[strohmie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by AuroraProject Nice to hear from you Mikhail, what is your response to the class A questions?

Note here that he does have the right to decline information about his designs if he would like to. If he'd prefer not to go into the amp's layout, that's his decision and it shouldn't be held against him.

 

[Sovkiller]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mikhail "......The answer is that our products do sound better than anything else on the market, according to our customers...."

Nice to hear from you Mikhail.......

Well, IMO this is a huge statement, and maybe it is just me, but would prefer that any other person would state that, and not the manufacturer himself, I don't know, but modesty is one of virtues I really admire, and I would like that more people have it...maybe I'm taking this comment too serious, and I'm wrong, but I can assure you that I have nothing personal with you, nor any of your amps, OK?...LOL....

BTW and this is only my humble opinion OK? I hear the Maestro and the Supra in the last mini-meeting in NYC, hooking there the R-10, CD3000, Qualia, HD650, PS-1, HP-1000, and to be honest with you, they sounded very very good, I like them, but I would never call them the better sounding amps out there, this is another very different story (and category) I have not heard too many amps, but IMO and to my ears, none of the two impressed me, to the point of calling them as such. Given the strong raves I had read here, and the difference in price with others, personally I was expecting to fall down sitting there, and I would like that those two beasts will creamed all what was in there, but sorry this never happen...I do not felt that I was missing anything from the other amps there in the meet, including the humble Solo, and my PPA.....but of course this is just my humble opinion according to my short experience with them....maybe is just that the main strength of your amps is to offer just that extremely natural and relaxed presentation, if this is the case, I agree that I may need more time for evaluation, but my first impression was that, very good amps, but at the level of many others.......but nothing like the best out there amps, and I'm not trying to bash your job, just trying to be accurate, and honest to the best of my knowledge...and short experience with them, BTW I consider all the amps there as very good sounding also. I'm not comparing yours with a Cmoy neither....


PS: What really impressed me was the R-10, but this is completely out of topic....

 

[TrevorNetwork]

Thanks Mikhail for posting your thoughts about this. I took some internal pictures of my MPX3 (wood + aluminum style) several months ago. I shared the pictures with Demolition, but did not feel it was appropriate to post them up. I for one do not feel that point-to-point wiring done correctly is inherently dangerous. I tend to think Mikhail and his staff know what they are doing. Should the amplifier fail, you have a full warrenty anyway. Frankly I would not worry about being shocked or electrocuted with regular use. The lesson here is DO NOT OPEN ANY VALVE AMPLIFIER. They are dangerous. You'll notice I was wearing a rubbermaid glove in one of these pics. They were taken with a Canon S50 at full resolution. I was only able to pry open the top slightly. Not safe for dial-up!

Pic1
Pic2
Pic3

 

[Edwood]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Earwax Can anyone go into more detail on what might need to be changed to get CE or UL approval? For that matter, how many of the other high-end tube amps have qualified for CE or UL listing?

For those that don't know, UL (Underwriters Laboratory, Inc.) Listing is a voluntary process of certification. Much like USDA rating of meat grades like "Select", "Choice", and "Prime." It is a voluntary rating that is paid for by the manufacturer.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ripped from UL Website FAQ Manufacturers submit products to UL for testing and safety certification on a voluntary basis. There are no laws specifying that a UL Mark must be used. However, in the U.S. there are many municipalities that have laws, codes or regulations which require a product to be tested by a nationally recognized testing laboratory before it can be sold in their area. UL is the largest and oldest nationally recognized testing laboratory in the United States. UL does not, however, maintain a list of the jurisdictions having such regulations.

-Ed

 

[Edwood]

Quote:

Originally Posted by purk So much tension in this tread, a little smile couldn't hurt!! Mikhail, Although I have not purchased any of your amp but all I can say to you is they sound awesome. Keep up the good works!!

Sheesh, you're telling me.

I guess no one will ever want an "AE" version SinglePower amp?.......

-Ed

 

[strohmie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by TrevorNetwork Thanks Mikhail for posting your thoughts about this. I took some internal pictures of my MPX3 (wood + aluminum style) several months ago. I shared the pictures with Demolition, but did not feel it was appropriate to post them up. I for one do not feel that point-to-point wiring done correctly is inherently dangerous. I tend to think Mikhail and his staff know what they are doing. Should the amplifier fail, you have a full warrenty anyway. Frankly I would not worry about being shocked or electrocuted with regular use. The lesson here is DO NOT OPEN ANY VALVE AMPLIFIER. They are dangerous. You'll notice I was wearing a rubbermaid glove in one of these pics. They were taken with a Canon S50 at full resolution. I was only able to pry open the top slightly. Not safe for dial-up!

Interesting shots. One thing I notice is the winding of the resistor leads around adjacent leads for the caps (edit: I also just noted a couple adjacent brown caps that have wound leads as well towards the center/background of the second pic). This makes me wonder about any inductive effect this may have on the overall circuit. Likely negligible, but it seems counter-intuitive to have short-as-possible leads and ptp wiring, then wrap leads in this way. Also, I can see a thick solder joint that appears to have been made smaller by using a wire cutter (second shot).

 

[PhilS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sovkiller Nice to hear from you Mikhail....... Well, IMO this is a huge statement, and maybe it is just me, but would prefer that any other person would state that, and not the manufacturer himself, I don't know, but modesty is one of virtues I really admire, and I would like that more people have it...maybe I'm taking this comment too serious, and I'm wrong, but I can assure you that I have nothing personal with you, nor any of your amps, OK?...LOL....

I think this is a little (maybe a lot) unfair to Mikhail. He didn't come on here to crow about his amps. He came on here to respond to a series of attacks on the build quality. Not to put words in his mouth, but I interpret his comments as saying that he builds them the way he does because sound quality is his number one goal, that he thinks that's what his customers want, and that in his opinion they sound the best. Thus, he has explained his philosophy behind the build issue, and one may agree or disagree, or have other comments about the build quality, but to say that he shouldn't be saying his amps sound the best (according to his customers) is missing the point, I think.

 

[oneeyedhobbit]

Good to hear from the manufacturer. I'm still pissed that anyone who has concern with the way these amps look is on a "witchhunt" or something, but groupies will be groupies, I suppose...All jest aside, I just hate how objectivism has been completely tossed out the window here.

That being said, I'd love to here some of the more knowledgable members debate/agree/refute the claims about this layout being optimum. For example, Strohmie's post (resistor wraps/cut solder blobs) was an interesting read. Dr. Gilmore comes to mind.

I'd still really like to see full pictures, too, for several clarification purposes.

Finally, two questions to Mikhail: Can you clarify the Class A/Class A/B thing I brought up way back on 5? Next, I understand that you have great warranties, but looking further (10+ years) down the road, can you comment on the concerns voiced over repairs?

 

[Wodgy]

TrevorNetwork, thanks for posting those pictures. Many of the joints are good, but the diode hanging by only one lead just to the left of the middle in the second picture is just inexcusable. All the pressure is on a single solder joint, increasing the likelihood of failure. The diode leads could easily bend with stress, vibration, or heat and gravity and come in contact with the chassis. The free hanging wire connected to the diode's other lead has considerable torque due to gravity (because of the long lever arm). You can see that the diode has already begun to bend.

I don't understand why anyone would wire something like that. That is just dangerous by any objective standard.

 

[PinkFloyd]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Wodgy The free hanging wire connected to the diode's other lead has considerable torque due to gravity (because of the long lever arm). You can see that the diode has already begun to bend. I can't understand why anyone would wire something like that. That is just dangerous by any objective standard.

Are you referring to this one?

Certainly not ideal and is not my idea of "expert point-to-point hand wiring"

 

[Wodgy]

That's the one.

 

[gsferrari]

Holy cow...trevornetwork - you never told me about those pics!!

You were THAT scared to post them? or even tell me about them?

If anything - they just make me feel worse about this whole affair. I am sick of the whole thing and wish it would all just disappear like it never happened

I feel let down in a BIG way

This is the kind of wiring I see right now in front of me in my crappy first attempt DIY amplifier.

I am going to post a pic tomorrow which will look eerily similar to what that mpx3 looks like...and this was built by me

 

[gsferrari]

Most of the "aesthetic" builds in P2P form use a "Bus" principle. Long conductor serves as a bus for that connection. Tuberollers chinese amplifier is an example.

 

[TrevorNetwork]

GS:

Nothing like that at all. With my inexperience with the wiring of tube amplifiers, and my not wanting to be a jerk about it I thought better of posting them. Demolition knew about this a long time ago. In fact, he was on the phone when I cracked it open. I was relatively new to tube amplifiers, and knowing the risks, I thought better of performing the... err... amposcopy without a person ready to call 911 in the case of a cap discharging into me

I had forgotten about them up until the point of this thread. They were taken some time ago.

<waits for the barrage of e-mails from people wondering what other pics I've taken>

Looking at those pics all that I am thinking is "I need an S50 again!" Hell, I need a digicam!

 

[Wodgy]

Quote:

Originally Posted by strohmie The direct soldering of components to the base of tube sockets is a little worrisome, just because there isn't any specific strain relief on the parts in the event of vibration/movement due to swapping tubes in and out ( maybe this was Tuberoller's problem? ). I'm not positive if this is common practice with tube gear.

This is common for tube gear. What's uncommon is having so much stuff hanging off the tube sockets without being secured somewhere else. In the first picture, for instance, there's a capacitor with a resistor securely attached to it near the middle, both of them hanging off the tube socket. There are three wires hanging from the other lead of the capacitor. The problem is that this puts all the stress on the capacitor lead attached to the tube socket. The three wires on the other end have a long lever arm and thus a reasonable amount of torque. When the amp is transported, the capacitor will wiggle around and the lead attached to the tube socket will weaken. It's a bad arrangement.