The Headcase Stax thread

[spritzer]

That is it plus any energy storage in the bias supply in general is a poor idea.  It has to be a super high impedance supply from a performance and safety perspective so storing anything after the ballast resistor is just poor engineering.  If one was going to do that (no idea why though) you would need a rather high value series resistor to negate the effect of the charge on the diaphragm. 

[JimL]

As an illustration, when I was young and innocent I once decided to discharge a power supply capacitor by putting a screwdriver across its terminals. The resulting spark produced a 2mm divot in the blade. A plastic diaphragm is a bit more delicate than a tool steel screwdriver blade.

 

To quote somebody or other: "Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment."

Edited November 6, 2018 by JimL

[spritzer]

So true and as I'm routinely zapped by bias supplies...they do pack a punch. 

[JimL]

Electrostatic headphones and speakers have the least distortion when they have a constant charge on the diaphragm. This was established at least as far back as PJ Walker who designed the original Quad electrostatic speaker. 

 

The "rationale" for having a "large" capacitor in the bias supply, e.g. 1 uf or more, is to smooth out any residual AC so the diaphragm charge and voltage remain constant. However, once the diaphragm is charged, the amount of current needed to maintain the charge is minuscule, so that in fact even a "small" capacitor (Stax uses 0.1 uf) is more than sufficient. This is illustrated by the fact that if you use an old Stax converter box, which contains a step-up transformer and bias supply but no active electronics, charge up the headphones and then disconnect the bias supply from AC, the headphones will continue to play for some time. The large value safety resistor used by Stax (about 5 megohms) between the last bias capacitor and the diaphragm ensure that any current traveling to the diaphragm is very low so the diaphragm cannot get zapped. Companies like iFi and Woo that don't follow these design parameters either don't understand or ignore these facts. iFi Audio's use of a high voltage battery to "power" the bias supply is, IMHO, an expensive solution in search of a non-existent problem.

Edited November 7, 2018 by JimL

[spritzer]

In other news, the Monolith Electrostatics from Monoprice are now available and a set is already on its way to Kevin for a full dissection.  While we wait, we finally have some specs:

Now I have some doubts about some of this, the capacitance is probably just the drivers and not the cable included as it is really low.  Now the cable is pretty short but still, 60pf is not probable.  The drivers are also quite small so comparable to the old Stax designs (SR-5 etc.) which are about 120pf so yeah...half of that is not probable. 

Now the only thing that makes me pause is the amp...let's look at the specs:

For first off, no volume control so one wonders what is going on in that small box.  It has a battery which powers something for some 5 hours but why no volume control?  It is just odd... 

Now to further add to the mix, I found this on ebay:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/223221739939?ul_noapp=true

Now here they are for a lot more money with no markings at all.  I looked at what other items the seller has and it is a lot of monoprice stuff for a lot more money.  Very odd... 

[Hopstretch]

[JimL]

Also note the low input impedance of 1 kilohm for the amp.

[spritzer]

Yeah, which points to a headphone amp being used to drive this.  Also the limited voltage swing is of concern...

[kevin gilmore]

it has arrived, going to wait for it to warm up before listening

N1,N2,N3,N4 are labeled XG  (2sk209)

q1,q2,q3,q4 are labeled lkw (pmbta45)

opamps are jrc401f

single high voltage of +440V. opamps get +/-17

this is very similar to the original stax sr-001 amp

 

Edited November 14, 2018 by kevin gilmore

[spritzer]

We are working on completely reverse engineering it.   

[SeaWolf]

I don't get these portable stats amplifiers. Stax hasn't made a closed headphone in years and using an open headphone in a public location is a dick move.

[spritzer]

Turns out the amp is a clone of the SRM-001 with some issues so yeah... not ideal.  This is a schematic I found in my archives so no idea where it came from. 

Kevin also notest that the player didn't have a high enough output to properly drive them so something is wonky. 

[kevin gilmore]

yep, pretty much that schematic. pull up resistor is 1 meg. false advertising, shows a rca to mini, not supplied, shows 1/4 jack not supplied. comes with usb cable.

bias resistor is 20 meg. power supply is fully regulated, something the sr-001 was certainly not.output stage bias is 200 microamps.

I think that this needs a lot more input voltage than it should. also no volume control, so designed to hook to something with a volume knob.

made in Taiwan. no names anywhere. after a few hours of warmup, still sounds like absolute crap. No way is this worth $700. or the $1k+ the guy on ebay is selling it for.

[spritzer]

Isn't everybody glad that I'm crazy enough to buy this stuff and have Kevin rip it apart?   

[judo]

I think we are glad because you inform us. We beleive you with cause. What about a quality portable amp or is it not possible at all? 

[spritzer]

We could do a portable amp but there are some issues there such as the PSU, custom chassis perhaps and stuff like that.  I'm not really interested in portable amps as I find them a silly novelty for open phones that bleed as much as Stax do but we could do something for the Shure's.  The stock amps are pretty good but could be improved upon... 

[judo]

I can endure the bleeding if it has the quality. So an sr-007 with the portable or it is not possible an sr-003 with highs.

[Whitigir]

I would love a portable amp/DAC similar to D10.  The idea is to carry Stax from home to work and so on, and not on the bus, subway or walking out and about 

[Mach3]

Yeah something more like an improved SRM-X Pro but with a builtin DAC

[JimL]

For me the issue is not so much sound bleeding out as environmental sound bleeding in with open headphones. It's pretty noisy out there in a lot of places.

[judo]

You are right but are there good enough closed headphones at all? I have never heard the 4070 but they say it is not the best stax. Maybe depends on the music you usually listen too.

 

[JimL]

I use Shure SE535 iem's on airplane flights because it provides decent environmental isolation and the noise level is high enough even with them that I figure I wouldn't get any significant benefit from anything better.

[spritzer]

KSE1500's...  

[Laowei]

53 minutes ago, spritzer said:

KSE1500's...  

What’s your opinion on the sound quality of these Shure in-ear electrostats vs the STAX SR-002/SR-003mk2?  

The Shure have to be less painful to wear.

 

Edited November 16, 2018 by Laowei

[spritzer]

The comfort is excellent and the sound is also excellent if just a tad too bright.  Easy enough to fix with the KSE1500 EQ...  Much better than the Stax stuff but at a hefty premium.