[Jason Stoddard]

I vote for jumpers.
On the board.
Inside an Asgard 1-like case, where you can't reach schiit.

Soldered jumpers. Or just posts so you can add your own resistors and capacitors. That'll be fun.

 

[mystaiced]

Hey all,

I said we'd have a couple of new things this month, and that might still happen. Getting into production is a bit slower than expected, but things are moving along well. By this, I mean:

1. We have boards for one of the crazy products, bottom chassis for both, and top chassis for one. Unfortunately none of them line up to complete products yet. Still hoping for February. We'll see.
2. We have boards for the craziest product of all, but no chassis. The chassis on this one is a bit more complex. We'll see when this hits. Maybe all 3 crazy/craziest will hit at once.
3. Urd drives came in and were wrong because we ordered the wrong ones. We swapped those for the more expensive metal drives and then discovered the control board is wrong, but that wasn't our fault. So still dealing with normal stupid getting-to-production stuff on that.
4. I'm getting production documentation going on MJ3, which is the boring part, but it needs to be done. Fingers crossed for summer.

In the meantime, there are a ton of under-the-hood changes going on here, all based on data we've been gathering from ERP and online marketing/ads/channels. Most of this is not very exciting. That said, we are looking into something to address our biggest out-of-control cost: PCB assembly. As in, we're looking at doing some boards ourselves. We have a handful of high-production boards that may prove practical to do assembly ourselves.

This is very important, because of all the crazy inflationary cost increases we've seen, assembly is by far the craziest. Now, things may calm down this year as the economy cools off and PCB assemblers start getting hungry again (we've already seen this starting elsewhere), and we may decide not to do it, but the preliminary estimates and projected savings make this definitely worth investigating.

If we do this, we'll have greater control of our production, and more of it will be done by us. Both of these are exciting possibilities, but they're also tempered by having to staff and maintain a new portion of the business. So, again...we'll see.

In other news, I've decided to start poking at a higher end phono preamp.

(STOP. Don't get excited. If you're looking to get a Mani 2, buy with confidence. IF we do something else, it will be MUCH more expensive. Note the "IF" and "MUCH.")

So...keeping this open ended, what might you want to see from a higher end Schiit phono preamp?

And...making this more pointed, let's talk:

1. Multiple inputs (is this really important?)
2. Simple vs complex (how many gains and how many loads do you really need?)
3. Discrete vs op-amp (thoughts, do you care?)
4. Balanced vs SE (system matching, don't care, gotchas?)
5. How important is great MC vs MM performance (and vice-versa?)

You may notice I haven't mentioned tubes. It's not that I don't like tube phonos, it's just that, if done right, they'll be more limited. As in, if you want to have a pure tube phono preamp with passive RIAA, you'll need a separate MC stage or SUT, and you'll need to stick to one type of tube for rolling unless we use lots and lots of tubes, etc.

Anyway, just thinking out loud. Looking forward to any input.

And, again: IF it happens. MUCH more expensive. Mani 2 is a fantastic phono pre. It took me a long time to be convinced we should look at anything else.

All the best,
Jason

1. Multiple inputs would be cool, since I do own a few turntables(*coughs* Five?). But not necessary.
2. Simple, most cartridge I have are MM or MI.
3. Don’t care, whatever sounds better.
4. Don’t care. Whatever sounds better within reason (price/cost ratio).
5. Not important.

 

[jaxtherogue]

Simple? DIP switches are simple and can be switched right where you need them and are generally good quality. The catch is that this means flipping the preamp over and fiddling with fingernails and toothpicks until you get the right combo. So, simple, but a PITA to use

For me, DIP switches are fine, but then I don't swap out cartridges regularly. If money is going to be spent on stuff, I'd rather it not be spent on dials i might not touch for years.

Besides, wouldn't a Schiit product with front mounted gain/load settings but with a power switch on the back violate some natural law and trigger an extinction level event?

 

[Orange5o]

Not necessarily...

Forgot about the new pro-ject line. Otherwise i guess I thought it would be extremely rare.

 

[LobalWarming]

This is where it gets interesting. It can be simple...or it can be very complex.

Simple? DIP switches are simple and can be switched right where you need them and are generally good quality. The catch is that this means flipping the preamp over and fiddling with fingernails and toothpicks until you get the right combo. So, simple, but a PITA to use.

Do this. Great phono sonics should always be a PITA. It's part of the charm.

Complex? Do it with switches. But you'll want custom super-high-quality rotary switches and you'll want them near the gain stage, not on the front panel, so you're talking custom switches and switch extenders and mechanical stuff like bearings. Not impossible, but much more painful and expensive. Also, when you're switching gain, will there be transients? I'm not talking clicks, I'm talking big bangs that take out speakers. That's a real possibility when switching gains, depending on the specifics of the gain stages.

Not for me.

Very complex? Do it with relays. Then they can be used at the point where you need them, and they can be run by a microprocessor to manage any glitches on switching. But you need a ton of relays. Like, one for each loading or gain level. Yeah, you can do ladders, but that only gets you so far. You don't save as much as you think. Aaaaaaand...are relays good enough for MC level signals? We're talking 1000x gain there. That's before your preamp (4-10x) and amp (10-20x). That's a metric ass-ton of gain. Yeah, you can get good relays, and maybe they're fine, but will the relay coils affect the signal? As in, will the tiny bit of ripple on the power supply running the relay be inductively coupled into the signal lines? Sure, you can filter that power supply even more, but it's worth asking. Also, how well with this super-high-gain device work with the noisy microprocessor running inside the box? Yeah, you can do "sleep and wait" on the micro and turn off the clock, etc, but now we're talking firmware and fancy relays and super-quiet power supplies...

This is my life. Most of the time it's fun!

I admire your life choices. At a safe distance.

 

[theeclone]

Discrete vs op-amp

What about discrete op-amps?

 

[Festive56]

What about discrete op-amps?

BTDT, Audio-GD Compass....

 

[Paladin79]

What about discrete op-amps?

I own some,

 

[theeclone]

I own some,

They see me (op-amp) rollinnn'

 

[artur9]

I have a wood lathe and know how to use it. I would need to know more details. Solid or hollow body?

Hollow. A nice cherry version of the TubeBass. Just a crazy idea, mind, pay no attention!
Maybe a barrel would make more sense...

 

[ArmchairPhilosopher]

Soldered jumpers. Or just posts so you can add your own resistors and capacitors. That'll be fun.

This just in:

Mani Max in development.
Internal code name: Sol-less.
Will come as set of hand selected components and premium breadboards.
College-level knowledge of analog signal processing and circuit design advised.
The usual 5 years warranty on parts, but a brand new and industry-defying 0 days warranty on outcomes.

Mani Max — Roll Your Own Phono Preamp!

* Do not attempt. Professional maniac on shorted circuit. Artist's impression, actual product may vary.

 

[Paladin79]

Hollow. A nice cherry version of the TubeBass. Just a crazy idea, mind, pay no attention!
Maybe a barrel would make more sense...

I could imagine better uses for a large block of cherry.

 

[pavnobi]

Cheapest crazy product should be $149, most expensive $449. Maybe a little bit more due to assembly cost increases. We'll see.

All 3 are products we've not done before.

(And no, none of them is a streamer. Nor a turntable. Nor a toaster.)

For those of us that are in the dog house
(My wife isn’t happy with my headphone hobby spending)

Are the crazy list of items something that will be continuously in production, or a one shot run?

 

[artur9]

All 3 are products we've not done before.

(And no, none of them is a streamer. Nor a turntable. Nor a toaster.)

Ha! Knew it - near field monitors!

 

[theeclone]

Ha! Knew it - near field monitors!

Aw man, I would love for Schiit to get into the speaker game!