sometimes kits have such high price that it makes no sense wasting time assembling.
For the love of...kits?
My foray into audio began with speakers, then amps, and other components. Subs and room acoustics came next. And so on.
Early on, trying to find good sound meant doing a lot of research about brands and, to the degree possible, about the designs and parts used by better components.
Upgrading my stuff came next -- improving capacitors, volume pots, and other aspects of my gear. I’m lucky to have an amazing tech and builder in town. He’s been a godsend.
I have largely shifted away from the new market. If I do make changes, it’s nearly always buying and selling used. I sold some stuff, bought other stuff, compared and contrasted.
The tech mentioned above has sold me one amazing preamp and has loaned me a number of great pieces he’s built, either from kits or DIY. These have included an autoformer preamp, solid state preamp (based around a Burson buffer) and a really impressive Hypex-based Class D amp. All these units look nice enough, but not fancy. But, they’re dead quiet and have all the inputs and outputs you could want or need. Recently, he also loaned me quite a sweet little headphone amp. Also, quite amazing.
Yesterday, I purchased an Akitika GT-102 amplifier for a mere $450 on USAM. It’s hugely upgraded and I’m beginning to listen to it -- comparing it to my Pass XA-25 (as Herb Reichert did a while back) and my Quicksilver Mono 60’s.
I’m not sure, but I’m starting to get the distinct feeling that if one knows which DIY stuff to buy, which kits, the path to really amazing sound is not necessarily that expensive. In other words, a little knowledge can save a lot of money.
I’ll be looking at speaker kits, next.
This is not to say that DIY or kits replaces most of the finely made and researched gear out there. Rather, that for someone looking for the best sound for the money, they could do a lot worse than (a) really smart used shopping and (b) used kits or DIY kits of higher quality (such as Pass’s Amp Camp stuff, or the Akitika kit I just got, assembled).
Over and out.
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- 33 posts total
Do it if you can make it happen. Its fun. My prior project set I used for 5+ years and later re-sold low cost to a friend utilized same/similar drivers as the Thiel’s CS 2.2 had. Tried 2-way, 2.5 way setups, with various bi-amp combos with all SS amps, or Tube & SS amps, and then adding separate subwoofers later too. You’ll learn a lot. Buddy called me to today sharing how he is still enjoying those speakers with his tube amp and tube dac setup fwiw. |
The kits from diyAudio are excellent. Step by step illustrated instructions for many amps and preamps. Most are Pass/First Watt designs generously shared with the diy community. And if you have the online forums if you run into trouble. I did my first because I could only learn so much about circuits by reading. When you building it part by part, it starts to make sense. |
Love my Korg Triode B1 line stage (linked). Really amazing and you can dial in just the right amount of distortion for your tastes by adjusting the bias. I also built the F5 amp (kit no longer available but they do have circuit boards and parts packages). Very nice with relatively efficient speakers like the Pi Speaker model 4 I built. The least costly way to get true top of the line stereo performance. I could happily live with Weiss DAC204 > B1 Korg > F5 > Pi Model 4 (current setup for that stereo). The only thing lacking is remote control volume but an experienced hobbyist could easily add that option. As always, thanks to Nelson Pass for his incredible generosity of knowledge. |
- 33 posts total