I'm building my first amp, an ESP P3A and I'm planning on using two boards to make a 4 channel amp. If I use a large enough toroid (625VA) can I run the DC from a single power supply to the inputs of 2 (well 4 actually) amps but still be able to control the volume of each pair of amps independently?
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Control of volume has nothing to do with power supply configuration.
That is the job of the preamp driving an amplifier.
That is the job of the preamp driving an amplifier.
The one thing that this does affect, however, is the grounding. If the OP's P3A boards are anything like the ones in this thread, you may end up with some internal ground loops that are really hard to get rid of unless you were to (properly) integrate a preamp section into the unit as well.
Joy.
Joy.
So long as the supply can provide a stiff DC voltage (i.e. it has enough current capability) to all four amps at once and the amps are reasonably insensitive to small supply variations (good PSRR), there's no problem at all using a single supply for all of them.
Nothing prevents placing a potentiometer at the input of each amplifier....
That will control the volume
That will control the volume
The two channels of most stereo amplifiers share the same supply. Not ideal, but it works well enough.
In fact, A/V receiver manufacturers are cramming 7 or even 9 power amps into one enclosure. It needs to be done properly though.
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