TPA 3116 vs the tripaths

trikster,

Below are the plans for the bucket sub which like the TPA3116 is another inexpensive audio triumph. I think I started a thread here on them.

I added one important feature: a plywood ring under the bucket baffle to mount the drivers to. I special ordered the 5 gallon buckets in black from Home Depot as it's almost impossible to paint plastic buckets and get good results.

My speakers are bass reflex using high efficiency 4.5" Fostex drivers. You can find all the enclosure plans for the Fostex drivers free at Madisound. If you haven't heard crossover-less, full range single drivers you're in for a surprise. :thumbsup:

http://www.transcendentsound.com/Subwoofer.html
 
I tried the 24V power brick that came with Dayton DTA-100 and saw no advantage vs the 12V. Some claim that with higher power comes more distortion. So far the best choice for my ears are the 12V ( 13.8V ) linear regulated power supplies. I believe my 12V Astron does 15 amps.
 
trikster,

Below are the plans for the bucket sub which like the TPA3116 is another inexpensive audio triumph. I think I started a thread here on them.

I added one important feature: a plywood ring under the bucket baffle to mount the drivers to. I special ordered the 5 gallon buckets in black from Home Depot as it's almost impossible to paint plastic buckets and get good results.

My speakers are bass reflex using high efficiency 4.5" Fostex drivers. You can find all the enclosure plans for the Fostex drivers free at Madisound. If you haven't heard crossover-less, full range single drivers you're in for a surprise. :thumbsup:

http://www.transcendentsound.com/Subwoofer.html

Where did you mount the plate amp?
 
trikster,

On the left are two Yung SD300 plate amps in some home made wooden frames. They are designed to mount inside a sub box but using them outboard offers greater flexibility. You only have to add speaker terminals and they work like any other amp. The plexi-top T-amp on the right is a TK2050/ Meanwell PSU but it falls far short of the TPA3116 in SQ.

PB030005.jpg
 
I tried a different version of the TPA 3110/3116/3118. This time mono TPA3118 boards. Just may be the best one (s) yet that I have tried! I am going to use them as mono blocks with separate ps's. I am currently running them both off one 24v SMPS, but i did try them with my 15v Astron. No thru-holes, so modding is probably not in the cards for me. However, they sound amazing just the way they are. Deliver more bass than my 3110/3116 stereo boards, and seem to have a lot more power. Postage stamp for size reference. These are really tiny boards, but don't let that fool you...they deliver BIG sound!!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/181977284636?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK:MEBIDX:IT



 
Great find Lacro and man are they tiny. Not sure my fumble fingers and bifocals could get me through the connections but I may give it a whirl.

They deserve a nice case but will it be one or two? :)
 
I just conducted an interesting, and frankly, disappointing, comparison of the twin-chip board and two traditional stereo systems. The setup was as follows:

Front room:
Yamaha home theater receiver, Polk RTi6 speakers

Middle room:
twin-chip board amp, no preamp, Polk RTi4 speakers

Back room:
Marantz 1090 integrated amp (original/unrestored/not re-capped), Cambridge Soundworks Model 6 speakers

Sources for all three: Chromecast Audio units configured as a group, playing Google Play Music. High Dynamic Range "on" on all three CCAs. Yamaha and Marantz were playing with the tone controls at their detents; loudness off; Yamaha set to straight two channel playback with no DSP stuff.

So I was able to walk from room to room to room, listening to the same track and doing essentially instantaneous comparisons.

What was immediately obvious was that the twin-chip board seems to have a very rolled-off top end. Cymbals lack sizzle; snare drums thud instead of snap; strummed acoustic guitars are dull. The Yamaha system was a little brighter than the Marantz, but the twin chip was way duller than both of them -- not at all a subtle difference. I'm 55, not deaf but don't have golden ears.

I had no dog in this fight; I've been pretty impressed with the twin-chip amp up to this point; and I only set this test up because I just took delivery of CCA nos. 2 and 3 and wanted to try out the group-play feature.

Since I have two boxed-up twin-chip boards, I tried them both (with different sets of speaker wire); I also used two different power bricks, one 12 volt/4 amp, the other 19 volt/3.4 amp; no difference in the top end that I could hear.

I guess to rule out an issue with the RTi4 speakers, I should have switched them into one of the other systems. But I'm pretty sure the two Polk models use the same tweeters.

I'd be curious whether anyone else can confirm my impressions, and/or if anyone has thoughts about whether something about the twin-chip's component selection, board layout, or other aspects may be responsible for the lack of top end.
 
Drew_t.
have you given the board / pot of the board some time to settle ? My current shunt style "pre" (to TPA3116 board) has taken awhile awhile to sound decent. For some time i have had rolled off highs, thick bass and quite a narrow sound stage.
 
I've had some individual conversations regarding speaker projects for the TPA3116 so here's one I'd highly recommend. In keeping with the low cost of the 3116 these open baffles are also inexpensive and require little in the way of DIY skills. If you can throw together a TPA you can certainly build these.

The Betsy full range drivers sell for around $100 a pair and the Eminence Alpha 15A woofer go for $59 each. The 80z woofer filters came from Parts Express but Fmod filters would be a better option as they function like an active crossover and change the frequency before it's amplified. The Betsy's are designed to run straight off the TPA3116 and sound their best that way. Although I haven't tried a TPA3116 dual chip with a 24v PSU it could be enough to drive the woofers. Any other amp with 50+ watts should work fine. I used an old AVR in stereo mode to drive them and had plentiful bass output.

I know many of you have read about the advantages of bi-amping so this is easy way to see for yourself. I think the TPA3116 really shines with full range single drivers and without passive crossovers that can suck the life out of music. That's all I listen to these days.

PB230002.jpg
 
Wow...
OK... this is strong motivation to find a bigger living area.
Poultrygeist, i have read and attempted to understand "some" open baffle theory (radiated sound waves cancelling etc) but i have never put one together.
Are the dimensions of the vertical plane and positioning of drivers critical to building this ?
 
Lacro,

Are you getting any thump on shutdown?

Have you any idea what the "mute" is on the board?

There is turn off thump (pop) with these boards, however, I have hard wired my brain to ALWAYS turn down the volume to 0 from whatever source, and this simple function has completely eliminated all "pop" when using any of these boards. Also, the mute pins when shorted together put the amp in "standby" which also eliminates the pop on shut down. A switch wired across the mute pins would make a good anti pop devise.
 
Man... These amps sound great!!. I decided to mount my mono blocks on a couple of these I got from PE (thanks again Poultry!). Now my chassis mounting is limitless. I can mount in speaker stands, any type box, wood metal, plastic, or even wall mount. Everything is self contained on the plate.

kPrbrF5.jpg


ndtP2ou.jpg


yA9d2ps.jpg
 
Drew_t.
have you given the board / pot of the board some time to settle ? My current shunt style "pre" (to TPA3116 board) has taken awhile awhile to sound decent. For some time i have had rolled off highs, thick bass and quite a narrow sound stage.
I'm not really a believer in "break-in" of electronic components, but, in any case, one of the two twin-chip amps has been in use for a few months now.

I tried a different pair of speakers today with the twin-chip, just to rule out the Polk RTi4s as being the cause; same lack of top end sparkle noted.
 
I'm not really a believer in "break-in" of electronic components, but, in any case, one of the two twin-chip amps has been in use for a few months now.

I tried a different pair of speakers today with the twin-chip, just to rule out the Polk RTi4s as being the cause; same lack of top end sparkle noted.

Have you been able to rule out room acoustics? That's worth checking out since it sounds like you had three systems in three different rooms.
 
The three rooms are quite dissimilar in terms of size, shape, ceiling height and type, furnishings, etc., and the speaker placement would not be considered optimal in any of them. I'm sure that if I had three completely identical systems playing the same thing at once, it would sound somewhat different in each room. But regardless of that, I did move around in the middle room where the twin-chip amp is, trying to find a sweet spot, and also got very close to the speakers; the high treble just doesn't seem to be being reproduced.
 
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