perpetual technologies P-1A

[askchan]

Does anybody have user manual, service manual or software of the perpetual technologies P-1A?

[Rarkov]

Bump! Software would be a bonus as PT now seem to be out of business. Did they release the Digital Correction (room and speaker) to the public?!

[psi310398]

Bump

I have just acquired one to go with my P3A and Power supply. I'd also be very grateful for any help.

Thanks

Peter

[bencat]

Sorry only kust seen this . I have a photo of the manual it is not ideal but when you print it out it is readable . It is on my laptop at home. Will post a copy on this thread later tonight as I am still at work and not able to access my home pc.

[psi310398]

As this may concern others, I'll take the liberty of replying to your post on the forum.

Bencat - thank you, that is very kind of you.

I might be able to assist further. I have made contact with a gent who is selling the P1 and P3 combo and power supply on a certain well known auction site and he has kindly agreed to photocopy the manual for me. When I have it, I will scan it and can make it available to you (and anybody else who is interested). It includes the addendum for later models.

Best

Peter

[bencat]

Hopefully these attached will be okay for the moment if there is a better copy that would be good for me too.

[psi310398]

Bencat,

That's great - thank you. I will post the scans when I get the photocopies or pm them to you.

Now all I need is a PhD in electronics to understand what to do...!

Peter

[bencat]

Hi Peter

The better copies when you get them will be helpful. What are you trying to do ? I can offer you some advice on using this unit but it depends on how you are using it.

If you are using the P-1a with a P-3a then the advice is to set the P-1a for the sample of the input ie if CD then 44.1khz . Then set the bit word for 24 bit. This then feeds this to the P-3a which will upsample the signal to 96khz and 24 bit length. This is the way this sounds best as if you upsample using the P-1a as well this seems to mess up the sound . Would suggest that you use the P-1a in its enhanced mode as I find this sounds better but you can switch between this mode anyway .

The only time this setting should not be used like this is if you have an I2s source and then you feed the P-1a to the P-3a via the I2s output . In this case you set the P-3a to I2s direct and it will send the signal direct to the Dac chip and miss out the Crystal Upsampller chip . So in this case it is better to set the P-1a to 192 Khz input and 24 bit word and it will tranfer the signal at its highest bit rate.

If you use the P-1a with another Dac then much depends on how that Dac works if it does its own upsampling then settings should be as per the P-3a if it does not then set the P-1a for the best sampling rate it will do and the word length to 24 bit.

Please let me know if you need anything more and hope your unit sounds as good as it can when set up correctly .

[marcus1]

Just out of interest, I wonder how the P-1A & P-3A combo (probably state of the art years back) now stack up against today's top end DAC's? Anyone had a chance to compare?

Originally Posted by bencat

Hi Peter

The better copies when you get them will be helpful. What are you trying to do ? I can offer you some advice on using this unit but it depends on how you are using it.

If you are using the P-1a with a P-3a then the advice is to set the P-1a for the sample of the input ie if CD then 44.1khz . Then set the bit word for 24 bit. This then feeds this to the P-3a which will upsample the signal to 96khz and 24 bit length. This is the way this sounds best as if you upsample using the P-1a as well this seems to mess up the sound . Would suggest that you use the P-1a in its enhanced mode as I find this sounds better but you can switch between this mode anyway .

The only time this setting should not be used like this is if you have an I2s source and then you feed the P-1a to the P-3a via the I2s output . In this case you set the P-3a to I2s direct and it will send the signal direct to the Dac chip and miss out the Crystal Upsampller chip . So in this case it is better to set the P-1a to 192 Khz input and 24 bit word and it will tranfer the signal at its highest bit rate.

If you use the P-1a with another Dac then much depends on how that Dac works if it does its own upsampling then settings should be as per the P-3a if it does not then set the P-1a for the best sampling rate it will do and the word length to 24 bit.

Please let me know if you need anything more and hope your unit sounds as good as it can when set up correctly .

[psi310398]

Bencat,

Thanks for your help. I now have a scanned version of the manual which I will be able to send you when the power cut we are currently experiencing finishes. Happy to send to anybody else who needs a copy, too.

I will run the P1A into the P3A as you suggest.

Regarding I2S, I have also scored some old Audio Alchemy I2S mini din cables off a company in California and was wondering about cannibalising one of the cables and an old CD player to experiment with all through I2S...again, happy to share the name of the vendor although she wont send outside the USA - had to get it sent to a friend who sent them to me.

None of my CD players has I2S out, nor my Sooloos Ensemble, sadly.

Peter