71–80 of 270 posts
How would one best control the output volume on such a DIY amp? 2-channel logarithmic 10K potentiometer in front of both inputs? What if you use balanced input?
http://sound.whsites.net/project30a.htm
You can easily insert a volume control right after such a stage.
It is refreshing to see these types of articles. Of all disciplines of human interests and hobbies, Audiophiles are one of the most stubborn, misinformed, anecdotal and delusional bunch. Of course I am generalizing, but every time I engage in a discussion about audio quality, it is a losing battle. Not because of lack of data or supporting evidence, but because of the fundamental dissent for data driven arguments. Yo…
Of course they’re anecdotal - listening to music is a subjective experience. If someone really thinks their music sounds better after adding $100 cable lifters and taping $50 bags of rocks to their $10,000 system, they are automatically correct . Their ears, their hobby. It would be like saying that something can’t work because it’s a placebo - even if all they’re getting is a sugar pill, if the symptoms went away, t…
Instead what you have is not placebo effect, but perceived value effect.
After working in high-end audio for many years it became apparent that the (high) price tag was in fact the benefit.
Some people just want what there neighbor cannot afford.
Any DAC chip and some usb interface for it that you could recommend to go with this? And slightly OT, but does anybody know any ABX test of balanced input/output signal? I find it hard to believe that there is a single person who can hear the difference.
I've heard of cases where you could receive AM radio stations from such a setup; I lean towards "urban legend" for that though. While it seems theoretically possible (since many amplifier topologies can have resonance when fed signals outside their expected operating range), it seems a bit farfetched to actually end up with intelligible audio.
It is refreshing to see these types of articles. Of all disciplines of human interests and hobbies, Audiophiles are one of the most stubborn, misinformed, anecdotal and delusional bunch. Of course I am generalizing, but every time I engage in a discussion about audio quality, it is a losing battle. Not because of lack of data or supporting evidence, but because of the fundamental dissent for data driven arguments. Yo…
Much of this is cultural driven by a historical time when we didn't have the tools to measure this stuff, and reproduction was so bad that nearly anything that changed the sound in any way could be argued to be an improvement. Those days are long gone, but the culture remains. Getting good sound out of an old victrola--which were very expensive--truly is an art. Getting passable sound out of today's average off-the-s…
I'm probably the only one with this opinion...but I sure miss the old days of tube amps that weren't able to be highly accurate. They would roll-off the on the high end, distort a bit all over, and gave a very warm and relaxing feel to the albums I played obsessively. Now I've owned high-end tube and solid-state gear, and the music hasn't sounded good for decades. Combine that with the very limited bits provided by C…
16 bits gives you 96dB SNR (and subjectively more with dithering), which is plenty at non-deafening listening volumes. It's more than even the highest quality vinyl ever had. High bit depth is mostly useful so you've got some headroom during editing.
I don't know much when it comes to audio amp design, but this reminds me greatly of the O2 headphone amp[0] - that anecdotally a few of my friends have soldered for their personal use. [0] http://nwavguy.blogspot.com/2011/07/o2-headphone-amp.html
I thought of the same thing. Both are inexpensive, straightforward, no-BS projects that leverage the advances made in electronics over the years to deliver quality audio. If I made one of these, I 'd be tempted to put an ODAC and O2 board in the same chassis to have a complete amplifier.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Your generalisation is unfair. Most Audiophiles just want to listen to music the way the artists intended. This is not easy in a industry where colouring the sound is even celebrated, e.g. 'Beats by Dre'. I recently tried the latest noise cancelling headphones by Sony (1000XM3). The noise cancelling was excellent, but the bass was +5db overblown, boomy and drowned out most of the mids, the treble was dark to hide the…
As far a noise sound quality for cancelling wireless closed headphones go, the Sony's are the best along with Sennheiser Momentum 2.0 on-ear. There are of course much better headphones, and I wouldn't call them audiophile headphones, but I haven't found other wireless ones that do noise-cancelling and isolation as well and still manage to sound acceptable.
It is refreshing to see these types of articles. Of all disciplines of human interests and hobbies, Audiophiles are one of the most stubborn, misinformed, anecdotal and delusional bunch. Of course I am generalizing, but every time I engage in a discussion about audio quality, it is a losing battle. Not because of lack of data or supporting evidence, but because of the fundamental dissent for data driven arguments. Yo…
Of course they’re anecdotal - listening to music is a subjective experience. If someone really thinks their music sounds better after adding $100 cable lifters and taping $50 bags of rocks to their $10,000 system, they are automatically correct . Their ears, their hobby. It would be like saying that something can’t work because it’s a placebo - even if all they’re getting is a sugar pill, if the symptoms went away, t…
I don't have a $10k system, or anything close to it, but yes, my system that I put together for about $1000 is way way way way better than what you're listening onm because I care enough to have a good external DAC, and feed that into a good amp paired with either a set of decent used speakers or one of a couple of sets of good headphones.
No "cable lifters" in sight.
Any DAC chip and some usb interface for it that you could recommend to go with this? And slightly OT, but does anybody know any ABX test of balanced input/output signal? I find it hard to believe that there is a single person who can hear the difference.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I have some questions. My son has been taking guitar lessons using a classic guitar. Using the advice of his instructor we are getting him a begginer's electric guitar for christmas. We also need to get him an amp. Is the amp in this article the same kind of amp that you could plug an electric guitar into? I know nothing about music or instruments, but I do know about electronics so I was thinking it might be fun to…
While you probably could use an amplifier like this for guitar, you usually wouldn't want to unless it's being used for acoustic guitar or vocals. The reason being, an electric guitar amplifier is going to add a lot of character to the guitar tone that you actually would want, where as an amplifier like this is going to strive for a perfect clean reproduction of the original audio. This is why a lot of guitar players…