I'm a professional amplifier designer for a well known southern California pro audio manufacturer. In order to help out the DIY community with their projects, I was thinking I could apply some of my board layout expertise.
If there was a circuit the diy community could agree was not comercially available but a worthy project to build, and if say 50 to 100 people wold commit to ordering a board, I would do the artwork, put it on the site for approval by the community and then get the number people commited to buy made at my supplier in Taiwan for distribution to those who wanted it at my out of pocket cost.
A board could be for a power amp, a DSP, whatever. I can do 2 or 4 layer boards. Plated through holes, whatever.
What I need first is a discussion on what would be the most desired board to get made, and no rip offs of commercial designs either. I need a schematic done well enough to be able to generate a parts list, one which at least 50 people would want.
If the project works out well, there could be more.
If there was a circuit the diy community could agree was not comercially available but a worthy project to build, and if say 50 to 100 people wold commit to ordering a board, I would do the artwork, put it on the site for approval by the community and then get the number people commited to buy made at my supplier in Taiwan for distribution to those who wanted it at my out of pocket cost.
A board could be for a power amp, a DSP, whatever. I can do 2 or 4 layer boards. Plated through holes, whatever.
What I need first is a discussion on what would be the most desired board to get made, and no rip offs of commercial designs either. I need a schematic done well enough to be able to generate a parts list, one which at least 50 people would want.
If the project works out well, there could be more.
Yes, I think with any open ended design request, there is a problem that different people will pull the design in different directions, and everyone will have a good idea on how to improve the design. Except, if you "improve" it too much (too many bells and whistles) no one will actually want to pay for it. (The fallacy of focus groups?)For example, if we were talking about a DAC, I would say that balanced, ASRC, and oversampling were requirements. But someone else will hate ASRC and want non-OS. It comes down to someone (or a few people) synthesizing the input and strongly focusing discussion in a given direction. Some people will inevitably be turned off but you can't design by committee: in the end the lead architect had better guide the development.
As for suggestions, I think we're definitely lacking a quality DAC design, but that is a tall order and I know JWB is working on a similar project. A DSP would probably be my suggestion if it were possible; there was recent activity in a thread about DSP engines, but as usual, it didn't really amount to anything for the peons. The real problem is we need BOTH someone committed to the digital design AND someone willing to write a robust software solution that could be implemented by people with limited expertise.
put the DSP before the DACs and one PCB will fullfill all needs: reclocking like desired, balanced or not, oversampled or whatever, even software switchable for A/B with different filters, and even better: digital crossover for driving biamped system without any analog crossover in the signal chain, crossover frequencys and slope software adjustable. Only enough DAC chips have to be forseen on the Board (i vote for at least 4 each stereo channel, balanced and 2 way)
Would also make a good tool for speaker crossover development.
I guess any DSP design is de facto buffered in the same sense that ASRC achieves, it only remains to worry about the accuracy (jitter) of the DSP output clocks. If you don't need actual SRC then that would suffice, if you do, it seems like you are burning a lot of cycles to do it in DSP when ICs exist that can do it quite well.
a lot of people (at least: me)Boards
I know of no way to add a polling mechanism other than reading the e-mails. If anyone can suggest a link to a poling system??
As for the design what I want is not a wish list but a project that has been already developed by someone on the site, which has been built, but for where there are no boards available for it. The author/creator of the design would have to agree to this as well.
I have the time to draft up a PCB but no matter how much I would like it, I have no time to develop the circuit itself or to debug it.
Please suggest things that someone on the site has already made work. I know there are some neat things done by members of this site that many other of you would like to have as well.
Otherwise we will end up talking about so many different things, that nothing will ever be accomplished.
I know of no way to add a polling mechanism other than reading the e-mails. If anyone can suggest a link to a poling system??
As for the design what I want is not a wish list but a project that has been already developed by someone on the site, which has been built, but for where there are no boards available for it. The author/creator of the design would have to agree to this as well.
I have the time to draft up a PCB but no matter how much I would like it, I have no time to develop the circuit itself or to debug it.
Please suggest things that someone on the site has already made work. I know there are some neat things done by members of this site that many other of you would like to have as well.
Otherwise we will end up talking about so many different things, that nothing will ever be accomplished.
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