The Apple diyMod: My Take on the Famous iMod [56k killer] Featuring 3G, 4G, 5G and nano 1G! - Page 117

I went searching last night and found it. I am now thinking I will just upgrade one of my 80gb ipods with the 240gb HD, and skip the 2nd gen ipod touch.

On a different note is there a detailed explanation of the purpose of the vcap docks, and how to build your own?

Same purpose as any other dock and exactly same way to build.

hmmm yes airwiring RCA jacks without a case would be very finicky

personally i'm gonna wait for the price to drop on those 240gb. I dont need the upgrade from 120gb that badly. still; very interesting though.

no-one has done a step by step for the VCAP dock because its basically a LOD with a box in the middle; it requires no extra steps other than the termination type, but thats pretty logical progression, unless you want to use the space to add a battery pack as well for charging the ipod while you are using it. but in general there isnt really any room for that kind of thing. on the hammond I use you cant even have a mini at one end and RCA at the other without grinding them dowm, and you need to grind the strip that would normally hold PCB's in place away so the caps fit.

So an LOD will suffice? I don't really want to add an extra box to the mix. I would prefer to keep it to the Diymod and an amp.

well it depends on your priorities; yes they are basically the same design; but the caps are worlds apart in quality. Blackgates are only really used because of the size constraints of being used inside the ipod or an LOD. they are good sounding caps; but given more room there is no way I would use them; pretty much any film cap of reasonable quality will beat a blackgate hands down.

Thanks for the info. I guess I am gonna have to read this entire thread from start to finish. I think I will just stick with the LOD as I don't want my rig to be any larger than it has to be.

finally got it done after a long long delay.

The mod was straight forward, though the desoldering of SMD parts was a little scary, as I don't have thermal-tweezers at home (and didn't want to wait two more days to use the thermal-tweezer at work). I ended up having to literally "burn" the parts off the board.



I guess I had too much a high hope on the ipods (supposedly, with a top of the line dock it will "rival $1000 CD players"). Well, the sound is more or less the same level as my modded CD changers, different but not really better. This is with the iPod and CD changer using similar output caps (Vitamin-Q bypassed with teflon).
Comparing to other portable/tranportable sources, the SQ performence of the modded iPod/dock is similar to a properly modded all-metal Discman PCDP (again, all with Vit-Q/teflon output), which is larger than the Ipod/Dock combo. Still pretty nice sound for such a tiny little box, though it is not exactly tiny anymore, after adding the dock box.

I want to say thank-you to all contributers for posting the detailed info (here and on the web) and making this mod so do-able.

well ipod mod sure sounds good and sound better than playstation
one mod cd player

If I follow the method for modding a G5 ipod that's shown in page 1 and on aaron's page, from what I can understand so far I will lose the headphone output, is this correct? Is there no good way to retain the headphone out like RWA does with G5?

I ask because I got a used 30G G5 for $20, and the headphone out is flaky. I assume it's something that can easily be resolved by replacing the headphone out cable from the board to the chassis, but I don't want to bother doing that if I can't have headphone out anyway, being that the main purpose for getting this used G5 was to do the mod.

what kind of mod did you do to the PS one? To me, the DIY mod'ed 5G actually sounds similar to a modded PS-101 (the little white playstation), relativly even and flat, Vs. the SCPH-1001's more meaty/full-mids sound.

I will have to say I still prefer a modded big playstation one (1001) over the modded iPod (when both are using the same kind of output caps). Of course, a playstation one is huge comparing to the iPod/dock combo.

no if you follow the mod on this thread you will retain the HP out aarons one you lose it though. thats why this one is superior.

BTW sweet deal on the ipod

Thanks, I saw the deal on craigslist and jumped on it.

So what threw me off with the guide on page 1 was that the picture said to remove the capacitors adjacent to the DAC, but the text I guess doesn't say that, it says to solder to the pad and doesn't mention desoldering the capacitor. So by leaving those capacitors there rather than removing it, I would have the headphone out while also having the direct line out from the DAC, am I correct?

Which kind of got me wondering, why not route the outputs from the DAC to one of the other pins on the dock connector, like one of the firewire pins. Wouldn't that allow you to use the iPod with standard docks (like say you have a car with an ipod adapter) while still being able to get the direct lineout from the DAC? I'll be using this with a PC only so I know for sure I'll never use the firewire.

That really was a great find!

As you say if you wire the top connections to some other pins on the dock (not the firewire ones, there are other pins that aren't used at all) while leaving the caps intact you would have standard line out, modded line out and normal headphone out. Also you can use pins spaced further apart making building an LOD easier. Good luck soldering onto the pins directly though, they are VERY close together.

The headphone circuit is totally separate to the line out so even if you remove the caps it will still work, a useful backup if your amp dies while out