not built to the data sheet spec and as far tested caps are lousy. Remember this is a commercial implementation.
You may be right about the speakes but yet to be determinated.
Antonio
You maybe looking to the wrong image from my link. The image is the lastone (3rd).
This is a 2.1 arrangement, so one woofer an two satellites and powered by separate chips so no need for xover, just compenation at the input of the chips, Satellites is composed of only one small speaker somewhere 2.5" dia.
The chipamp the one feeding the woofer is not built to the data sheet spec and as far tested caps are lousy. Remember this is a commercial implementation.
You may be right about the speakes but yet to be determinated.
Antonio
- Status
- This old topic is closed. If you want to reopen this topic, contact a moderator using the "Report Post" button.