Yes
If you buy a Goldmund one thing you definitely don't get is value for money. There have been lots of areas where they have tried to save money.
No wonder why vibration is such an issue for them when they under size there transformers, hence the need to pot them and decouple them from the chassis.
Nonsense that Goldmund is some of the worst performance per dollar out there? Not saying it's a bad amp...but at 40k dollars you're way beyond value.
All this with no prototype , my original "beef" (no ill will intended), how will anybody ever know?? all "puffery".... 🙄
Build it , then b...i...ch...
OS
Build it , then b...i...ch...
OS
They don't just do it with the transformers. The single rear foot is directly attached to the heatsink making the output circuitry suspended from the chassis and coupled to ground.
How about this familiar story from boutique amplifier desginers......
How many create a beautiful 60w circuit, but when scaling the same design up to 200 watts find the magic is gone? The common solution is to build more and more complexity into the design to achieve the same result, usually with worse sound quality.
But Goldmund did not do that. The schematic is the same from the low power up to high power amps. The only change is the number of output devices and some other minor adjustments.
This shows that perhaps they were onto something when stating 'high current' causes vibration to feed back into the input stage, thus adding to smearing and lessened sound quality. It does not necessarily mean they were skimping on the build quality.
How many create a beautiful 60w circuit, but when scaling the same design up to 200 watts find the magic is gone? The common solution is to build more and more complexity into the design to achieve the same result, usually with worse sound quality.
But Goldmund did not do that. The schematic is the same from the low power up to high power amps. The only change is the number of output devices and some other minor adjustments.
This shows that perhaps they were onto something when stating 'high current' causes vibration to feed back into the input stage, thus adding to smearing and lessened sound quality. It does not necessarily mean they were skimping on the build quality.
Why did they not just put the power supply in another box and you place it in the house next door, or pot the whole damn thing.
One of the accoustically most dead substances is bee's wax. maybe pouring bees wax into an amplifier makes it dead to microphonic and vibration. Hope I did not give away any state secrets, it sure beats any mechanical wigets.
I just pour honey straight into the vent holes. But only honey from the ligurian bee. The others do not sound as good.
Hi Agistos, this is no joke. In the late seventies and early eighties most of my research work was done in surface accoustic wave propagation.
Wax in general or just bees wax specifically?
Im sure there are speaker manufacturers out there who would have experimented with bees wax as an internal coating substance.
Im sure there are speaker manufacturers out there who would have experimented with bees wax as an internal coating substance.
The 9.2's must have been expensive to manufacture, just think how difficult it is to make a solid steel amp case that also looks good, including the corners.
Ever seen these models ?
Just a shame that it was uncalled for, later models have non-single piece aluminum cases, a used Mimesis 29 sells for $1500.
Attachments
Jacco, steel fabrication is expensive when done in small quantities and by humans, which I presume it must be.
If it was made with punches and presses like a car or any high volume manufacturing then it is really only material cost and recovery of the tooling plus a little profit.
If someone at a car factory had to hand beat a shape out of a flat piece of sheet metal, only the very wealthy would own a vehicle.
To be absolutely honest, if it was made in high volumes it would be a fraction of the cost, and a household name ranking amongst Pioneers, Sansui, Onkyo, NAD, etc.
Furthermore, if these guys bought a reel of transistors to identically match a few and bin the balance I could also accept that there is a high wastage cost, but Nagys claims that there are no reason for matching.
The transformer consists of a core and copper, a dome and some potting, unless some highly paid person threads the toroid by hand, then it would not cost more than many other transformers.
Let us then also assume that every screw is hand threaded from a piece of wire.
Maybe the face plate is hammered from an aluminium ingot and filed and shaped with basic hand tools by the hands of highly paid professionals, and it justifies some of the cost.
There is nothing spectacular or innovative about the circuit either, it is worth at most $200 and probably $ 50 in volume from China.
Have a look at this web site what you can buy for $79. and probably looks as good if not better.
Audio Catalog
If it was made with punches and presses like a car or any high volume manufacturing then it is really only material cost and recovery of the tooling plus a little profit.
If someone at a car factory had to hand beat a shape out of a flat piece of sheet metal, only the very wealthy would own a vehicle.
To be absolutely honest, if it was made in high volumes it would be a fraction of the cost, and a household name ranking amongst Pioneers, Sansui, Onkyo, NAD, etc.
Furthermore, if these guys bought a reel of transistors to identically match a few and bin the balance I could also accept that there is a high wastage cost, but Nagys claims that there are no reason for matching.
The transformer consists of a core and copper, a dome and some potting, unless some highly paid person threads the toroid by hand, then it would not cost more than many other transformers.
Let us then also assume that every screw is hand threaded from a piece of wire.
Maybe the face plate is hammered from an aluminium ingot and filed and shaped with basic hand tools by the hands of highly paid professionals, and it justifies some of the cost.
There is nothing spectacular or innovative about the circuit either, it is worth at most $200 and probably $ 50 in volume from China.
Have a look at this web site what you can buy for $79. and probably looks as good if not better.
Audio Catalog
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