Nice job!
One day semiconductors will be "old school" and people will post about how they built an amplifier using mosfets instead of quantum cheerios or whatever we will have in the future.
Typically FETs aren't use in audio applications because of the low voltage gains. BJTs are more common in hi-fi applications! Just an FYI
I said typically, not never. Considering the same amplifier with the same supply voltage you can get almost double the power out of a bipolar amp setup due to the low voltage gains associated with fet based amps. A typically fet based amp usually has considerable preamping to pump out its operating power.
Nice. Was it a kit or did you design it from scratch?
For alot of good audio projects:
http://sound.westhost.com/projects.htm
For alot of good audio projects:
http://sound.westhost.com/projects.htm
Yea, im working on a couple of his projects ATM. The hifi preamp and the phono stage to be exact. But im not going to purchase his PCB's...gona go the whole perf board route again
Nice. Was it a kit or did you design it from scratch?
All i had to start with was a circuit diagram, and some pics from people who built similar units, so no not a kit..lol
As well, i couldn't match the same components (namely the output transformers) that were spec'd in the circuit diagram, so it required some research and modification.
As for the circuit board layout, case layout and wiring...thats all me
I have over 100 pics...lol...a lot of them were me just laying out the components on the top of the case to get the look right. Took me about 2 days to plan out where everything would go up top, mark with pencil, get the angles and distances just right..ect, and drill
It was my biggest project to date....no templates, no drill guide, nothing pre-assembled....it was truly from scratch!
Though i did receive a lot of help from sites like diyaudio and diyaudioprojects. The basis for my amp, as well as the circuit diagram is from diyaudioprojects from a design done by Bruce Heran
Typically FETs aren't use in audio applications because of the low voltage gains. BJTs are more common in hi-fi applications! Just an FYI
QuoteTypically FETs aren't use in audio applications because of the low voltage gains. BJTs are more common in hi-fi applications! Just an FYIPretty much every modern design I have seen uses MOSFETs for the output. What's amazing is how it's possible to put power MOSFETs capable of 600W on the same silicon as a low voltage Delta Sigma modulator. ( http://focus.ti.com/docs/prod/folders/print/tas5630.html ) I would think that process differences would make that very tricky!
And here's my new amplifier design: http://ecorenovator.org/forum/appliances-gadgets/984-allie-moore-ihybrid-40-next-generation-ti-hybrid-digital.html . I bet that in 10-20 years, that technology would be considered ancient and I'll have a nice story to tell by then.
EDIT: I have experimented using display tubes as amplifiers. They are cool to look at and quite interesting to play with, but I'll stick to semiconductors for actual use.
I love valve gear, even my CD player is valve, a Musical Fidelity CDT ''Frog Eye'' Class A Single Ended Triode.
I love valve gear, even my CD player is valve, a Musical Fidelity CDT ''Frog Eye'' Class A Single Ended Triode.
When I first read that, I entertained the idea of the entire thing being valve, DAC and all
I bet we see that someday on makezine/hackaday on a steampunk hifi.
Now that is something I would love to see, if I remember rightly the very first digital computer was valve and used to decode Nazi cyphered messages during the 2nd world war.
Vinyl beats any CD player hands down in my opinion though, I think CD is a step backwards as far as sound quality is concerned and I fart in the general direction of MP3.
Now that is something I would love to see, if I remember rightly the very first digital computer was valve and used to decode Nazi cyphered messages during the 2nd world war.The Bombe was mechanical, and used for cracking Enigma messages. The first digital computer was the ENIAC I think, and was indeed all tubes.Vinyl beats any CD player hands down in my opinion though, I think CD is a step backwards as far as sound quality is concerned and I fart in the general direction of MP3.How about an all tubes MP3 player? The tubes might compensate for the digital crap . It might need something more complex than the ENIAC, though, to do real-time MP3 decoding.
I like your design NiHaoMike, that's how I build these days, use discarded parts except for the main drive elements, why pay for support electronics when much is free and in the trash?
For your design 'Allie Moore', have you tried to check its specs? Its frequency response? Its distortion? At its rated output?
The thing about MP3 is that it is ''lossy'' compression, you lose dynamics. I got turned back onto vinyl because I wanted to buy an album and it was only available on vinyl (Andy Summers-XYZ) so I needed something to play it on and rip it to my PC, a friend gave me a Technics Hi-Fi system complete with turntable and when that needle hit the vinyl it was like an angel sticking its tongue in my ear. I hadn't listened to vinyl for over 20 years and now I understand why DJs use vinyl, the dynamics are awesome and the warm musical sound pisses on any CD player.
The frequency response is pretty flat over the 20Hz-20kHz band, not sure exactly since I don't have an oscilloscope yet. ("She sounds great to me, but I'll check her out with a Rigol to be sure.") As for distortion, I had to alter the inductors during design. The "black" cores (from some old DC/DC converters) performed extremely well for efficiency but were much too nonlinear for general use. The "white/yellow" cores (from some old computer speakers) is slightly worse for efficiency but were much more linear. I haven't done much testing at full rated output except with some dummy load resistors.