Not here to judge your intelligence. So no need to apologize. We are working through a problem here. Trust me - we all have problems and sometimes they aren’t easy to figure out.
In the picture you sent. Put one lead of your meter in the - screw of the blue screw terminal and the other on the same outer sleeve of the each input Jack.
Does side one go right to zero and the other not?
Green side stays at .9, and red side is a bit higher- maybe 1.2? Thank you for your help and patience.
Unplug the cables from whatever you are feeding the amp with. (Preamp I think you said)
Plug them into the amp.
Put one end of your meter into the - terminal you just used.
Measure each cable at the end that would normally be plugged into the preamp.
Mostly I’m interested in the outer part that covers the silver part of the Jack.
Thanks. So to clarify, I was using a SYS (schiit) passive volume control. So with the power off to the ACA mini, plug the RCAs that are going from the SYS into the ACA RCAs, with power to the ACA still off, and take reading? Silver part of RCA cables? Am I understanding correctly?
Or no RCA to the SYS, but just in to the ACA, open in the other end?
So if I put multimeter on speaker connector and then on corresponding rca open end, I get no reading. Does that answer?
Edit: Sorry I was touching the male part of the rca (no reading). When touching speaker connection to outer metal ring of RCA open end, my readings are same as before, .9 and 1.2.
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Unplug both sides from SYS
RCA into the ACA
Meter connection to - terminal
Measure open end of each cable
Ahh. Then that isn’t the answer I’d hoped to hear.
But should verify the cables are ok.
Sorry I was touching the male part of the rca (no reading). When touching speaker connection to outer metal ring of RCA open end, my readings are same as before, .9 and 1.2.
That 1.2 bugs me. Take a piece of wire and strip both ends. Lamp cord, cat 5, a twist tie.. whatever you may have and put one end into the (-) speaker terminal along with your speaker connection.
Plug the cables back into everything. Speakers. Preamp. Like you are getting ready to use it.
Take the other end of the wire you put in the negative end of the speaker connector and have it ready.
Turn the amp on and when you hear the noise - put the wire on the silver outer conductor of the offending channel.
Ok. Just heading out so will do this when I return and report back. I appreciate the suggestions and help.
Ok. Did as you said. Turned amp on. No noise until I turn the source on (cd player). Buzz/hum started — sounds like white noise buzz. Used a piece of speaker wire for test. Touched it to the red rca connector (metal), and the noise remained constant (no change).
I’m curious now about the four resistors in the R2 and R3 position.
The color bands should be red red black orange for those four positions.
That isn’t what I see in your picture.
According to the guide —
https://www.firstwatt.com/pdf/art_aca_mini.pdf
The brown colors are all on the right hand sides for R2-R6. I double checked mine against the photos in the guide and they are the same. I’ll post a closer pic if that helps.
https://www.firstwatt.com/pdf/art_aca_mini.pdf
The brown colors are all on the right hand sides for R2-R6. I double checked mine against the photos in the guide and they are the same. I’ll post a closer pic if that helps.