No the monster is just a conditioner, no voltage regulator built in. The readout varies between 118-119v at home where I've never had a problem with the amps. It's stays locked on 120v at the shop and doesn't move. I hooked up the monster bar to my UPS and when I unplugged it from the wall, it switches to the battery supply, both of the amps start working and the readout drops to 109-110v. As soon as I plug it back in one fires up and the other flashes on and off intermittently. Without the monster plugged in both won't work at all. I imagine this is because the monster bar absorbs some of the electricity bringing the voltage down slightly.
Ya seems that way. It would be nice if I could adjust it at home. But on the other hand it might be a good idea to run that voltage regulator anyways. Unless it has any detrimental effects on the sound quality. I read some stories about other audiophiles using the APC regulator with their delicate tube gear with very positive results.
Not sure what is the prescribed way to run cables carrying 600mV @450kHz so they don't radiate. Tonearm, which by design has a piece of unscreened, unshielded signal carrying wire is about a meter away.
Preferably as twisted pairs.
As long as the signal wire doesn't run parallel with the speaker cable, I wouldn't think there would be much interference. How badly does the phono input pick up stray fields from stuff like mobile phones? Can you twist the unshielded signal wires together? And how about putting a small HF capacitor to shunt off HF in parallel with the phono input?
Only run them at the speakers
Monoblock amps behind each speaker with xlr leads to the amps
Thanks. All good advice but not really applicable. Staying away from anything class D seems the easier option at present.
That...
Is certainly one option. But, you have also learned something here: your turntable/phono pre set up is sensitive to RF. I would suggest that it is overly sensitive even. It might be a good idea to address this sensitivity, even if you choose not to use a Class D amplifier in your system, as RF pickup from the general background RF levels may be affecting the performance of your vinyl rig in a more subtle way.
Certainly, I would expect tonearm wiring to be twisted. And I would pay special attention to the wires carrying the signal from the 'table to the phono pre as well, making sure that they are high quality, as short as possible, and properly shielded. I do not design phono pre-amps, but considering the high gain needed, would it not be prudent for them to be designed with an RF filter at the input? Perhaps this is one reason why so many who use low output MC cartridges prefer the sound of a step transformer as the first gain stage for vinyl playback, as the transformer itself should be an effective filter against high frequencies. I often wonder why people do not always take full advantage of the fact that phono cartridges output balanced signals; a fully balanced phono pre seems to make perfect sense to me, this approach, coupled with a transformer input, ought to be able to reject any noise pickup at all.
Is certainly one option. But, you have also learned something here: your turntable/phono pre set up is sensitive to RF. I would suggest that it is overly sensitive even. It might be a good idea to address this sensitivity, even if you choose not to use a Class D amplifier in your system, as RF pickup from the general background RF levels may be affecting the performance of your vinyl rig in a more subtle way.
Certainly, I would expect tonearm wiring to be twisted. And I would pay special attention to the wires carrying the signal from the 'table to the phono pre as well, making sure that they are high quality, as short as possible, and properly shielded. I do not design phono pre-amps, but considering the high gain needed, would it not be prudent for them to be designed with an RF filter at the input? Perhaps this is one reason why so many who use low output MC cartridges prefer the sound of a step transformer as the first gain stage for vinyl playback, as the transformer itself should be an effective filter against high frequencies. I often wonder why people do not always take full advantage of the fact that phono cartridges output balanced signals; a fully balanced phono pre seems to make perfect sense to me, this approach, coupled with a transformer input, ought to be able to reject any noise pickup at all.
I know of someone developing an amp for commercial purposes.
He said working with some of these class D amp modules is like drinking distilled water.
It's ok at first, but you'll go back to spring water or even tap water just to get some flavor. They don't have much soul. Nice specs though.
I agree...
with your point in a way, but think it may be a "wrong" analogy. Should not we want our amplifiers to be as distilled water, and for them to not impart any "flavor" at all? In my view, all the "flavor" should be present in the recording, and the amplifier should not be adding any "flavor" at all.
Where some amplifiers fall down, IMO, is that they do not present all of the "flavor" which is present in the recording, so far in my brief experience with nCore, I felt some the subtle harmonics of high frequency sounds (orchestral beels, chimes, cymbals) seemed to go missing in comparison with what my Pass presents. I need to do more listening though, and will be...
with your point in a way, but think it may be a "wrong" analogy. Should not we want our amplifiers to be as distilled water, and for them to not impart any "flavor" at all? In my view, all the "flavor" should be present in the recording, and the amplifier should not be adding any "flavor" at all.
Where some amplifiers fall down, IMO, is that they do not present all of the "flavor" which is present in the recording, so far in my brief experience with nCore, I felt some the subtle harmonics of high frequency sounds (orchestral beels, chimes, cymbals) seemed to go missing in comparison with what my Pass presents. I need to do more listening though, and will be...
A power amp should have ultimate grip, control and purity - it should add nothing and take nothing away and be load- (and source-) independent
If there is some effect on the signal which the power amp introduces to add 'flavour' then it is because of a change to the signal. If we want to add seasoning to the signal, then the place to do it is upstream of the power amp
If there is some effect on the signal which the power amp introduces to add 'flavour' then it is because of a change to the signal. If we want to add seasoning to the signal, then the place to do it is upstream of the power amp
I agree with you. Maybe it's not the best anology. I also like to hear what was intended. By my friends description, it seems that something is lacking after passing through these modules. Maybe something from source to amplification is being subtracted? I think it's a sense of presence that they are missing.
I have another friend that had a set of Spectron amps. Liked them for many reasons.
Then, sold them for a monster set of OTL amps.
Anyway, I think these modules have a place and I think it's awesome they exist.
I know I will eventually use them for something.
Thanks for listening to my two cents. It's just an opinion based on what I heard from experienced people.
Best,
Vince
Ah, you like some colouration. By or build something which is doing that!!
Physically impossible - it's an ET-2 air bearing arm and twisting the wires will impose unacceptable drag.
my
Pass X150.5 in my case. I would not extend my listening experience to a general point of class A and class A/B amps though. Only what I have actually compared.
And: to respond to your other comment: no, what I was describing was definitely not coloration, this is specifically why I mentioned it. Coloration changes tonality of sound which already exists. What was lacking in my (admittedly too brief to come to a full conclusion, why I mentioned I am going to listen more) listening was the upper harmonic decays of bells, chimes, cymbals, and other very high frequency sounds with tonal decays. With nCore amps they just seemed quite truncated. This observation does not indicate a coloration in the Pass (although that exists as well, as with any amp) but something omitted from the output of the nCores. I have heard enough actual bells, chimes, and cymbals in real life to know.
Perhaps longer break in, and/or a slightly different build could ameliorate this lack in the nCores. I am going to do another build soon and intend to do a lot of listening and fine tuning in order to find out.
It does not help to find the real perfromance of the nCores, if everytime someone has a listening observation which could be considered negative, then someon chimes in with: "you want coloration", or "you like the sound of distortion". As if the nCore amps were "perfect". Sorry, but nothing is perfect. I find the nCores very, very impressive and promising, and am very interested in a longer term audition of them. Hence, I will be doing a high quality stero build with them. If you must have measurements which indicate that the nCores are not "perfect", I would point you to their bandwidth, though I do not know that the limited bandwidth is a problem or not. What I do know, is that many, very well respected amplifier designers, with quite a bit more experience than Mr. Putzeys, do consider extended bandwidth important for amplifiers.
Pass X150.5 in my case. I would not extend my listening experience to a general point of class A and class A/B amps though. Only what I have actually compared.
And: to respond to your other comment: no, what I was describing was definitely not coloration, this is specifically why I mentioned it. Coloration changes tonality of sound which already exists. What was lacking in my (admittedly too brief to come to a full conclusion, why I mentioned I am going to listen more) listening was the upper harmonic decays of bells, chimes, cymbals, and other very high frequency sounds with tonal decays. With nCore amps they just seemed quite truncated. This observation does not indicate a coloration in the Pass (although that exists as well, as with any amp) but something omitted from the output of the nCores. I have heard enough actual bells, chimes, and cymbals in real life to know.
Perhaps longer break in, and/or a slightly different build could ameliorate this lack in the nCores. I am going to do another build soon and intend to do a lot of listening and fine tuning in order to find out.
It does not help to find the real perfromance of the nCores, if everytime someone has a listening observation which could be considered negative, then someon chimes in with: "you want coloration", or "you like the sound of distortion". As if the nCore amps were "perfect". Sorry, but nothing is perfect. I find the nCores very, very impressive and promising, and am very interested in a longer term audition of them. Hence, I will be doing a high quality stero build with them. If you must have measurements which indicate that the nCores are not "perfect", I would point you to their bandwidth, though I do not know that the limited bandwidth is a problem or not. What I do know, is that many, very well respected amplifier designers, with quite a bit more experience than Mr. Putzeys, do consider extended bandwidth important for amplifiers.
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