Concentrate on improving your vinyl TT passion may benefit you more lah!.

Contrary to popular belief, caps take time to run in. I changed lots of china capacitors in my subwoofer to Panasonic FC's and the improvement wasn't immediate. Having said that, change to boutique caps is no guarantee of improvement. Its installing the right type of cap at the important part of the circuit that'll contribute to improvement.
BTW, those brand caps you mentioned are more suitable and beneficial for tube amplifiers...not T-amp.

This post has been edited by bsl555: Nov 28 2008, 01:12 AM

Improve the sound? .. replacing to bigger sized resistors and caps is in practice, dirtying up the sound and increasing the distortion figures.

Errr.. you can get unlucky on other components too..like other value resistors accidently mixed up with the actual values you want. Thats why I bring my own multimeter and magnifying glass. My eyesight ain't all that good nowadays.

Ah..its always normal proceedure for me to check properly before paying. I would hate going there just to get a replacement. BTW, almost every shop I've been would allow you the most inaccurate or malfunctioning meter for your checking. Cheh!. Bring my own and trust it!

How to trust lah?. The meters (referring to analog ones) are so inaccurate or may not deflect to full scale (due to weak batteries). You go try and you tell me. Those meters are there perhaps for formality.

What exactly did you replace it with, different value, no?

Positive cap terminal to Pin 36. Negative terminal to Pin 33.
Hope that helps.

This post has been edited by bsl555: Dec 4 2008, 10:16 PM

Good job YC. The passive pot to the PCB is certainly an advantage compared to an external passive pot patched with 1m interconnects. Yours will cut the crap and much shorter signal path. I always believe in the shortest signal path where possible.

Heh!.. their boards cost only 5 meals. Its perhaps busting it up won't hurt the pocket to acquire another one for another hack session.

Oh really?.. I've seen many commercial amps with JP type pots and they're just as great sounding. Its quite true that Alps blue have a more accurate (because its logarithmic type) and heavier feel that makes one think the sound has improved a lot. I too can fall for that.
I sometimes wonder who is Alps biggest consumer of this item as I've only seen this very very rarely in commercial amps.

This post has been edited by bsl555: Dec 25 2008, 12:34 PM

Actually a well designed PC PSU can be used, subject to some mods, refinements and conditions.
1. Reputable brand thats not with missing parts inside (EMI filter components)
2. Remove parts of the circuit that output other misc voltages that you'd not use. You've to know the PSU circuitry of course and what to remove.
3. Change the DC output cables to a pair of thicker gauge ones.
4. Beef up the DC output circuitry with better parts and values.
There's other things you can do, afterall if the PSU is already FOC, its all to your savings.
I'm confident yoru FOC PSU after modding can likely outperform the Meanwell PSU, except the PC PSU is more bulky and there's a fan too.
Your choice.


This post has been edited by bsl555: Jan 3 2009, 01:42 AM

Heh!.. need I say if you're always on the look out for the fun factor, nothing is really too much work.
Anyone got a BUSTED but BRANDED Coolermaster, Antec, Corsair 500W PSU to give me?.. I'll gladly accept it and of course I mod it and its for MY keeps??...

This post has been edited by bsl555: Jan 3 2009, 01:56 AM

Can! can!. I hope it won't be a daunting task to revive them first.

PSU's are mostly run of the mill stuff and perhaps middle quality at best. Just that the current output is adequate for current PC requirements. You're not going to find usable resistors, IC's, transistors or the capacitors which are mostly sourced from China and brands you've not heard of. They're built to borderline architecture and will fail in good time.
You want really good parts from PC related peripherals, gut your CRT monitor, especially the older models.

This post has been edited by bsl555: Jan 3 2009, 11:40 PM

Line it all up on a thick black spectacles in flashing mode, raise eyebrows and blink the eyes at you???

Hey Jazzy, Actually someone really DID that!.. and flashed the specs at the big boss, when he was coincidently summoned from a fancy dress party. He also wore a Chinese skull cap with a false long pigtail. BTW, he was an Irishman. Imagine an Irishman dressed like that, and facing the chinaman boss!...hahahahah!.
Sorry if it was off topic.

Geez.. shouldn't have spray painted the knob...looks wierd if you ask me, nevertheless your preference lah.
I've got my own 2k paint spray gun and compressor and maybe economical if spraying many items but its bloody hazardous to the lungs and spraying 1 or 2 small items including all that trouble may not make economical sense.
The paint costs some RM30 for half litre from a specialized auto paint shop and the special thinner is another RM25. Go do the maths.
A well equipped motorbike shop does offer spray painting, AFAIK. They respray custom colors for owner's bike visible painted components.

A higher PSU for any amplifier is seldom an "overkill". It matters most of how clean the DC output which noise, ripple and stability which are undesirable. Well design amps are bulky and heavy because of the weight of transformer and PSU. Surely they don't do this for fun. They could have put in any old SMPS PSU if they didn't care. SMPS is mostly meant for industrial applications and of course a cheap alternative for audio DIY'er. 3 Amps PSU is bare minimum.

So many types of SMPS can be found at Pasar Rd shops at affordable prices. Just a matter whether reliable or not. SMPS or any switch mode PSU are most prone to breakdown compared to traditional tranny types. Like your PC PSU lah.. all switching PSU's.

This post has been edited by bsl555: Feb 2 2009, 04:25 PM