The Stax thread - Page 128  

^ Is it just me or shouldnt there be a missing something in the middle of that? Like a piece of mylar?

Heh, I do now.

Hi folks,

I'm a pretty new (and junior) member of team Stax now, having bought an SR-84 set. I'm enjoying their clarity and brightness a lot, especially for guitar music and female vocals. The only problem I have right now is that I can only enjoy them at home, right next to my reciever, due to the speaker style cables that they use.

I'd very much like to be able to use them at work, but I can't seem to find a cheap, easy way to connect them to my computer, with its mini headphone jack. Has anyone found a way to convert the speaker cable to a mini headphone jack? (or even RCA, as I have a nice mini headphone to RCA cable).

Where would it be?

Yahoo! auctions Japan, under Stax. Looks like a nice unit too.

That would have been something!

Currently on ~USD 250.00. But the seller don't ship internationally, so it is out of the question for me.

Happy to help. Actually, the format is quite logical once you find out where everything is!

I don't imagine too many people have had both 202 and either 303/404. I had 404 for a while that came with an Omega 2 I borrowed from a Japanese contact. I bought the 2050, a set which includes 202, as a temporary set, intending to upgrade to the 404 later after I build a tube amp (a second one, actually; the first design, which I didn't like much because it was too cruelly revealing, went to the fellow in Japan, who likes studio monitor types of amp). After hearing the 202 I changed my mind. I think only the Omega 2 makes a big enough sonic difference and at a desperate price multiple. Your mileage may vary.

You can buy a variac for a reasonable price but you have to box it, fit sockets, etc, by which time you may as well buy a converter. For the period I had the Japanese chap's earspeakers and amp, I just made up a quick 100V adaptor with a pair of 2x25V transformers, all in series. which I already had mounted in a box as a mains isolator for a small SE EL34 triode-linked amp.

In general the Stax tube amps are good value for money (I've heard the most expensive one supplied with the O2) but limited by their size (so that they have to be hybrid, and the power supply cannot be at all substantial), market niche and intended price. For that sort of money or no more than twice as much -- and no worries about what the traders in a distribution chain will eat -- I can build a very fine amp indeed with no-compromise design and the finest components. (I'm not pretending it can be sold at a price anyone will want to pay, of course; I'm merely saying that an experienced designer not limited by the restrictions placed on the Stax engineers should have no problem creating a much superior amp.)

It seems to me that in the 4040 kit you get a (very likely) good amp at a great price (assuming you buy from the discounters) with the 404 thrown in just about free. I say "very likely", because the one I heard is the next and top step of the Stax tube amps (7t, the one in the 4040 kit is 6t), but, as far as I can make out, the only difference between the two amps is doubled up tubes in the output of the 7t and presumably a bit of jiggling in the power supply to make it possible; I know from experience with 300B and other tubes that parallel output tubes are never twice as sweet as singles and often far from it, and in any kind of a differential output with dual triodes in the same envelope, as in the Stax tube amps, matching-related problems quadruple (or worse) with parallel tubes; I conclude the 6t is likely to sound substantially nearer in relation to the 7t than the price difference would seem to indicate. Is there someone here who has heard both in a head to head comparison?

PriceJapan, from whom I bought on price alone (a satisfactory process described in the thread
BUYING FROM THE FAR EASTERN DISCOUNTERS
http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=215182 )
sells a pretty solid-looking converter unit. They're also cheaper than AV Japan.

I wouldn't use a solid state amp a fifth of the voltage over but tube amps are pretty rugged; unfortunately the Stax "tube" amps have their silicon input sections, and you never know for what voltage the other components are rated. Running 100V components at 120V sounds careless to me but perhaps those who do know something we don't.

For the price of carriage, I'd rather sit at home and do my research right here on Head-Fi. One has to be obsessed to consider the prospect of shopping in Tokyo with enthusiam <g>.

Andre Jute
Visit Jute on Amps at http://members.lycos.co.uk/fiultra/
"wonderfully well written and reasoned information
for the tube audio constructor"
John Broskie TubeCAD & GlassWare
"an unbelievably comprehensive web site
containing vital gems of wisdom"
Stuart Perry Hi-Fi News & Record Review

Sorry to see that you have been outbid on this one!
It is already $185 above your maximum, and still two hours to go.

Better luck next time.

Thanks for the nice reply, Andre. I had a little time this afternoon and managed to find a few posts around page 55 or so that had nice comments on the 202. Your info is also appreciated. And, agree, going to Japan just to visit Akihabara would be nuts - the 12 hour flight alone is brutal. I just seem to find myself in Tokyo periodically on business, and it's always fun when I have a few free hours.

I expect the difference between 202's and 404's is pretty small, and, while I can pick up a set of 404's pretty reasonably from the Price Japan site, I may pass for now, instead focusing on a better driver than the 212 (maybe a 7t). One of these posts had some photos of someone who'd done an internal mod to a transformer (just different wiring/jumpers) but that may have been a Lambda Pro, not sure. Anyway, I've got some old Variacs here from a fifties transmitter I could press into service; just trying to avoid the hassle. I'll look into the converter at Price Japan if I decide to proceed further with this.

Actually, it's kind of neat that I stumbled onto this site (while researching ear buds for the new Ipod!), because it's revived this old audio affliction of mine. I've got the 2020 out here on the desk, where I am playing around having a ball plugging its input to the outputs of various, mainly low-end gear, like the Ipod, a CD player, and my XM Roady (which has surprisingly good sound for its 64K digital stream!).
The 202/212 combo sounds quite good as it is, and I'm thinking of bringing them on some trips, as they're very compact and make the Ipod fairly listenable. As far as the 6t and 7t, only comments I've read were on the Simply Stax site (UK, I think), and they seemed to be raving on about the 7's.

It's pretty cool to be able to build your own amps! My skills are limited to modifying some of the older stuff, pulling out Zeners, etc., and swapping various capacitors (Dynaco Stereo 70 - now that's an oldie!).
This is a cool hobby, if not an obsession. Thanks for sharing the info.

You won't be able to power the stax amp from an RCA or mini jack. The converter box only works with speaker amps. If you want to listen at work pick up a super t-amp or regular t-amp. They are both small speaker amps.

So I've heard stax are insane, but how are they specifically better and what genres of music do they excell at?

double post