There are certainly differences in preamps that account to different sonic signatures. But as zman01 and ChrisMmm point out, preamp impedance and current match will allow the 3116 to fully reach its best performances.
Concerning your tube preamp gain, I figure reducing the gain to 1 (0db) will not be simple, unless you simply insert an attenuating network between the preamp and 3116. But that's too silly and will negate the whole "preamp" function...
I just ordered this case, which is ridiculously cheap:
Promo # 2107 new aluminum amplifier chassis/ amplifier enclosure with heatsink-in Consumer Electronics on Aliexpress.com
It seems that the power inlet and knob is included. What i dont know is the jibber-jabber text being a bit fuzzy concerning the switch on the front.
Promo # 2107 new aluminum amplifier chassis/ amplifier enclosure with heatsink-in Consumer Electronics on Aliexpress.com
It seems that the power inlet and knob is included. What i dont know is the jibber-jabber text being a bit fuzzy concerning the switch on the front.
Well Aliexpress is not very reliable I fear, check his 100% feedbackscore. Now check feedback... This seller too cancels orders or doesn't send goods, and from personal experience for me that meant advertised full refund wasn't full refund. Looks like Jean-Paul ordered a 3116 here, I believe he got cancelled too, he did not give feedback, I am curious if he did get a full refund if so.
From the same seller? I have ordered from aliexpress in a few years now, and the orders that went to **** i got a full refund on (11 so far), so i feel quite confident, but then again its pretty important to be on guard when purchasing from actual shitty sellers. But the feedback doesnt look all that bad?
When all thats said! I have so far over 50 successfull orders, and yes 11 failed, but most of them was DOA and one incident with a product that wasnt as described.
I have heard here that some others did get full refund, but I did not and reading around in feedback on Aliexpress you come across other complaints about no full refunds after seller cancelling. Maybe buyers from some countries do not get refunded and others do??? But like I said, curious if this is Jean-Paul the moderator here, and if he did get a full refund if his order was cancelled as I remember:
Jean-Paul S. TPA3116D2 amplifier board 50w +50 w... US $11.89 x 1 piece
23 Mar 2014 18:00
good buyers No Feedback Score
Meantime seller has 100% possitive feedbackscore 16, while 2 negative feedbacks are clearly in the list. When I gave 1star negative feedback, the sellers 100% positive feedback rating actually grew LOL, that combined with still no respons after several officially filed complaints with alibaba made me very sceptical
Jean-Paul S. TPA3116D2 amplifier board 50w +50 w... US $11.89 x 1 piece
23 Mar 2014 18:00
good buyers No Feedback Score
Meantime seller has 100% possitive feedbackscore 16, while 2 negative feedbacks are clearly in the list. When I gave 1star negative feedback, the sellers 100% positive feedback rating actually grew LOL, that combined with still no respons after several officially filed complaints with alibaba made me very sceptical
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That sounds very suspicious and messed up, thanks alot for the heads up, i will kick his *** if something goes wrong.
Resurrecting a 10-day-old post here. Does this address a problem unique to the blue Taobao boards you have, or is it something that someone with a YJ 2.0 blue/black board should consider addressing?
(And just out of curiosity, could you share images of how you accomplished this? Those pins are mighty small to my aging eyes.
Yes, my understanding is tubes have more 2nd order distortion whereas solid state has more 3rd order. If I recall odd order harmonic distortion is more damaging in sonic terms than 2nd order. Tubes do tend to have a greater amount of distortion than solid state even tho its the less damaging 2nd order.
I do not know where D class sits in all this. Unfortunately amplifier distortion is usually stated as THD (total harmonic distortion) which does not tell you the order where greater distortion lies.
Do you have a circuit diagram for the 6n3 pre?
I too have been looking at how to reduce gain also but I think unless it employs some sort of feedback its the tube MU defines the gain. Possibly change the tube to a similar one with lower MU but thats almost a redesign.
On ebay I do see some "buffer" preamps using 6n3 (tho some say they have gain - a buffer to me is 1x gain) so a different configuration with this tube is possible I think.
I am personally not a tube-aholic tho I have built a few tube amps. I have just bought a JC-2 JFET pre kit off ebay. Not necessarily for use with the 3116 but I will certainly try the combo at some time. This has a sensible 4x gain.
There are several guys whom I trust opinions' of things and they have this preamp and say it is great. There are discussions in the other forums like class A and analog source etc. You don't have to take his opinion - his data speaks volumes.
I don't believe its unique to my board though I've not examined the others. The reason for my belief is the decoupling isn't mentioned in the DS for TPA3116, though it is in at least one other member of the family. So the implementers who followed the DS won't have included it. Its not on TI's example schematic.
Pic attached - I don't have a macro lens so this is about the best magnification I can do - pin17 is right beneath the green electrolytic (top left corner of the chip). I lifted it from the board and wired it to the top side of an end-mounted ceramic cap (1206). I then wired that cap to the 'lytic - fine wire is required, 30AWG or thinner. The yellow wire is brought off board to a 100,000uF bank of caps.
Also note the inductor substitution - the 0.68uF caps were taken to the reverse side of the board to create space for the hulking great coils....
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Wow!! The price of the case is OK, it is the free shipping that makes it a good deal. I have been looking to buy some chasis for my F5 build for a while now. It is always the shipping charge that break the deals.
Please keep us posted on how the deal goes.
Regards,
Abraxalito, my friend, you do not do things by half measures. I can't reconcile your above photo with the other photos of the Taobao 2.0 I've seen, it's been altered so much. And then there's your power input cap arrays... Rave on!
So you have two caps in parallel off of pin 17. What do the other leads of the caps connect to?
So you have two caps in parallel off of pin 17. What do the other leads of the caps connect to?
You are right, as reported in publications, even order distortions are more pleasing to the ears as compare to odd order ones.
The distortion of solid state amp tends to be very low as compare to tube amps. In general, our speakers have the biggest distortion in the whole audio chain.
Regards,
I started out with just the 10uF cap (going to the groundfill nearest pin17, just to the north of the chip). Then added 470uF (snatched from the board itself as I'm using off-board bulk decoupling). After that I was curious as to how much improvement could be gained by going 'the whole hog' hence the yellow wire to 100,000uF off the board. The answer was 'not a lot'. So I don't recommend going much beyond 470uF decoupling on pin17 - the performance can't be improved because the internal reg determines the impedance seen by the internal circuits, the cap is at the input to this reg.
Earth one assumes.
But isn't there a 3.3ohm resistor in series as well? I guess thats hidden somewhere in there?
