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"Price DEFINITELY a factor" amp for AKG K1000 - Page 4

post #46 of 89
3/8/07 at 9:20pm
bump, im really curious how the Trends sounds
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post #47 of 89
3/8/07 at 9:33pm
Thread Starter 
Ok gang. Updates to come soon. I have spent a significant amount of time with Big Joe v1.3 and Trends Audio 10.1.

I will give a more detailed report at a later date, but in summary, I am very impressed with both of these little amplifiers and how they sound with the K1000s.

They both can also serve as a decent power amp. I have experimented with both of them by setting them up as a power amp, and using a tube pre-amp to add some tube flavor. The results were fantastic.

Currently Big Joe has taken the lead, because I like the option of Opamp rolling for tuning Joe to personal tastes. The Opamp I like best so far is the AD827AQ.

To answer a few questions real quick:

Both Amps drive the K1000s with authority, and have TONs of overhead. I don't dare turn the volume knob past 10 o'clock.

The TA-10.1 is a hot-rodded tripath based amplifier, the Big Joe is not.

The current version of Big Joe is v1.3, and he looks like this:





I will get around to writing my detailed impressions one of these days, so stay tuned.
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post #48 of 89
3/9/07 at 5:55am
Good to hear, cos I am holding back for buying T10.1 now. Just want to hear your impressions first.
I guess I just impatient. But how can you hold it on when you have like dozen of beer, that's how I feel right now
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post #49 of 89
3/9/07 at 10:19am
powering my speakers with the trends amp at the moment; i've previously been using a firstwatt, which is another popular k1000 amp. nothing much to say yet aside from that it sounds good so far, and has way lots of volume

and it's tiny

edit: i'm just playing around with the trends, it's not replacing my firstwatt
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post #50 of 89
3/9/07 at 10:52am
Which model do you have 10.0 or 10.1

What do you mean by tiny, sound or amp

How is the BASS and fullness of sound in general.


Quote:
Originally Posted by hugz View Post
powering my speakers with the trends amp at the moment; i've previously been using a firstwatt, which is another popular k1000 amp. nothing much to say yet aside from that it sounds good so far, and has way lots of volume

and it's tiny

edit: i'm just playing around with the trends, it's not replacing my firstwatt
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post #51 of 89
3/9/07 at 11:56am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackmore View Post
Which model do you have 10.0 or 10.1

What do you mean by tiny, sound or amp

How is the BASS and fullness of sound in general.
I think he means the Trends' size is tiny compared to hit FirstWatt.
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post #52 of 89
3/9/07 at 12:55pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Blackmore View Post
Which model do you have 10.0 or 10.1

What do you mean by tiny, sound or amp

How is the BASS and fullness of sound in general.
10.1

the SIZE of the amp is tiny.

i'll report back more fully on the sound later because i need to give it a way better listen before giving an opinion on it

note that i dont have k1000 so any opinion i can give wont be specifically related to them
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post #53 of 89
3/9/07 at 1:08pm
No prob, thanks


Quote:
Originally Posted by hugz View Post
10.1

the SIZE of the amp is tiny.

i'll report back more fully on the sound later because i need to give it a way better listen before giving an opinion on it

note that i dont have k1000 so any opinion i can give wont be specifically related to them
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post #54 of 89
3/14/07 at 11:27am
Any updates
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post #55 of 89
3/14/07 at 1:54pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by elrod-tom View Post
What about the nOrh SE9? It pushes the envelope a bit (I see the price is now $450), but IMHO these cans need TUBES!!
http://www.norh.com/products/se9/index.html
another contender of that ilk would be the little dot 3+.
larry, dunno if you've addressed this but how'd you hook up the k1ks to the big joe?
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post #56 of 89
3/14/07 at 2:02pm
Id like to hear some more on this also. I would love to be able to spend over $1k on a nice amp like the sig 30 or f1. But at this point in my life that does not seem to be a rational option. Part of me says spend the money on a great amp, and the other part says your crazy. Will a small amp like the big joe let me down?
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post #57 of 89
3/14/07 at 2:36pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by strungoutt1 View Post
Id like to hear some more on this also. I would love to be able to spend over $1k on a nice amp like the sig 30 or f1. But at this point in my life that does not seem to be a rational option. Part of me says spend the money on a great amp, and the other part says your crazy. Will a small amp like the big joe let me down?
who's to say? try it and if you feel let down then put it up for sale.
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post #58 of 89
3/14/07 at 4:41pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by daveDerek View Post
another contender of that ilk would be the little dot 3+.
larry, dunno if you've addressed this but how'd you hook up the k1ks to the big joe?
I have a short 'pigtail' that I plug my K1000s XLR connector into. The pigtail ends in 4 wires (L+, L-, R+, R-), to which I connected male banana plugs. Then it is simply a matter of plugging the male banana plugs into the proper female banana jacks on the Big Joe.

Believe me when I say that both the Big Joe and the TA-10.1 are contenders, even when compared to the more expensive amps like the Aleph 3.

The catches:

You may need to tune the Big Joe to your tastes with Opamp rolling. I personally prefer a warmer and fatter sounding Opamp. So some Opamp experimentation may be required before you get Big Joe to sound 'just right' with the K1000s. For whatever it may be worth, at low to moderate listening volumes (which are the volumes I listen to music at, I never 'crank it'), I couldn't hear a big enough of a difference in sound quality between Joe and the Aleph 3 to justify keeping the Aleph 3. Some may scoff at that statement, but I am just reporting things as I heard them when I compared Joe to the Aleph 3. Big Joe also works great as a power amp, in the event you want to add tube flavoring to your K1000s with a tube pre-amp. I hate, hate, HATE the location of the on/off switch on the Big Joe. But this is a small price to pay, and an issue I am willing to deal with to get such great sound out of my K1000s for such little dough, in such a small (and cool to the touch) amplifier. The Aleph 3 would scald your hand if you touched it for more than 4 or 5 seconds, and it also raised the temperature in the room by a couple of degrees.

I need to spend a little more time with the Trends TA-10.1, but so far I am equally impressed with its performance. With the TA-10.1, I got the best results when using resistors wired across the output terminals (due to the fact that the TA-10.1 is a Tripath based amp). I forget the values of the resistors I am using, but I will update this post with their values when I get a chance. Without the resistors, the TA-10.1 can sound a bit shrill with some recordings. One beef I have with the TA-10.1 is that there is a channel imbalance at lower volumes (not uncommon with a lot of amplifiers), but it seems that I have to turn the volume up a little bit further than I think I should have to in order to get past the channel imbalance. I know that the TA-10.1 has a couple of pots that I believe will allow me to adjust the imbalance a little bit, but I haven't gotten around to trying that out yet. Like the Big Joe, you can also use the TA-10.1 as a power amp.


At this point in the experiment, I am slightly favoring Joe a bit more, due to the fact that you can opamp roll, the channel imbalance goes away at much lower volume setting, and Joe is not a Tripath based amp, so there is no need to use the resistors as I did with the TA-10.1.

I haven't used Big Joe to drive a full sized set of loudspeakers yet, but I did try with the Trends TA10.1, and the results were spectacular.

I want to spend some more time with both of the amps, but in the end I may very well end up keeping both of them - they are that good.
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post #59 of 89
3/14/07 at 4:53pm
Wow lmilhan! That's good stuff to hear.

How would the Big Joe compare to the Melos SHA-1 (if you've heard it with the K-1000)?

I can't justify having a monster amp, and a speaker amp around. I just don't want to load my place with giant, hot amps. The RWA is an option, but pricey too.

Sounds like something like the Big Joe might be a good option if it gets close to the Aleph, that's good enough. I'm just wondering if the SHA-1 comes close too because it sounds really good with the K-1000.
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post #60 of 89
3/14/07 at 5:00pm
Excellent, I'll be waiting to hear what warmer opamps are favoured in the BJ, and if the bills ever stop piling up I'll finally be able to get mine. It's interesting that it's not shown up to any appreciable level by the Aleph, interesting in a good way of course

I'm all about cheap if I can get away with it. A Big Joe for the K1K and a Trends TA-10.1 for the Stax SR-X and I'm happy if all goes to plan. Thanks Larry, good info.
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