Wow indeed!
1st post in a thread and instant sarcasm from two members.
Thanks for that guys, guess I should stay away and leave the big boys to it.
Seems the only opinions that matter are yours.
1st post in a thread and instant sarcasm from two members.
Thanks for that guys, guess I should stay away and leave the big boys to it.
Seems the only opinions that matter are yours.
GJF don't be dissuaded so easily. Not everyone here is bent on being sarcastic. I have the Breeze 2.1 and the SMSL SA60 and both perform admirably especially considering the price of entry. I also have some old school amps, Dyna SCA35 modded, Fisher 500C stock, Van Alstine Fet Valve, BEL 1001, and B&K 105. In absolute terms which one I prefer very much depends on what speakers I am trying to drive. Pretty much across the board all of them benefit from a clean power conditioner. But give the TPA3116 amps a reasonably easy load and they are stellar performers at a price where nothing else I know of comes close. For the Breeze 2.1 I only use it in stereo mode as I find the sub crossover to leak too much midbass and upper bass into the signal. I've just ordered one of the twin chip boards and power supplies that Poultrygeist likes so much. I am coming to the conclusion that lower entry price good sounding amps like this are reason to hope that high end audio can survive.
The best way to deal with negative comments is to ignore them.
But it's easier said than done.
But it's easier said than done.
On this remote controlled 3116 board replacing the coupling capacitors (4 electrolytics + 2 (+2) ceramics in signal path from input) was a day and night difference, there isn't a equal big improvement to be made elsewhere, on this board.
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On this remote controlled 3116 board replacing the coupling capacitors (4 electrolytics + 2 (+2) ceramics in signal path from input) was a day and night difference, there isn't a equal big improvement to be made elsewhere, on this board.
What do you mean by remote controlled? Can you provide link with more info? I was going to purchase a separate remote and motor controlled pot, however source selection is still an issue.
I'm in total agreement as a scholar of science; which is difficult at times in the audiophile community. I just read a lengthy post about the differences in audio bliss from fuse-rolling in amps 😆
With that said I don't see allot of these mods in the first instance as capacitor-rolling, but more swapping out components which probably, as fake Chinese, were not functioning, tolerance, or spec'd poorly. In which case your taking a circuit or chip not operating correctly and fixing those issues. I would like to see some measurements before and after from swapping out Chinese copies to trusted components, then further measurements from rolling components.
3 inputs, 1 output, tone controll, volume control, wireless remote, display
http://www.princeton.com.tw/Portals/0/Product/PT2313E_s.pdf
High Power Digital Amplifier Board TPA3116D2 PT2313 Remote Control 50W 50 W | eBay
If you look at earlier picture you'll see layout tpa3116 part isn't as poor as some popular 3116 ampboards, parts in real need of replacement are the "elna" electrolytics for coupling and determining if you need an "elna" in series with a smd ceramic cap for coupling after preamp pt2313. All other parts can give small improvements, coils/output filter for intended speakers, dc electrolytics, but result after just replacing "elna's"/removing ceramic caps is very pleasant when compared to other 3116's.
http://www.princeton.com.tw/Portals/0/Product/PT2313E_s.pdf
High Power Digital Amplifier Board TPA3116D2 PT2313 Remote Control 50W 50 W | eBay
If you look at earlier picture you'll see layout tpa3116 part isn't as poor as some popular 3116 ampboards, parts in real need of replacement are the "elna" electrolytics for coupling and determining if you need an "elna" in series with a smd ceramic cap for coupling after preamp pt2313. All other parts can give small improvements, coils/output filter for intended speakers, dc electrolytics, but result after just replacing "elna's"/removing ceramic caps is very pleasant when compared to other 3116's.
The PT2313 shows the inputs have adjustable gain:
FEATURES • 3 stereo inputs with gain selection, range from 0dB
to +11.25dB in 3.75dB/step
Does this mean the TPA3116 gain can be changed? Would this help in lowering the already too high gain of the cheap 3 tube Chinese preamps send to the TPA?
When you replaced the electrolytics on the inputs (2 on each channel, 6 total) did you remove the SMD ceramics, and leave the pads open or do they need to be jumpered?
Please bear with me, I am not very electronics knowledgeable, but I can follow directions, and sling solder!
Board has its own "preamp" that adds 4 dB gain, I haven't looked at way to set gain per input, I don't think it is remotecontrolled🙂
single ended inputsignal->1 "elna" per channel->pt2313 single ended output->1 "elna" per channel->ceramic cap-positive input tpa3116 (ceramic cap to gnd for negative input)
I indeed jumpered the smdpads that had ceramic cap on positive input of tpa3116, jumpering the "elna" positions towards tpa3116 caused some added noises sometimes, pcbtrace/pads/holes quality/thickness isn't upto replacing parts (many times), need to be really carefull 🙂
single ended inputsignal->1 "elna" per channel->pt2313 single ended output->1 "elna" per channel->ceramic cap-positive input tpa3116 (ceramic cap to gnd for negative input)
I indeed jumpered the smdpads that had ceramic cap on positive input of tpa3116, jumpering the "elna" positions towards tpa3116 caused some added noises sometimes, pcbtrace/pads/holes quality/thickness isn't upto replacing parts (many times), need to be really carefull 🙂
Obviously many people here prefer "to trust their ears". Nonetheless there have been real measurements about distortion in coupling caps long time ago. Which showed that the mast majority of improvements you can find here by changing coupling caps is simply nonsense. But any debates are as clueless as debating with religious fanatics.
Just my 2c
On this remote controlled 3116 board replacing the coupling capacitors (4 electrolytics + 2 (+2) ceramics in signal path from input) was a day and night difference, there isn't a equal big improvement to be made elsewhere, on this board.
What exactly type of capacitors did you used? Do you have maybe some pictures with your board after the mod? How does it sound compare with the Sure board for example?
Thank you for shearing your experience!
Would you mind sharing the literature that you are referring to. I am very interested in this topic. Thanks!
By the way, if we cannot trust our ears, what should we do? This is audio after all. The ears are our own personal transducers and are different from one person to another. Our ears pick up the sound signals and our brain interpret. The psychoacoustics effect is actually quite a complicated matter. That explains why different people hear the same sound would described it differently.
Regards,
Do you always thrust your eyes? Brain gets fooled by many things, I.e. MP3, optical illusions etc.
For the ears, they're biased for the most/all of us. They'll let you hear what you want to hear. I.e. normally it's not the burn-in of electronic components or caps that changes the sound, it's the ears/hearing readjusting biased by your expectations. I frequently ask friends of mine to listen to new stuff (amps, configurations) and don't tell them what to listen for, they usually don't hear any difference.
For speaker chassis, to my knowledge, they'll change a bit while "burning-in/using them, but this can clearly be measured.
Changing caps with different capacitance in a wide variation will lead into different bandwidth, but "shouldn't" affect the sound performance. With known input impedance, it clearly can the calculated by simple math, what to expect when changing from 100n to I.e. 10uF. But changing caps to lower the xover frequency from 20Hz to 2Hz gives what advantage? With speakers, not able to reproduce sound lower than 30Hz at proper levels, this ain't makes sense at all.
So, will rolling caps with same parameters gives an advantage like "more crisp mids, better highs, warm sound? If it sounds different, this should easily be proofed by measurements. 🙂
There are so many tips in this thread to use this n that coupling cap, only use Oscon caps, not using standard Panasonic caps, doing bootstrap snubbers with standard parts etc, but no one ever proofed/measured before/after and showed the results. It's just because, someone said so and now many/everyone hears this "advantage" regardless of what was there before.
Reminds me a bit on religion, people want/need to believe in things. (And I'm not into it)
(Things/Parts aren't usually better because they're more expensive)
But that's just my personal opinion, not meant to be offending,
For the ears, they're biased for the most/all of us. They'll let you hear what you want to hear. I.e. normally it's not the burn-in of electronic components or caps that changes the sound, it's the ears/hearing readjusting biased by your expectations. I frequently ask friends of mine to listen to new stuff (amps, configurations) and don't tell them what to listen for, they usually don't hear any difference.
For speaker chassis, to my knowledge, they'll change a bit while "burning-in/using them, but this can clearly be measured.
Changing caps with different capacitance in a wide variation will lead into different bandwidth, but "shouldn't" affect the sound performance. With known input impedance, it clearly can the calculated by simple math, what to expect when changing from 100n to I.e. 10uF. But changing caps to lower the xover frequency from 20Hz to 2Hz gives what advantage? With speakers, not able to reproduce sound lower than 30Hz at proper levels, this ain't makes sense at all.
So, will rolling caps with same parameters gives an advantage like "more crisp mids, better highs, warm sound? If it sounds different, this should easily be proofed by measurements. 🙂
There are so many tips in this thread to use this n that coupling cap, only use Oscon caps, not using standard Panasonic caps, doing bootstrap snubbers with standard parts etc, but no one ever proofed/measured before/after and showed the results. It's just because, someone said so and now many/everyone hears this "advantage" regardless of what was there before.
Reminds me a bit on religion, people want/need to believe in things. (And I'm not into it)
(Things/Parts aren't usually better because they're more expensive)
But that's just my personal opinion, not meant to be offending,
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That's what exactly what I am driving at. Our brain decide what we hear. Not the measured data. Sometime, one can correlate the data to our hearing, sometime we cannot. How our brain convert mechanical sound wave into neuronal signal and "create sound in our head" is still not fully understood. When you listen to a piece of music that you really enjoy, do you keep asking yourself "is this real or is my brain playing tricks on me"? You don't, right. You just sit back, relax and enjoy.
You brought up a very good point - our bias. For example, your measured data showed that there are essentially no differences before and after changing something in the system. So you listened and "confirm" that your hearing test matches the measured data - there are no differences. However, in this scenario, aren't you biased? You have the preconceived notion that there should not be any difference in the hearing since the measurements had shown that. Now, if there is a group of person participate in this exercise (but have not seen the data), some people will report hearing differences.
I am sure you heard of placebo effect. Patients on drug trials actually feel better even though they are in the control group - the group that does not know that they are not taking the drug but a blank pill. So mental bias can have profound effects.
By the way, under what condition that you know "your brain is not telling the truth/or your brain is being fooled" and therefore is not trustworthy?
How do you know it is not the cone driver that is changing its physical characteristics slightly?
Well, different people could have very different perception of the sound when the bandwidth changes. Some people can hear better into higher frequencies than others.
I totally agree with you. The speaker is a much less "precise" equipment as compare to our amps. Why loose sleep over some minute imperfections of our upstream equipment.
Oh, I think there are speakers that can reproduce 30 Hz quite well. Whether one wants to pay for something like that is another questions. Also, I was told that there are very few music that contain information at such low frequency, except may be some organ music. So no worry about that.
Well I have no opinion on cap rolling at all. That's why I ask the poster to share any literature information on this subject. By the way, I have talked to an audio electronic engineer who swear by burning in of capacitors and claimed that changes on some capacitors can be detected/measured after burn-in.
Hey, I like these intellectual discussions and exchanges. Unfortunately, it is OT.
Regards,
Doctormord and voltwide are trolling imo, they claim it is no use to replace chinese capacitors and claim it was documented years ago no differences were found between chinese "made in japan" capacitors and japanese ones, yet they also say never buy chinese "made in japan" components.