Owen, its a switchcraft mini XLR for power. thats not a rendering, Stixx has access to some pretty decent CNC gear, just search for some of his other builds. if it is its not just a rendering, its a composite, no way is that cable rendered; its not perfect enough (no offense stixx, its the weakest part of the design)
I resisted asking you to twist the wires because its so nicely done otherwise.
Owen, do you know what I would ask for a prize? to see your finished projects
I resisted asking you to twist the wires because its so nicely done otherwise.
Owen, do you know what I would ask for a prize? to see your finished projects
Not even a composite, just well lit and on a piece of paper / board / cloth?
My headphone amp is heard but not seen. Tucked away beside the settee and not in a case.
I took some photos but, oddly, very poor quality. I'll try and get better lighting and take some more at some point.
But first, I'm about to solder into the signal leads some Panasonic micro relays to see if I can hear any difference with the HD800's. The downgrade they made was easy to hear with the ATC150's (when toggling between DSD recordings of with and without the relays, replacing the relays with links of the same wire as the leads, so the number of solder joints in the signal path remained the same). But my pal said he thought they were the best switch in the signal path he's tried yet. I plan to concoct a small source selector for a couple of friends that will sound better than the Alps switches in their pre-amps.
Then I want to direct wire the headphone amp to the sound card instead of the XLR's currently there. I was able to hear the difference between gold plated and silver plated XLR's. So none might be the best?
For those people who might like to say told you so, the squawking chattering noise I had in the headphones was coming from the sound card post regulated ±8V rails, or earths. It went when I changed to the separate PSU, which happens to be ±13.8V. The signal wires are still earthed to the sound card though. There is very faint but just audible hiss / modulated whistle now whilst the sound card output stage to the Bal-Bal headphone amp remains a bit bodged, feeding single ended to it.
My headphone amp is heard but not seen. Tucked away beside the settee and not in a case.
I took some photos but, oddly, very poor quality. I'll try and get better lighting and take some more at some point.
But first, I'm about to solder into the signal leads some Panasonic micro relays to see if I can hear any difference with the HD800's. The downgrade they made was easy to hear with the ATC150's (when toggling between DSD recordings of with and without the relays, replacing the relays with links of the same wire as the leads, so the number of solder joints in the signal path remained the same). But my pal said he thought they were the best switch in the signal path he's tried yet. I plan to concoct a small source selector for a couple of friends that will sound better than the Alps switches in their pre-amps.
Then I want to direct wire the headphone amp to the sound card instead of the XLR's currently there. I was able to hear the difference between gold plated and silver plated XLR's. So none might be the best?
For those people who might like to say told you so, the squawking chattering noise I had in the headphones was coming from the sound card post regulated ±8V rails, or earths. It went when I changed to the separate PSU, which happens to be ±13.8V. The signal wires are still earthed to the sound card though. There is very faint but just audible hiss / modulated whistle now whilst the sound card output stage to the Bal-Bal headphone amp remains a bit bodged, feeding single ended to it.
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@ everybody: Thanks a lot for all the kind words and the good advice! Without Diyaudio I would have never been able to build such stuff... in terms of EE I am pretty much an idiot, and most of what I have learned is from reading, more reading, personal advice from knowledgable people and actually trying things out
I have to admit that I have access to a lot of CNC stuff at work or fellow colleagues who are happy to participate with nice tidbits for my little "side projects" (apart from my daily job) And it is always good fun to think about how to case a new project up.... I couldn't in fact resist "The Wire" mainly because it's so small!! Its so well done and cute and such a vast contrast to my other amplifiers...
@qsp: First I had it sitting outside in the fresh air, and it wouldn't rust. Then I used some kind of vinegar on it (sitting inside now) and that helped a lot. Another weekend outside in the rain and occasional spraying with salt water, took about three weeks to have the rust you see now...wow long story.
And you are right, it is a mini-XLR on the back. I would've never used a 1/4" connector
@ OPC: those wires are about 4cm long (1 1/2") and were really hard to twist anyway... its quite a tight fit. But the amplifier is absolutely dead quiet so actually I don't bother too much... hope you don't mind!
@mvmkravchenko: This IS reality (and close to an insult) although I sometimes do computer stuff (raytracings) for my projects. The pictures on the white background (which actually is a fleece blanket) were taken today...
I have to admit that I have access to a lot of CNC stuff at work or fellow colleagues who are happy to participate with nice tidbits for my little "side projects" (apart from my daily job
) And it is always good fun to think about how to case a new project up.... I couldn't in fact resist "The Wire" mainly because it's so small!! Its so well done and cute and such a vast contrast to my other amplifiers... @qsp: First I had it sitting outside in the fresh air, and it wouldn't rust. Then I used some kind of vinegar on it (sitting inside now) and that helped a lot. Another weekend outside in the rain and occasional spraying with salt water, took about three weeks to have the rust you see now...wow long story.
And you are right, it is a mini-XLR on the back. I would've never used a 1/4" connector
@ OPC: those wires are about 4cm long (1 1/2") and were really hard to twist anyway... its quite a tight fit. But the amplifier is absolutely dead quiet so actually I don't bother too much... hope you don't mind!
@mvmkravchenko: This IS reality (and close to an insult
) although I sometimes do computer stuff (raytracings) for my projects. The pictures on the white background (which actually is a fleece blanket) were taken today...
Owen, do you know what I would ask for a prize? to see your finished projects
That's some big talk, coming from you
Stixx that is some beautiful work you've done there, surely one of the front runners for the title!
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I thought Owen meant prizes were for people that got projects in boxes and 'complete'
ie tools down and more tinkering allowed. I'd also be empty handed too for the record.Time to shut your windows mate? Another storm not far off here now
Edit: For shenanigans I did up a screenshot of the weather radar ...
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I will take your advice and find a new dream -- the EHHA Rev A. I thought there might be an advantage to even a SE-BAL configuration. However, if the voltage swing isn't going to make a difference then why bother. I suppose if I had a balanced portable source then it might make some sense.
If there is no advantage, why would HiFiMAN or any other company make portable headphones that are balanced?
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they do, just not yours, yours are as far away from that as you can get...they make planar magnetic headphones that are very very hungry, lowish impedance, but VERY low efficiency, balanced is the only way with ICs really to get that much swing as most high performance opamps run out of steam ~18-20v.
balanced is OK, most high performance dac chips are balanced and its easy to build a balanced dac, but SE-Balanced has a single advantage, higher voltage swing
Thanks!
Shots were taken on our dining room table with a white fleece blanket as underground and -sort of - horizon. Light is pure daylight ... there is a lot of glass around our dining room so its well lit. Camera was a Nikon SLR on a tripod to have a "steady hand"
You are right, to set up a good rendering takes a while of fiddeling with shaders and light sources, but then I am using Alias software since 1995 (when I was in the US to work there for almost two years).
@stixx; a fantastic looking setup... Vinegar is nice stuff for attacking metal and helping it to rust... In my model making days, used to use a mix of bleach & vinegar on wire wool to create a liquid rust that can be painted on. Stunk like anything but worked fantastically ...
Hmm, like the idea of creating a chassis for The Wire that has a bit more impact than just a black aluminium box. Have a few design ideas that would work nicely, but could be tricky with my lack of wood/metal work skills.
Hmm, like the idea of creating a chassis for The Wire that has a bit more impact than just a black aluminium box. Have a few design ideas that would work nicely, but could be tricky with my lack of wood/metal work skills.
I finally started my build. Soldered two mini resistors and made a total meal of it... Messy. Resistors are salvageable I think... I am going to buy a new soldering iron... Kinda bummed as I am not terrible at soldering, just my first time with this little stuff and didn't have any support jigs to hold the board.
Live and learn. In other news I updated my Linn Sondeck to a MUSE/ Hercules power supply and didn't mess that up!
Live and learn. In other news I updated my Linn Sondeck to a MUSE/ Hercules power supply and didn't mess that up!
Is there any chance you can find an old motherboard or dead video card that you can practice on? Any old piece of tech should have at least a few different sizes of SMD on it that you remove and try to re-solder.
I think nervousness is your worst enemy when it's your first crack at SMD work. Get that out of the way by practising on something that doesn't matter, and you'll get the hang of it in no time. If you can solder PTH parts, you can learn to solder SMD.
Cheers,
Owen
I am still doing testing on the boards and found a couple of things. With some old PC motherboard heatsinks cut up and glued to the LME heatsinks. The LME chips now are just warm instead of too hot to touch. The heatsinks in the old Kenwood poweramp I am using appear to be a bit small so I was trying to find a compromise between bias current and too hot to touch standby opperation. 200 ma appears to be about the limit in my situation. With larger heatsinks I could get away with a higher bias, but that's for the next build. I noticed this morning that the bias was a lot less than 200 ma reading I was getting yesterday. I was trying to see what was going on and found that the bias was very slowly creaping up a ma or so every minute or two. I then tried to monitor the gate to gate voltage to see if it was also going up in relation with the bias current. Once the smoke cleared out of the basement I realized putting a meter across the gates caused the amplifier to oscilate, a lot. Thank goodness for 1/4 watt resistors. I am using 1/4 watt 10 ohm resistors in series with the fets to protect them. I can measure one gate to ground without oscilation. I am waiting for the amplifier to cool so I can start measuring again. The other thing, with +/-68 volt rails the amplifier can easily put out 35 volts rms into an 8ohm load. The feedback resistor is 5.49k 1/8 watt and with about 35 volts across it, it is disapating about 1/4 watt, hmmmm, I am using AC coupled single ended version. I guess for the next build I will have to change the resistors.
I think the above post is in the wrong thread
If you re-post it in the LME amp thread then I'll reply there.
Cheers,
Owen
just in case you did, do not try to use a fine tip, 2mm chisel is ideal for the little parts, move up a bit for the buffers