T Amp

[slinger]

I was looking at buying a pair of powered monitors to hook up to my "studio" and pricing (for anything half-way decent) started at around £150.00. Then I had a tidal brain wave. I've got a pair of Celestion DL4 S2 speakers sitting around, and a pair of Kef Q15.2s as well. So, I've ordered one of these and will pair it up with one of the sets of speakers. I was just curious to know if anyone else had tried this particualar T Amp (and yes I do understand that they are the spawn of the devil) and what results they got.

Info on the amp I've collected so far includes...

High quality digital amplifier which adopts Texas Instruments Chip TPA3118D2DAP as the main chip, and uses a lot of High-ranking fever components such as EPCOS, Rubycon, ERO, ELNA, ALPS, TDK, DALE, Panasonic, etc.

and

Use TDK inductors , AV / PILKOR polyester film capacitors MKP selection of the best series for output filtering. Element , though small, but collections are fine .

SA-36A Pro with Texas Instruments simplest design schematics design standards. Try to use the least , the best material for the principle. Avoid unnecessary coloration to the highest possible degree of reduction of musical flavor.

EPCOS polyester film capacitors do coupling , extremely well, brighter sound grainy , tiny particles are not rounded , and the crystal clear, much like the summer ice melt in your mouth . High frequency is very pretty, good ductility and not harsh.

So it should be good.

[George Hincapie]

I haven't used one, but an LPSU will probably improve it's performance.

[George Hincapie]

Also..."summer ice melt in your mouth"?!

[wallace]

I use the model before that one in my workshop with an old squeezebox and my mini monitors ,easily out classes the big old denon amp i was using,which went in the skip.

[_D_S_J_R_]

Not sure about these. Gutless, no bass power and thin toned is my experience and with no current output to speak of. Very good at whisper-quiet levels I found from the Mini-T I borrowed, but harshness and distortion (sorry, excitement!) grew as the volume went up. The distortion spec isn't maintained to full output I recall from reviews.

Yours may be different and more powerful Slinger, but I regarded it as not more than a toy amp. Alfafan here uses a Mini-1 with JBL Control 1's and rates it though.

[Frasernash]

Hi Slinger did you order from the website as I have seen them on Amazon UK in differing specs and looking at reviews a lot of customers have replaced the supplied plug for a fused UK version look forward to your findings as I might get one to power by JVC speakers wadding removed for TV use and drop the Sound bar.

[Fretless]

These are also distributed in Holland and have been praised as: 'Cheap & sounds fine - but only one input and lack power'. The reviewer suggested getting 2 and using them as monoblocks. Might be worth a try!

[slinger]

Hi Slinger did you order from the website as I have seen them on Amazon UK in differing specs and looking at reviews a lot of customers have replaced the supplied plug for a fused UK version look forward to your findings as I might get one to power by JVC speakers wadding removed for TV use and drop the Sound bar.

I've ordered mine via eBay. It was the same price on Amazon but I get Nectar points on eBay. All I know from the seller's description there is that it comes with "1 x Power Supply (UK Plug)"

Dave - I'll be running it using the speakers as near field monitors, so at a pretty low volume most of the time. If I need "LOUD" I can always flip the output from my studio to the NVA setup via the computer, so distortion shouldn't be a problem. What I want is a solution I can leave in place 99% of the time. Lack of bass might be a factor though, especially if I run it with the KEFs as they can be a bit lean at the low end.

Fretless - One input is all I need, and I read the "sounds fine" comment somewhere too.

George - A review of the PSU might figure into my plans later on, but my immediate aim is (tight bugger that I am) to get something that may sound as good as at least upper low end powered monitors costing approx £150-£200, and perhaps bettering the £200-£250 I know I'd have convinced myself it would be worth spending on monitors. As long as it comes with that summer ice and my particles are rounded though I'll be happy.

Wallace - Cheers for the positivity.

It's an experiment at the moment, and won't have cost a huge amount if it fails. One thing I'm quite keen to try is using the optical out from my computer (via a cheap toslink to RCA converter) and comparing it to the 3.5mm format direct output.

Thanks for all of the replies folks. Much appreciated and plenty for me to think on.

[slinger]

Well, all of the bits & bobs have turned up. I've also ordered a pair of 330uF/25V Panasonic SEPF OSCON capacitors to replace the current (no pun intended) DC decoupling caps which, from what I've been reading about modding the SA36A, is probably the most bang-for-bucks upgrade that should improve SQ. I never thought I'd be considering posting something in the DIY room.

I'll also be interested to see how this performs

As for a LPSU, unless I'm looking in all the wrong places, that would cost more then the amp did, which would rather defeat the idea of doing this more economically than just buying powered monitors. So, unless you know different that is probably an upgrade too far, certainly in the foreseeable future.

[CycleCoach]

I'll also be interested to see how this performs

That looks like the one I bought to put between my Macbook and NVA P20, and I was really pleased with the result - just beware as the USB power lead was a bit fragile on mine.