Mini Dac TDA1543 X 4 NOS - Page 16

I did some soldering this evening. I replaces the output caps with Vishay 1820 MKT's and bridged them with some small Russian PiO's. That was really all I could fit in there. I put them on top of the heatsink.

They would not fit upright by 1mm, and this way I had 1/2 mm left. See?

Oh, and I exchanged the 'on' LED for a green one. Seems more logical to me.

Well, the sound... just what the doctor ordered. This gets rid of the slight grain and harshness of voices while keeping nice rendering of details. The sense of space is improved. This is what it should sound like and I have no more reservation for a full thumbs up.

Jeep man, how bout just using 4.7uf Blackgates as coupling caps instead? or perhaps as hi as 10-22uf works as well. space should allow that.

 

Great!

It is terrible to be in the small box.

Well, you use what you can lay your hands on, and use it in the most effective position. I stumbled on them on a Dutch forum. This cost me €5. I don't know exactly what blackgates cost (nor where to get them for that matter), but it sounds a hell of a lot more expensive.
I searched a bit, but they are getting pretty scarce, and what type I should use for best results eludes me too.

Anyway, this does the trick for me. I'm pretty satisfied now. And tired. I went to bed much to late because I was still listening.

BTW; I don't mind working in tight spaces. I'm used to working with 1:72 scale models.
Edited by ]eep - 3/2/11 at 8:42am

What are those paper in oil caps doing connected to the MKT caps?

I made the output condenser a socket.

 

 

 

I tested it with RMAA. 

Metrum NOS DAC arived. They blanked all the interesting chips, it seems...   Sounds good so far

 

Hey guys seeing the fun you guys are having & the results you're are getting is wetting my lips enuff to try it myself. I want to change the 2 output caps to film caps so I have 2 questions.....

1. Since space is limited, can I use smaller values instead of 10uF, say 1-3.3uF?

2. Which is the correct direction for the replacement caps if I'm facing the RCA out end as they will likely be polar caps.

Any & all additional tips will be highly appreciated. Thxs guys

I'm sure IIzuka can calculate it for you, but i think you shouldn't go much lower than about 5.6µF. 10µF puts the highpass freq at 23Hz so if your can't reach any decent volume under 50Hz anyway it doesn't really matter.
In my cd-player I had 10µF originally and now 6.8µF and I didn't notice any difference, but if I would go much lower I would lose subbase.

I bridged the MKT with a small PiO because that enhances airyness (the very high frequencies will have the quality of the smaller better caps). When you have 2 caps in parallel the frequencies will pass over the particular cap according to their capacity. It is a trick used in crossoverfilters for speakers when large caps are getting to big or really expensive.

I'm not really an electronics-buff, but if you have filmcaps (like MKT or MKP), wouldn't that mean that they are bipolar?

This might give you some clues.
And some more reading.
And some more on the art of bypassing.

couldnt let u guys have all the fun so my dark side got the better of me & i did my very 1st mod.......ever! atleast all by myself that is. went to my local favorite EE store today & asked the owner abut coupling film caps. he pointed me in the rite direction & i found a couple of 3.3uf NOS polypros that even he couldnt name the brand of except that its german made & meant for speaker xovers usage. perfect i thought as this means its audio quality & best of all, its only $2.70@ so how can i lose or atleast so i thought. O he also told me that they are non polar so it didnt matter which way it went - another perfect score!

 

off i went & did some chores til bout after dinner before i got to it. it was a tad shaky at 1st as it was my 1st cap removal. anyhoos things went relatively well & 3hrs later....voila. hope u guys wont pan me too much for such an fugly soldering & routing job. its bad i know but...its my 1st & im kinda proud of it. here's the pics

 

 

well i cased her up, hook'd her up, slap'd on the cans, cross'd my fingers & press'd play in foobar. holy christ theres music! woooweeeee houston ah got lifeofffff! LOL. 1st impression with zero burn in is very detailed with deeper depth in soundstage than stock but has a tinge of upper end sibilance/graininess. goodthing is its not sounding worse than stock so it can only get better. i hear films take upto a few hundred hrs to burn-in before its cook'd. stay tuned 

good work mate - nothing like the buzz you get from your first mod!! congrats on having the courage to do it!

ya know, normally it isn't nice to hear someone say. But in this case...

told you so

Well done mate.

thxs for the encouragement guys & yup Jeep'man u told me so! LOL. to be perfectly honest, i was more than a bit concerned that i'd screw the pooch. thought about it some more & decided no pain no gain so mites well go for the gusto. gotta say this was fun 3hrs & i think im starting to like this mod biznes but if i didnt see u guys do it, i'd never have the inkling to even try. so thxs again mod dudes!

 

a brief 14hr update:the agressiveness i heard up top seems to have disappated sufficiently that i dont notice it as much as lasnite. the biggest change seems to be an expansion of the soundstage in both width & depth by quite a significant margin. there also seems to be an organic feel to the sound or perhaps its because its slightly less aggressive due to the soundstage enlargement. deep bass does seem to be down on impact perhaps just a smidge but its hardly noticeable.

 

anyways this the impression i get after letting it burn the whole nite & slapping the cans on. another funny thing's the Muse Dac unit itself seems way cooler than before. i remember it being slightly above skin temp but now the case is isnt cold to the touch but it seems much cooler than before. i woulda thought the opposite since i cramp'd more stuff into the tiny enclosure. strangely funny -thought i'd mention it.

 

TDA1543   +--Cap-- -  RCA-Output

 

 

 

I have just received mine, and I can say the sound is very good!!

But it really tire my ears..I think it is to harsh and grainy.

Well I would love to mod then ( everything its possible), anybody could give me a hand on what could I change? or where to start?

Thanks alot!!