Pars

Yeah, they made no attempt to put the singles next to each other, which really would have been pretty easy to do. The PSU in the Gilmore Ref is the original tracking design with the OPA548s, so would be better than what is in this. This appears to be a simple LM317/337 PSU. These guys claim they switched transistors... wonder what they used and if it is an improvement over the Toshiba 2SA1015/2SC1815 used by the original design? Really can't think of many areas to "tweak" one of these designs. Certainly not to the level of "puffery" they allude to. Still, for the price, not bad. Hope the PCB doesn't suck like some "blue" boards I have worked on. Poor copper bonding to the substrate in those.

My brother asked me what I thought about using a Mac Mini as a htpc. Since I've never done this, I thought I would ask here. I know some of you use these as music servers. Any tips, recommendations, etc.? Thanks in advance

Happy Birthday dood!

Happy Birthday!

Fastener Express has them in black oxide stainless down to 1-72 thread, as well as metric. Bolt Depot is another place I look, but they don't carry black oxide (that I found).

Bryan: Congrats, and enjoy your break! Colin: That sucks...

I enjoyed that episode also more than the vast majority of them.

Happy (or is it unhappy??) unbirthday! Enjoy Ken!

I've got some 200R RN60s if those would work.

Of course you can already start firing it up before you get all the parts in... where's the fun in soldering circuits that aren't on?

I for one do not see how this could work fro a volume control... it looks like it just acts as a variable resistor between the two "channels", even if those are the same signal 180 degrees out of phase? I could also just be dense

That kit looks OK, but doesn't have meters (though I don't know that I trust them anyhow), and isn't tracking. You might take a look at Circuit Specialists and also wait to see if luvdunhill or cetoole or nate or anyone else has recommendations. I seem to recall someone pointing out a new bench supply that looked pretty good, but don't recall what it was. Circuit Specialists Inc. - Bench Top Power Supplies

Sorry, hadn't noticed that. Here's a single HP HEWLETT hp PACKARD DC POWER SUPPLY BENCH SERIES 6218A - eBay (item 300374779932 end time Dec-12-09 16:48:33 PST) A bit outside your budget: Hewlett Packard HP 6228B Dual DC Power Supply w/manual - eBay (item 360214245044 end time Dec-10-09 10:30:57 PST) Lambda: Lambda LPD-421A-FM Dual 0-20V 1.7A DC Power Supply - eBay (item 360214381205 end time Dec-10-09 18:06:48 PST) Another HP: HP 6205B Dual DC Power Supply..... - eBay (item 110468187695 end time Dec-16-09 10:17:12 PST)

Take a look at ebay for starters. I have a dual supply B&K that is OK (and was pretty cheap). I would recommend a dual output supply because many tasks require +/-V. Current limiting would be nice, but for $50 not likely. Here's an HP that although it seems to need some work, is advertised as working, and not one of these "I'm a test equipment vendor, but this is sold as is cuz I have no way of testing it". HP 6253A Dual DC Power Supply 0-20V 0-3 Amp - eBay (item 280435088410 end time Dec-13-09 18:00:43 PST) Drawback is only up to 20V. You can put these in series to get 40V though.

Of the headphones that I have listened to large scale symphonic on, the 501/601/701s get my vote for best sound and truest to the recording. As a caveat, there are many high-end headphones that I haven't heard.

sigma22 shit for a certain dynahi/FET project (board, HS's, output FETs; already had most of the other stuff). Didn't want to disturb my 15V sigma I use for IV board testing. Plus a couple of opamps to fix a mini3.

Go to Home Depot, Ace or whatever hardware store and buy a 3/8-16 and a 3/8-24 bolt for $0.05 apiece or whatever. Go home and try threading them in (gently). If I were to guess, it looks like fine pitch (-24) to me. Could be 5/16 also though.

Just went thru AA to see if I could find anything and ran across a thread that I had seen some other points/spikes and had commented that they looked similar to the ones I have other than material: https://myesound.com/Points_n_pads.html

If it is 3/8", there are two common thread pitches that I am aware of... -16 (UNC) and -24 (UNF) I would grab a bolt of each and tip the speaker over and try it.

I'd get spikes. I used to have a pair of Infinity Monitors ('70s, same vintage as ESS AMT-1s) and could not believe the improvement some conical TipToes did for them. In my current Von Schweikerts, I have a set of Soler points which were stainless steel cones that I had him do in 3/8-24 thread for my speakers. Unfortunately he doesn't seem to be around anymore (Esoler on Agon). At any rate, you need to determine the specific threading required before you do anything.

Happy Birthday!

Getting worse with burn-in? Ever post that on HF? One of the burn-in threads?

I didn't have any np0 so I used what I had. I only bought 2 of the Aries adapters and used them for the THS4031s... I figured the AD8599s would work OK on BrownDogs which I already had. I may still etch some adapters I laid out which have the caps right on the opamp pins, and a ground plane on board. I don't think I could do these the way Aries does with the pins below the surface though, so the opamp would have to be mounted transversely like the Browndogs.

Put things back together tonight after socketing the PCM63s and replacing the 12 stock 1n4003 rectifier diodes with 11DA10 shottkys. I bypassed the Pana FMs on the Aries adapters with 0.1uf X7R 1210 package SMT caps (soldering those across the cap leads sucked... snapped 3 of them bending leads after they were soldered, leaving me short for the AD8599s). Removed the sockets for the AD8599s and soldered them on the BrownDogs into the board with Pana FM 100uf right on the pins. Worked right off the bat. Took a look at the PSUs on the scope and remembered that the PCB has the ground plane split into multiple sections, which are tied together with the chassis. Once I put a few of the screws in, the noise spike I had been seeing (~50mV on +/- 15V supplies) was down to 12mV PP. My HP3468 was reading AC of 0.065 mV on both + and -. Listened to a CD (nothing critical) but it sounded good, though I had it up too loud. After the CD was done, I checked the AD8599s and they were cool (had been fairly hot before). Button it up tomorrow and it will be done for a bit. Discrete boards this winter, as well as clock. Will post a pic tomorrow.

My condolences to you and your family Mike.