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donsachs

Responses from donsachs

300b lovers
Yes, you do star grounding, and you always do "sub" stars for each stage.  At least that is how I do it.....  
300b lovers
if you can fit a toroid in there, then look at the antek site.  They have small filament transformers and may have what you want.  AN0205 is 25VA with dual 5V windings so will give you 2.5 A x 2.   They are fine for what you want.  they also sell ... 
300b lovers
Much appreciated.  I will investigate further.  Vinnie is a well respected designer of note.   cheers, don  
300b lovers
@bcurtis1 I looked that piece up.  It has absolutely no tubes of any sort in it at all.  Can you enlighten me?  Did I miss something?  
300b lovers
Yes, it is quite surprising how sensitive these two circuits are to parts choices.  Much more so than any I have ever worked with.  I am used to coupling cap differences, and I have my favourite types, but there are several film caps in here that ... 
300b lovers
Actually, I have already improved the preamp considerably with a few subtle changes, and the power amps will get improvements to the power supply with the larger case, as well as higher quality and physically larger film caps in what we now know a... 
300b lovers
@alexberger Consider using the tube rectifier for the front half of the amp and good diodes for the 300b.   Do a C-L-C for each and use a good film cap as the last one after the choke.   Separate power supplies allow the input and driver tubes to ... 
300b lovers
Yes we all have different tastes.  I would say the Lynn and I overlap considerably.  When we discussed our favourite rooms at the PAF we were in general agreement.  I stand by what I said a million pages back in this thread.  If I were to magicall... 
300b lovers
@atmasphere  Yes we agree.  If you cannot drive a loudspeaker in a normal room to adequate levels with 60 watts/ch, then you really need to reconsider your speaker choice! The least efficient speaker I ever owned was a pair of Joseph Audio RM25s... 
300b lovers
@atmasphere Please don't think I was implying that "tube watts" are somehow louder than "SS watts".  Just that I have heard both driving speakers and straining and I know which I would prefer to listen to when driven hard.   When I was building th... 
300b lovers
The above, in a nutshell, is why tube amps behave very differently at clipping than SS amps. It is why, with the right speaker of course, that a 60 watt tube amp can sound like it has the drive of a 200 watt SS amp, and especially why these 300b m... 
300b lovers
This is where my good friend Lynn and I disagree:)   I have heard my Lampi Pacific in the same system as the May (which Lynn doesn't favor).  I have heard various tube based DACs, the Schiit Yggy and a few others for SS, and the Pacific is in a di... 
300b lovers
@alexberger  I don't use tube rectifiers in power amps, but I do use them in preamps.  In your amp, if you wish to keep the 5u4g, I would consider using it for the input and driver section and using good quality diodes to drive a separate power s... 
300b lovers
@lewinskih01 I have experimented for years with tube preamps.   When I built the Raven preamp it was after I had sent the 300b monos down to Spatial Audio for the Seattle show.  Then I built the matching preamp.  They were able to run the mono amp... 
300b lovers
@antigrunge2 Yes, IT is known as an excellent way of coupling, but it is expensive for very good ITs, and also they take far more physical space than your typical coupling cap.  So most vintage tube amps use RC coupling due to cost and size consid...