Oct 5th, 2009 by AnA
Today is the 5th Anniversary of my DIY SunAudio Amplifier which I had build in 2003. This is the very first amp which I had build from ground up. The tubes it uses are 6SN7, 2A3 and 5U4G. It is one of my favourite. Till today, I am still using it. Below are some of the pictures which I had taken during that time. Enjoys.
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Sep 24th, 2009 by AnA
This was the amp which I have built many years back. However, I will like to introduce it again as it had created many happy moments with my family together.
Remember that time before 1995, I do not have any interest in DIY audio. But, after witnessed a shop displaying an internal layout of a tube amplifier change all that. I became very keen in the layout of such tube amp. Not long after that, around 1996, I decided to build one for myself. After some shopping, I chose Audio Note Kit4 as a starter. Till today, I am very glad that I had picked up this Audio Note’s tube amp as it really sounded good and musical. Until now, it still in my bed room. This amp will be always in my mind as we had very great moment together as a family listening to this amp in our bed room every night before we go to sleep. I really enjoys every moment with it. Thus, I will keep it forever. Cheers!
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Aug 29th, 2009 by AnA
As I am very happy with the sounding of the hybrid amp from eBay. I decided to build one from stretch. After few days of surfing the web and finally decided to work on the amp designed by Sijosae. I was inspired by his work just by looking at the pictures of his amps. Anyway, here it goes…
For this amp, I had put in a lot of efforts and time. To date, this is the only amp which I had spend the most time and efforts. The time I spend most was the troubleshooting of the humming noise. I had redo the wiring and re-soldered few times just to get it right. Components had changed from the initial designed. I planned to use the toroidal transformer but due to the “magnetic interference”; which cause noise to the surrounding circuits, I was forced to drop the idea of using the toroidal. I guess I trusted the toroidal so much that I believe it will not cause interference even my circuit is very near to it. Thus, I never take extra precaution while planning the components layout. I was wrong; therefore, I had to replace the toroidal with a Switch Mode Power Supply (SMPS). I know, in the audio world, SMPS is not very popular. Well, I had no choice for now unless I want to redo everything again; such as getting another bigger chassis, change the components layout or solder on PCB … etc. For now, I choose to leave everything as it is and enjoys. Cheers!
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Aug 15th, 2009 by AnA
After searching the web and found many people had done DIY for the hybrid headphone amplifier. Since, I had never DIY a hybrid amp before, why not give it a try. While browsing for a hybrid amp, I came across this amp from ebay and decided to get one and try it out. If it is good, I will DIY it from scratch. The amp I got is shown below. I sounded pretty good. Enjoys and thanks for viewing.
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Jul 3rd, 2009 by AnA
My son loves the first CMoy amp after listen to it for a while. He requested me to build him one with a different design. Since he seem bore during the school holidays, I decided to build one for him. Below are some of the pictures of the completed amp. I also put my first CMoy amp side by side with my son’s CMoy amp as comparison. Enjoy and Cheers!
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Jun 8th, 2009 by AnA
After building the amp. I decided to hunt for a decent headphone. In this end, I purchased a AKG K242 HD headphone after a 2 hours long audition session with comparing with other headphones. This AKG is a “oldies” looking headphone and I like the design very much. This piece could produce bass down to only 15Hz but it specially “match” my amp as the roll off frequency is also only around 15Hz.
Before I finialised my decision on getting this AKG headphone, I like Sennheiser. I had tried their HD 600 model at the shop and I find it has a little punchy bass. Pretty clear sound overall. But the price is too high as my first headphone. I think, getting a headphone more than $400 is not so worth as the ratio between price and performance may not justify.
Another headphones I had tried were the famous Beyerdynamic the DT 770 and th DT880 series. The bass is very smooth and not as punchy as Sennheiser HD600. I like how is sound for the bass for the Beyer’s DT series. But, I find the treble is too sharp for my liking. Anyway, this headphone need amplifier to drive as it has high impedence of 250 ohms. Normal earphone only 32 – 55 ohms on average and only require the source to drive it well.
All in all, which ever headphone we choose, it has to match with the whole chain of system we use; such as the source, the amplifier etc. For now, AKG K242HD is good enough and for the first time, the headphone is challenging my hearing rather than the other way around. Cheers!
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