n_maher

Well, with the sale of my single-ended Beta today I will be officially launching into balanced-beta land shortly. My wallet weeps.

I'm certainly no authority on this as honestly I've never tried to roll ground channel opamps to see if there was a difference. Based on what I've read there is good motivation to use as good an opamp (if not better actually) in the ground channel. There are some interesting discussions on the three channel topology at Headwize if you're looking to learn more. In short, my advice, use the 627. If you don't have one post a WTB thread at Head-fi, you can usually pick one up for about 50% of retail without too much difficulty.

You rock, Salty.

Please, please, please someone submit this to the headphone price guide on Head-Fi.

I spent about 3 months with an HA-1 MKII at work alongside a tricked out PIMETA and preferred the PIMETA by a fair margin. If you're ever wanting an amp like that again I'd see if you can't get MisterX to build you a PIMETA/Alien DAC combo. I seriously miss having that setup at work and will probably build another one like it one of these days.

Yup, just tried to head over there and send someone a PM with a progress report. The Fi no worky.

One other thing worth noting, the money you spend on mods is likely money that you'll have a pretty hard time recouping later on where something like a DAC is going to maintain much better value. Not that you ever buy equipment with the idea of selling it but it's not something that I ignore either unless I'm comfortable with the loss.

Just one alternate suggestion, why not upgrade the DAC to something like a DA220 and have the option of going balanced? I don't know about any one else but I find myself listening to less and less redbook stuff and using my squeezebox or PC as my source. What can I say, I'm lazy but if I were spending money it'd be focused or more flexibility. That's just me though.

Just in case anyone didn't see this elsewhere: I'm currently running a group buy for the e22 backplane pcb's that can be used with a beta build. See Headwize or "that other headphone site" if you'd like more info. And I'd third the recommendation of the Mogami cable, I've used it for all my current interconnects as well as a few recables and have no complaints. Well, it is a bit stiff for headphone cable but strip the jacket and shield and it works ok.

Reks, FTW!

sniff sniff Do I smell the next Head-Fi sponsor?

My addition to your musings would be that I find it funny/frustrating/odd how amps get pigeon holed into only being good for one kind of headphones. Unless there is justification related to output impedance (or similar) I just don't see why a good amp wouldn't sound good with lots of different headphones.

If that's the case one of the my big summer projects is to build an extension off of my back deck. Space is a little tight now so I'm going to add 4' in one direction and 3' in the other. Should be able to bang that out in a couple days. My dad and I built a shed last summer when I found out that HD/Lowes wanted about 5 grand for what I could build for $1500. It has doors now, but that's pretty much it.

I've received multiple items from overseas and never had to pay anything regardless of the shipper, I guess I've just been lucky.

That's pretty much what I did.

Busy weekend... I also got the sigma22 built for my DAC which means that I might get to fire that up for the first time in a week or so... YIKES!

Back on the topic on the Tiny Singlepower... There are a few interesting comments coming out in the most recent Florida Meet thread. Jp#'s gives it a pretty good bitchslap and everyone else has precious little good to say about it (which really speaks volumes) other than the fact that it runs hotter than a bastard. Choice quote for the banned among us:

The TREAD. The M3 could potentially pull enough current that if you're dropping a lot of voltage the stock heatsink might not be enough. You could of course go with a lower voltage wallwart (like 20VAC) which would give you a maximum output of closer to 24V which is a pretty happy number. What opamps are you thinking of running?

Do yourself a favor and at least toss a TREAD on the output of whatever wallwart you use. If it were me (for an M?) I'd use a 24VAC wallwart with a TREAD set to 26V or higher depending on the opamps you're going to use. You might need a larger heatsink for the M?.

Ugh, you really want that list... ok, here goes. The Defintes (currently underway) 1. Balanced DAC of unmentionable origin with a sigma22 power supply operating at +/-12V, the DAC is done, the power supply isn't. 2. Sigma11 power supply for SB3 (for me, finally). 3. Sigma11 for SB3 (for a friend). 4. Sigma11 for Apogee MiniDAC (again, for a friend). 5. Hagerman Bugle - the board has been populated for 6 months and I just need to case it up. Some day, some day. The Maybes (some big maybe, some small maybe) 1. Balanced Beta22 - this is pending the outcome of the balanced DAC, if the DAC works as well as hoped this will quickly become a definite. 2. Aikido - I've had all the parts for this project for the past year almost and still haven't started it. Before I had too much going on, now I have the Wheatfield which quite frankly I'm not sure I ever want to part with so the Aikido once again gets shuffled to the back burner. It hurts my head bad to have $600 worth of parts sitting in a box gathering dust. 3. Further modification of the Wheatfield. I've mildly tweaked this amp already but if I can coax some more suggestions out of Pete I might have another go at it. Or I might make the great leap and try to PTP a new one. That's all I can think of now, although I'm sure there is stuff that I'm forgetting about.

Of course you can ask, it's a 1455N1601. Nope, it's a Avel Lindberg Y236001 (for 5V output). At higher output voltages (bigger trafo) you might want to seriously consider a bigger case. I'm not saying that you couldn't fit more in the case only that it already takes a bit of planning to do. It's a little more expensive than the STEPS in my case. I'd put a STEPS at around $100 and the σ11 around $125. I'm sure in both cases you can build them for less, but that's a fair ballpark. There are pros and cons to both power supplies and neither is a bad choice. I think technically the σ11 has lower output ripple but the STEPS is pretty damn low to begin with. Being the glutton for punishment that I am I'm actually working on three σ11's right now and another σ22. Lord have mercy on my wallet.

Thanks man, I'll look into that tube. The good thingi about 6080's is they're pretty cheap (generally speaking). I like the NOS RCA that I've got in there now. In bad news it would appear that the 6528A that I got is unhappy. I put in the amp last night, powered it up and it makes this occasional pinging sound. It's like of like the sound your car's engine might make while cooling off. I let it go for a little while hoping that it was just the tube warming up but it kept going for 20min. at which point I shut it down for fear of damaging the amp. I'm hopeful that I'll be able to return it otherwise I just flushed ~$65. Grrrr.

Well, my Wheatfield tube sampler arrived today from Radio Electronic Supply so I now have all of Pete's recommended output tubes. Included was a Tung Sol 6528A, TS 7236, RCA 6080, TS 5998 and an RCA 6AS7G, wuhoo!

Sure, just paypal me the shipping, $1000 should cover it.

I've heard stories of reviewers holding gear hostage and can't imagine how frustrating that must be for manufacturers. Don't sell product unless you loan gear out for review, send gear out for review and risk never getting it back. Reason number 643 not to become an electronics manufacturer.