Radical
New Head-Fier
Dear Fellow Members,
although I have been with Head-Fi since 2007, I have not contributed much over the years and decided to change that and offer all the enthusiastic DIYers with a very good sounding headphone amplifier to exceed even the most critical music lover's requirements.
This amplifier is extremely simple, easy to construct and does not suffer from listening fatigue. In fact I wear and listen to headphones everyday for hours on end. Some would argue that I was born with a set of headphones on my head.
What I am planning to offer is the following:
1) complete schematic, PCB layout (both gerber plots & PDF format) and bill of materials
2) same as above but including the PCB made to high standards, with silkscreen and solder mask.
3) same as in 2) above but including a kit of parts.
4) built and tested PCB including option 1.
What are my goals:
I would like as many as possible Head-fiers to have a very cost effective, high quality headphone amplifier for everyday use. My second objective is to establish the brand over the long term as a quality headphone amplifier simply because I feel that headphone listening is becoming a very serious activity.
Currently the project progressed from designing and tweaking the product since March 2017 to its current state including thousands of hours listening both on cheap and nasty as well as HD800S headphones. Although I do not claim that this amplifier is any better than other designs, it is certainly not worse than the best offerings out there and is in fact very pleasing and I believe it would be very competitive in performance.
I will post all the details described in 1) in subsequent posts and follow with 2, 3 and 4 as soon as I can establish if there may be a reasonable interest before having 100's of PCBs made and sourcing components.
I have thre photos just taken with my phone to show what I intend the amp to look like. The size of the box is about the same size as a mouse for comparison and I use a standard 15VDC 500mA wall wart to power the amplifier. Because it is not battery driven, it is not portable, but I am open for ideas and one can easily design the PCB using surface mount components miniaturizing it and add some batteries.
although I have been with Head-Fi since 2007, I have not contributed much over the years and decided to change that and offer all the enthusiastic DIYers with a very good sounding headphone amplifier to exceed even the most critical music lover's requirements.
This amplifier is extremely simple, easy to construct and does not suffer from listening fatigue. In fact I wear and listen to headphones everyday for hours on end. Some would argue that I was born with a set of headphones on my head.
What I am planning to offer is the following:
1) complete schematic, PCB layout (both gerber plots & PDF format) and bill of materials
2) same as above but including the PCB made to high standards, with silkscreen and solder mask.
3) same as in 2) above but including a kit of parts.
4) built and tested PCB including option 1.
What are my goals:
I would like as many as possible Head-fiers to have a very cost effective, high quality headphone amplifier for everyday use. My second objective is to establish the brand over the long term as a quality headphone amplifier simply because I feel that headphone listening is becoming a very serious activity.
Currently the project progressed from designing and tweaking the product since March 2017 to its current state including thousands of hours listening both on cheap and nasty as well as HD800S headphones. Although I do not claim that this amplifier is any better than other designs, it is certainly not worse than the best offerings out there and is in fact very pleasing and I believe it would be very competitive in performance.
I will post all the details described in 1) in subsequent posts and follow with 2, 3 and 4 as soon as I can establish if there may be a reasonable interest before having 100's of PCBs made and sourcing components.
I have thre photos just taken with my phone to show what I intend the amp to look like. The size of the box is about the same size as a mouse for comparison and I use a standard 15VDC 500mA wall wart to power the amplifier. Because it is not battery driven, it is not portable, but I am open for ideas and one can easily design the PCB using surface mount components miniaturizing it and add some batteries.
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