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Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

naughtycomputer.uk

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Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#351

Post by ohithereyou »

wilsonnb3 wrote: post #199
013a wrote: post #156

I have a pair of powered studio monitors (Mackie MR5), and I completely relate to this problem. Many PCs and phones will emit an audible hissing noise while plugged in. I've tested on a dozen different devices, with integrated and external DACs, five hundred dollar sound cards, massively shielded cables, practically every modern OS you can name, tweaking every audio setting exposed to me. The only devices that work p…

Except you’re leaving out all the positives and only focusing on the negatives. Sure, Google can revoke my access to a movie at any time but I can watch on any of my devices and I dont have to worry about finding it in stock at the local store. I can carry literally thousands of books with me in a device smaller than a paperback. I can’t stream lossless music from Spotify but I can stream high enough quality that mos…

>Not to mention you get access to pretty much every song you want for 10$ a month.

If you listen to mainstream shit where the artist does not have enough control of their work to opt out of the scam that is the pay scale for streaming music.

I have had to resort to ripping vinyl and CDs from my collection to get digital versions of tracks that Spotify, Apple Music, and Google Music do not have. If I had to do it all over again, I'd keep the vinyl and CDs in the box and just grab the music from somewhere like REDacted instead.

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#352

Post by 013a »

wilsonnb3 wrote: post #199
013a wrote: post #156

I have a pair of powered studio monitors (Mackie MR5), and I completely relate to this problem. Many PCs and phones will emit an audible hissing noise while plugged in. I've tested on a dozen different devices, with integrated and external DACs, five hundred dollar sound cards, massively shielded cables, practically every modern OS you can name, tweaking every audio setting exposed to me. The only devices that work p…

Except you’re leaving out all the positives and only focusing on the negatives. Sure, Google can revoke my access to a movie at any time but I can watch on any of my devices and I dont have to worry about finding it in stock at the local store. I can carry literally thousands of books with me in a device smaller than a paperback. I can’t stream lossless music from Spotify but I can stream high enough quality that mos…

It worries me that you believe there's a natural conflation between the genuinely valuable services products like Kindle offer, and the specific business model of purchasing ephemeral licenses to media content. Kindle, Google Play, iTunes, whatever; they're amazing services that provide a lot of value. But that value could still be conveyed if the products they offered didn't have additional restrictions beyond those restrictions already present on physical media.

I'm not going full RMS here and saying DRM is evil. I'm just saying that: I should be able to loan digital content to other people. I shouldn't be afraid that Apple will, one day, just say "I know you really enjoyed spending $200 on all that media, but its all gone. See ya." Maybe that means they need to offer downloads of the content, or maybe it means we need legislation which says we can sue the hell out of them when they try it. I have no preference. But consumers need more protection.

Also its worth clarifying: I don't hold subscription services to the same standards. That's a different business model.

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#353

Post by korethr »

If he's able to get that much of an improvement with 5532s, I'm curious what he could get if he used modern opamps. Granted, the 5532 has been the opamp to beat for sound quality for decades, but someone posting by the handle NwAvGuy dis a shootout of opamps comparing and measuring the specs that actually matter for quality audio use back in 2011[1]. That was 7 years ago, and the various component vendors have released some new devices since. I suspect a slight redesign using a 2068 for the gain stage and a 4556 for the buffers would do even better, and drain the batteries slower because of less quiescent current of modern devices.

The circuit design looks weird to me. Wouldn't it be better to use a inverting setup on the opamp to get get some attenuation, and then feed the gain stages into a high-current opamp like the 4556 as a buffer to drive the headphones, or perhaps a transistor that'd be good at the job? And why are there a pair of parallel gain stages on the ground line? Why not just throw your gain stages on the signal lines, ground ground and let it be ground?

1. https://nwavguy.blogspot.com/2011/08/op-amp-measurements.htm...

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#354

Post by 013a »

nine_k wrote: post #327
013a wrote: post #156

I have a pair of powered studio monitors (Mackie MR5), and I completely relate to this problem. Many PCs and phones will emit an audible hissing noise while plugged in. I've tested on a dozen different devices, with integrated and external DACs, five hundred dollar sound cards, massively shielded cables, practically every modern OS you can name, tweaking every audio setting exposed to me. The only devices that work p…

Wat. > we're puking web and electron everywhere ... literally only because developers are lazy No. This is done because developers are slow and expensive. Reusing most of your web app as a desktop app, same for every platform, saves a lot of money to companies. > you're consistently asked to pay a monthly fee to access this functionality literally only because companies are lazy No. This is because companies want rec…

Businesses are inherently lazy. Business shrewdness and laziness are literally the same thing; businesses always take the easiest path to the greatest profit. "Lazy" just means "unwilling to expend energy".

Let's say Dow Chemical wants to start dumping chemical by-products into the Mississippi River. Thankfully, we have the EPA and strict laws which make this impossible. The only other force which would stop them from doing this is consumer outrage, which only works in some situations and even then tends to be very fleeting.

Now, let's say Slack wants to build their app in Electron. By doing so, they are collectively forcing their 8M users to burn more CPU cycles and purchase machines with larger memory footprints, all of which literally waste resources and cause pollution. Not to the same degree as the previous example, but the comparison is very valid.

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#355

Post by korethr »

mindslight wrote: post #215

IMHO your circuit topology looks wacky. Perhaps there's a goal to making your amplifier ground ride in the middle of the waveform, but it could just as well be unintentional. So my immediate thoughts - You've already got a real split supply with 2x 9v batteries. If you use that instead of deriving a virtual ground, you will save 9mA of quiescent current. How purposeful is that whole low side duplicated circuit and wh…

What I'm wondering is why the 1k resistors in the power supply. Wouldn't 100k, 1M or 10M resistors drastically cut the idle current consumption? Or would that compromise the performance of the opamps by choking them off from the current they need?

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#356

Post by madengr »

korethr wrote: post #353

If he's able to get that much of an improvement with 5532s, I'm curious what he could get if he used modern opamps. Granted, the 5532 has been the opamp to beat for sound quality for decades, but someone posting by the handle NwAvGuy dis a shootout of opamps comparing and measuring the specs that actually matter for quality audio use back in 2011[1]. That was 7 years ago, and the various component vendors have releas…

Maybe he’d be better off just using a transformer. Don’t these high end headphones have a high impedance?

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#357

Post by kwccoin »

@13a note this “... (2) every single Apple product.” work but not PC and phones. Consistent with the article trying both Android and Linux ... Consistent with image that Apple is in the A/V world. Just wonder there are exception e.g. would Sony (a multimedia company) would have the same problem.

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#358

Post by Declanomous »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #339
jstarfish wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those aren't positives. It does nobody any good to have 1000 books on a single device if the whole thing is subject to revocation, especially when you paid full retail price for the privilege of being allowed to read it. This is regression. Previously you paid your $10 and received a paper book. You could read it, re-read it, lend it, sell it, or burn it for warmth. You owned it for as long as you kept it dehydrated.…

It does nobody any good to have 1000 books on a single device if the whole thing is subject to revocation, especially when you paid full retail price for the privilege of being allowed to read it. This is regression. What? You can still buy the paperback book, tons of my kindle books are $10 or less, and it very clearly benefits me , which is why I buy tons of Kindle books.

You don't own the book itself though, you own a license to the book. The doctrine of first sale does not apply, and they can revoke your license at any time.

They have revoked licenses in the past and deleted books from people's devices. I know you have a physical file that contains the book, but that file is secured with DRM.

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#359

Post by korethr »

madengr wrote: post #356
korethr wrote: post #353

If he's able to get that much of an improvement with 5532s, I'm curious what he could get if he used modern opamps. Granted, the 5532 has been the opamp to beat for sound quality for decades, but someone posting by the handle NwAvGuy dis a shootout of opamps comparing and measuring the specs that actually matter for quality audio use back in 2011[1]. That was 7 years ago, and the various component vendors have releas…

Maybe he’d be better off just using a transformer. Don’t these high end headphones have a high impedance?

Depends on the headphones. Some have higher impedances, some have lower ones. Transformers bring their own complexities into the circuit.

Re: Do I really need to get out the soldering-iron again?

#360

Post by Declanomous »

ohithereyou wrote: post #351
wilsonnb3 wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except you’re leaving out all the positives and only focusing on the negatives. Sure, Google can revoke my access to a movie at any time but I can watch on any of my devices and I dont have to worry about finding it in stock at the local store. I can carry literally thousands of books with me in a device smaller than a paperback. I can’t stream lossless music from Spotify but I can stream high enough quality that mos…

>Not to mention you get access to pretty much every song you want for 10$ a month. If you listen to mainstream shit where the artist does not have enough control of their work to opt out of the scam that is the pay scale for streaming music. I have had to resort to ripping vinyl and CDs from my collection to get digital versions of tracks that Spotify, Apple Music, and Google Music do not have. If I had to do it all…

I ripped all my CDs at one point, realized it was a pain in the ass, deleted all of them, and then redownloaded them from Oink.cd/What.cd.

I stopped buying albums for a while, because I have a Google play music subscription, but a couple albums I really liked were deleted from the service recently. I had "added them to my library", understanding that I didn't own them, but I never expected them to get pulled from the service.

I'm getting pretty sick of Google Play shenanigans altogether. I'm probably going back to ripping my own music because the streaming services suck, and oink/what are shut down.

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