Beefy

Congrats on the dissertation! You always expect to feel celebratory after finishing, but I found myself just feeling really flat for a couple of weeks. You pour your heart and soul into it, concentrate on that one thing so hard, and then it is gone. Be thankful for the word limit though..... my PhD thesis ended up being just shy of 65k words

The DAC board will come fully assembled. You'll just need to build the power supplies (which are pretty easy), and then case and wire it up.

I'm still trying to work out why he would put a preamp and electrostatic amp in the same box. Surely there can't be that much shared circuitry to make it worthwhile?

I tried to convince people of this in a previous related thread, but nobody would believe me Well just considering the TPA offerings...... Buffalo doesn't need a separate SPDIF receiver, and gives native dual-mono balanced audio. Much easier builds, and the performance is at least as good, if not better.

Ewww, sticky.

The old one was $295, which included DAC, IVY, LCDPS and LCBPS. Russ said this new version would be a bit more expensive...... so I'm going to take a total stab in the dark and guess $395 for an equivalent package.

Why the big stupid rings around the knobs and jacks? And the gold screws look silly next to the knobs and nameplate...... silver would have looked much better.

I've got the original Buffalo, and see no need to upgrade yet. But I do hope to re-case my existing Buffalo after I move and add a SPDIF MUX, USB receiver etc...... and I will make 100% sure that my case layout can accommodate the new DAC design You can't use the Buffalo32S with Counterpoint because these new boards have integrated I/V and line stage (updated from the previous IVY). TPA found that wiring of the current output was critical to performance, and that having everything on one board was best for performance. They will be releasing a second Sabre32 design though for tweakers that doesn't have the integrated I/V and is also much more flexible...... for a start, it will apparently offer up to a full 8 channels out...... Yep Counterpoint is intended for the original Buffalo and the as-yet-unreleased 'tweaker' Buffalo32.

How does it sound with low and high impedance cans? I demand answers! But seriously, looks great!

Just below the white box caps, on the inside of the big transistors. Perhaps they aren't caps? I can't read the silkscreen, but it may read TH1/2.... so thermistors perhaps

Its not too bad for a first effort. I've seen worse! I would have put some heatshrink over one of the legs of the tiny black capacitors. And you'll need to clean off the flux with some isopropanol and a toothbrush.

My brain just imploded.

This new 'sounds better than foobar' phenomenon makes me pretty skeptical right off the bat......

Millett Maxes really are incredible value. And with a bit of shameless self-promotion, I must say that I have never seen Hammond cases look better than they do with Maxes even for the 'standard' build...... I should have built one of mine as a MOSFET Max. But I suppose that is why I have the MMM

Man, its been a while since I did a pork belly for dinner......

...... 16 OPAMPs? I saw the description of OPA627 with Jung Diamond buffer and thought 'Pffft, PPAv2'...... but if you are right, then that is a bit more interesting.

I'm always happy to set aside personal differences when there is money to be made But seriously, I don't hold grudges. Shipping would have been nuts, and I like to keep anything 'cool' inside Oz because we miss out on a lot of goodies. Academic anyway, because it is now sold. If you are still keen to have a y1, just drop MisterX a message. His builds are almost certainly better done than mine!

Are you sure it is 100IF? Might actually be 1001F? It probably follows the convention that the first three numbers are the start of the value, and the next number is how many zeros to follow it with. So a label of 1001 is 1000 ohms. 1002 is 10000 ohms. At least that is how it is for Vishay Dale resistors......

I don't fully understand it, but think I can summarise the wikipedia for you. Imagine you want to amplify a small signal in a circuit. You can just pop a single transistor in the circuit and it will work, but not great, because you also amplify the small capacitance present in the transistor. But if you use two transistors together in a cascode you don't amplify the capacitance so it potentially works much better.

I've had a set of those for..... almost two years now? One of the smartest things I have ever bought, and I would highly recommend them to everybody

It is so awfully tempting to pop that string into Google image search, and just post the first thing that pops up......

Bloody chunder. That's awful * I'm writing a grant today. Scientific research sucks monkey balls

I like that one, Dusty

It is plenty sharp for me - certainly much better than any P&S I have ever used. But I am still happy to admit that it isn't something a 'pro' would be happy with. Do I care what 'pros' think? Not really Never used it, but according to dpreview, it is quite good optically. What turned me off was the reportedly very slow auto-focus. The Nikon is very fast and accurate, and I love being able to quickly override the autofocus. Sounds great, and getting the SB-600 for indoor shooting is a great idea. A lot smarter a purchase than trying to buy a full complement of f/2.8 glass straight away, and STILL needing the flash every now and again...... In my short time with the 50mm f/1.8, I have lamented it being both too long, and too short. I guess that means it is about right for me, and I need to be less lazy when taking photos