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  1. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    I'm grateful for your warning, and instructive example, which I will interpret as a red card. Power is measured in Watts, though. One thing can be objectively bigger than another thing. I leave you to your mystical cogitations, gentlemen, it's been fun.
  2. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    In the end you've spent not much money on a good value amplifier. It is legitimately questionable if you needed the extra 24V supply for probably <1dB of extra sound pressure, but overall you've done OK, by luck or judgement, and it's always good if you're happy with it.
  3. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    There's no indication from the manufacturer's datasheet that the chip itself has problems with bass reproduction, but it is an $18 board, so it's probably just poor/cheap component choices on the board, most likely in the post chip filtering between the chip and the speakers rolling off the bass...
  4. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    I would guess these switches change the gain of op amps in a pre-amp stage rather than the TPA chip. I think the op amp has to be there anyway to convert unbalanced inputs to differential, and it should also sort out any input impedance issues. Noise as you say would be less of a problem at the...
  5. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    No direct experience but some observations. Firstly the power claims are absolute nonsense, but this happens more often than not and is not an indicator of quality. 32V x 5A (DC) = 160W, so by any scientific measure it is literally impossible to produce 300W from this continuously without...
  6. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    It's probably about the price, I'd guess that not many people have reviewed them because not many people have bought them, so not many people have any realistic basis for recommending them. If I was buying today I'd go for the 3e board personally. I went for the EVM board because it was priced...
  7. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    As far as I can tell, there are two known good boards, the Texas Instruments TPA3255 EVM evaluation board, which is about US$150 but was on sale for half price (I have one), that you can use for 1.0, 2.1, 4.0, 2.0 systems. For 2.0 systems, the 3e 3255 stereo board is also a good implementation...
  8. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    It's a good implementation, but far more expensive than other 3116 options (eg Nobsound NS10G isn't completely terrible but costs a fraction of the Volts). Lots of people say it gets the best performance they've heard out of the 3116 chip. But as you get to the expensive end of the 3116 range...
  9. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    Exactly my problem and why i want to try DSP, I'm pretty much forced to have one speaker near a top corner and the other near a junction of wall and ceiling. There are no placement guides which recommend that. Multi-use rooms are far more common than listening rooms I expect. They are in my...
  10. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    It's complicated. DSP is mainly used as parametric EQ, so in theory you have the same amount of control of frequencies across the audio range, assuming you have a microphone to detect small differences accurately. Low frequencies behave differently from mids and highs, but here is probably not...
  11. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    DSP doesn't fit everyone's idea of how audio signals should be treated, and I don't know which DSP system you tried, but the board I'm not yet using has a couple of pots on it that could each be assigned to a crossover frequency, for example, or LR balance, or volume, or sub volume or almost any...
  12. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    They are really nice. My only slight problem with the miniDSP stuff is that it would cost almost the same as the rest of my system put together (which does not sound low budget I think). So I'm hoping to make a very inexpensive DAC/DSP preamp with balanced outputs for my 3255 amp. Just don't...
  13. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    There are a couple of key advantages in my view. Also I find it interesting enough to do a low cost experiment just for fun and learning. The first advantage is that you could do linear phase crossover, or adapt the signal going into a physical crossover, so that it has effective linear phase...
  14. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    It's on the to do list, I've got all the parts, but haven't put it together yet. I'm gong to use that ADAU1701 board from the 3e group buy, but first I'm going to try to add a SPDIF input, then sub crossover, then room correction. If I was sensible I'd probably be better off with a MiniDSP 2x4...
  15. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    I agree in terms of sound quality. I think all the alternatives suggested are pretty good though, including the SMSL amps, they're good value in terms of integrated features like remote control and BT etc. But as pure amps they're just adequate from what I've heard. We still await a really good...
  16. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    Consider adding a reset/mute switch. Your board already has connections to implement this and it requires 2 simple components and maybe one hole in the case. Circuit is Reset pin(on board) -> switch -> 1k resistor (pulldown) -> GND pin (on board) If you use a 2 pole switch you can also have an...
  17. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    Sure, output filtering also seems to be important, there's a lot of talk about picking exactly the right output inductors. I have no idea what the 33xxs (or whatever) will look like, but once you get the distortion down below audible levels and the power delivery above a certain minimum that's...
  18. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    There is no escape. :) Useful to know there is a noticeable difference between 'cheap' and 'good' implementations. I suspect this is partly down to the amount of capacitance on good boards, eg the EVM has 2 enormous caps, whereas the YJ-likes seem not to have paid attention to this, maybe to...
  19. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    Yes, I think Chinese production for hifi can be chopped up just like any manufacturing system, there's design, component selection, fabrication, assembly and so on, supply chains. You could apply this analysis equally to Apple. YJ to me seem like small margin retail box shifters (a perfectly...
  20. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    I think that's right, I emailed 3e yesterday asking where's my toy, those boys already got their toys, and they thanked me for my patience. But it can't be long now. I'm trying to get my head around Sigma Studio so I can put in some room correction.
  21. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    Cool. Looking forward to your comments. I looked up the forum post, and Allo said they were testing a '325x' against that NC400 which I've also never heard. Unfortunately it wasn't more of a commitment than that, and that was the only thing said. If they make a good implementation for a...
  22. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    One reason would be that the chip is best configured in PBTL mode (mono output, see the TI datasheet for TPA3110). If you get a board that can be set up for PBTL that would be a much better solution.
  23. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    Not exactly, but the same general idea applies. You need a power supply, an amp board, and a case that fits them and all the other bits like panel connectors and wiring. The idea is the same, but the budget is closer to $200 at present for a single 3255 system. I'm not sure monoblocks are...
  24. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    I agree, they would be shooting themselves in the foot. Except that a cap multiplier is mostly good for DC smoothing, and 32xx are already pretty good at rejecting supply ripple from a reasonably well executed SMPS, so for me a CM is much less necessary than putting enough real capacitance on...
  25. Ytheleus1212

    TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

    In the bucket analogy I think it's important to be careful about what stands for voltage. From theory Energy stored in a capacitor is 1/2 x C (capacitance in farad) x V squared. (see eg wikipedia for theory) Consider 2 cases, in one case the supply voltage is 2V, in the other the supply voltage...
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