john_tracy
Responses from john_tracy
| K&K phono break-in period 250-300 hours will get you 95% of the way. 500 hours will get you another 3%. That last 2% will happen after ~1000 hours. At last count there are 20 Lundahl signal transformers in my system! I am well acquainted with the break-in drill. And yes, K... | |
| 6922 6DJ8 or 12 AX7 tubes better for preamp? None of the above. | |
| the best kt88 tube there is available? My bad. I went home and looked at the boxes again and they were marked KT-120. I guess old age must be rotting my brain. ;-) | |
| the best kt88 tube there is available? I have two matched quads and the boxes are CLEARLY marked ST-120. | |
| the best kt88 tube there is available? There's a new tube on the block you might consider. New Sensor just released their new ST-120 tube. It's like a KT-88 on steroids. 65W plate dissapation! I have a pair of DIY PP Parallel mono-blocks that run the output tubes at 60mA class A1. It k... | |
| What phono preamps are balanced Sonas Veritas Venice - Kevin Carter of K&K Audio's latest effort at "State of the Art". Fully balanced differential circuitry input to output. | |
| What Makes a Good RIAA or Line Stage? I don't have the patience to read this whole thread, so this may already have been addressed: high capacitance PSs charge "faster", not slower than low capacitance PSs. That is, unless there is some series resistance between them and the rectifier... | |
| Using XLR for Phono out Manufacturers do it because SE is cheaper (half the number of parts ;-) ). In phono preamps, designers have traditionally used SE architecture because adding the other half for balanced will increase the inherent circuit noise. That would be a goo... | |
| Using XLR for Phono out Lewm, if you feed a balanced signal to a transformer and the primary winding is either "floating" or wired balanced (CT grounded), you will have CMR even if the secondary is wired SE. If the signal is the same on each leg of the primary (common mo... | |
| Using XLR for Phono out Lewm, of course I was refering to the use of transformers as an input device. That was the context of the discussion. Even when used as the input for a SE (balanced to SE conversion) you still have high common mode rejection. If you apply the same... | |
| Using XLR for Phono out The type of plug does not determine whether a connection is balanced or not. I am using a "balanced" connection from my cart. to my fully differential phono pre. However, by choice, I am using RCA plugs. Why? XLR plugs fitted on my OL arm would no... | |
| Using XLR for Phono out Just to point out a potential fly in the ointment, not all true balanced inputs (outputs too) are created equal. One needs to measure the CMRR (Common Mode Rejection Ratio) at the input. Many manufacturers use OP amps to implement balanced inputs.... | |
| Best IC and Speaker Cable for DIY I recently made up two pairs of XLR ICs using the recipe on the VH Audio web site. This involves winding 28 ga OCC cotton-wrapped silver around a 1/4" O.D. foamed teflon tube, then wrapping with teflon plumbers tape. I covered this with flexible m... | |
| Cottage industry of phono stage? K&K Audio fits the definition of a "Cottage" industry. It's a one man operation run out of Kevin's home in Apex, NC. Kevin is very helpful and supportive of the DIY community. I'm sure that everyone out there who has built one of his products ... | |
| Stand out phono stages I have been enjoying the beta release of the new K&K Audio 3 stage, fully differential, transformer (Lundahl amorphous of coarse) coupled phono pre now for several months. In every way it out performs the SE version. Dynamics, sound staging, f... |