Hi,
I have changed the full set of op-amps from my X-fi (no more mods at the moment).
My impressions:
- Treble is cleary improved. The digital sound is gone and the sound is much more pleasant. I can raise the volume without obtaining harsh highs.
- Bass is tighter and with more detail.
- With multichannel music the singer IS in the room. Soundstage is also more deep and imaging more wide.
- The outputs can reasonabely drive directly my dt990, maintaining the characteristics described. The improvement in this aspect with respect to the unamped output of the stock x-fi is enourmous. However, I suppose that an external amp is always needed for a 250 ohms cans.
I have approximately traced the correspondence between surround op-amps and the two physical tri-pole jack outputs. From up to down (with respect to the first pic in the first post):
- Upper surround op-amp corresponds to one side surround and one back surround (not sure if it is left or right). All go to the second line out.
- Mid surround op-amp correspons to the other side surround (second line-out) and center/or sub (third line-out).
- Lower surround op-amp correspons to the other back surround and the center/or sub (complementarily to the previous one). All go to the third line-out
The conclusion is that, even with a 5.1 setup, you have to change all 4 op-amps due to the ad-hoc configuration.
I'm going to try further mods. I have ordered the blackgate and the ERS paper.
With respect to the op-amp caps, I preffer not to sort them but replace the full set of 16 caps with higher value ones.
Which cap value do you recommend (that can fit in the available room)?
As they seem to provide current and not transport signal, does high quality cap is really needed in this case (I suppose exchanging 16 blackgates will be quite expensive)? Do standard nichicons may be enough?
Thanks again to cotdt for this awesome thread!