Is my Little Dot I+ broken?
Mar 18, 2009 at 6:13 PM Thread Starter Post #1 of 15
Epicfailman

Epicfailman

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Hey guys, I was very excited today when my Little Dot I+ came in the mail today. Naturally I went straight for the package and left all the other mail on the table. I open it up and pull out the manual so I can make sure I get all my settings right for my WE 408As I got from yen audio on ebay (he sells matched pairs and was a highly recommended seller on the LD I+ tube rolling forum). I get my tubes in and triple check the jumper and switch settings. Everything was good to go. I plug everything in, power it on, turn on some music.....nothing. So I bump my desktop volume to 100, VLC Media Player volume to 200....still nothing. Finally I put my amps volume all the way up to 100, now I can faintly hear the music. Thinking my tubes might be the ones to blame, I put the 6JIs that came with the stock model in and I flip the switches to the 6JI setting. I put it all back together and plug it all back in....Still, nothing unless all volumes are at a max. Thinking my PC might be to blame, I tried my ipod, but to no avail, max volumes on that all around and still I only faintly hear the music. I have checked to make sure that everything was plugged in properly, and it was. I am at a loss here. Any ideas? I will try and get some interior picture uploaded as I see something that could be suspect. I bought this from Ebay seller Davidzhezhe (the official retailer) and paid $34 for shipping. I would hate to have to send the thing back for another $68 dollars...any ideas? I have searched around the forums but can't seem to find this particular issue. Thanks guys!
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 6:39 PM Post #4 of 15
That's very odd. So aside from making sure everything is plugged in fully...really do email David at Little Dot right away. He seems to keep very close tabs on his products and has responded very quickly - like an always online kind of guy - to emails.

It's a bummer about the shipping, right, which is why he offers insurance which covers the cost of sending the unit back in case it needs repair. So...this is something for anyone considering buying an amp from half way around the world to consider.

Good luck
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 7:06 PM Post #5 of 15
Email has been sent. I checked the fuses and orientation of the opamp and both the fuses and opamp position appear to be in good order. When it is plugged in, there is no burning smell; however the tubes appear to have no glow whatsoever, no matter how dark the room is. I have made sure on both occasions that the tubes were well seated. Any ideas?
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 7:53 PM Post #10 of 15
Quote:

Originally Posted by LeftyGorilla /img/forum/go_quote.gif
It does sound like an epic fail, man.


HAHA! Beautiful....
Anyways, I haven't let it plugged in long enough to see if the tubes get warm on account that I am a little worried that if something is wrong with the circuit, leaving it plugged in for too long could escalate problems. But I am going to try the interconnects due to the fact that ratshack is about 3 minutes from my house. I know that their cables are said to be lower quality, but I have made no decisions on cables thus far and I just wanna eliminate one possibility at a time here. Thanks again for the help thus far guys! Both you guys and David have been great on replying quickly.
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 8:46 PM Post #12 of 15
So, guess who gets the nomination for dumbass of the year? That is right, your's truly! I left it on for more than 30 seconds to let the tubes heat up and VOILA! Works like a charm. Well, live and learn I guess. Listening to my AD700s on my ipod I noticed a further bass boost. Signal was a bit fuzzy, but it is an ipod and I am sure coming out of my ASUS D2X it will be great. Thanks for the help guys! I gotta go email David and let him know that it is working fine.
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 8:50 PM Post #13 of 15
Hmm...it seems victory might have been short lived; I went and changed the volume on my ipod and then on the little dot and I listened to the volume fade slowly away until is was gone for good. Looks like we might be back to the drawing board on this one.

EDIT: Yup, my amp worked for a couple glorious minutes....I checked again when I noticed that the tubes had lit up some and it worked, so I paused the music to come back and type on here that it was user error, and when I went back to change the volume, the sound faded away. So there must be some kind of short going on with the unit. I tried different electrical outlets to no avail. I am gonna switch out the fuses just to be sure that the fuse is not the problem even though it looks to be fine.
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 9:47 PM Post #14 of 15
Well, I switched fuses, flipped on the switch, boom....tube glow came as soon as I flipped on the switch. So as of now, it looks to be a bad fuse. I will make sure that it runs smoothly for 30 minutes or so, then switch back to my WE 408As in the hopes that I did not damage them. Hopefully this is the last issue I have with this amp. It really is a terrific little amp. It made significant bass increase on my AD700s, which are pretty easy headphones to drive, so I would love to hear the increase on a good set of headphones. I will keep you all posted!

EDIT: It is confirmed! The fuse was the problem. Thanks for all the help guys, I really appreciate it! The Little Dot I+ sounds great on my AD700s; I highly recommend it.
 
Mar 18, 2009 at 10:05 PM Post #15 of 15
glad to hear you got a quick reply from David and that things seem to be working out.

I will say the 1/4 to 1/8 adapter that came with the amp I threw away eventually. It gave almost the same problem you are describing. I did not have to turn the volume all the way up, but quite a lot higher than I thought was necessary, and also it sounded like there was a veil in the music. Something got stuck in there or it just wasn't making the connection.
 
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