savoy014

Introduction SB Acoustics is not a familiar name to many Audiophiles although they are one the largest OEM speaker suppliers in the world. A collaboration between Danesian Audio of Denmark and Sinar Bajar Electric in Indonesia, SB Acoustics brings affordable and technologically advanced speaker drivers to the market by marrying the considerable design experience of Danesian and Sinar Bajar's 27 years of transducer manufacturing. Manufacturing in Surabaya, Indonesia would result in certain cost efficiencies, and the lucky beneficiaries are cash-strapped audiophiles like you and I ! It's well worth to have a look at the factory visit done by AudioXpress to find out more about their manufacturing quality (Link here ). Description   The Ara is sold overseas as a kit, but available in Singapore in fully assembled form. My review sample came in Gloss White, and has a visually interesting cabinet, with a chamfered corner (mirror-imaged for each pair), and a backward tilt of about 7 de...

Introduction Mains conditioning is often an essential tool in achieving good results from quality equipment, unless you happened to be blessed with good mains power. You have transformer based solutions, such as isolation or balanced power transformers. You also have capacitor based filtering, which tackle a certain frequency range based on the tuning of the circuit. There are also other approaches such as choke filtering and power regeneration.   Description The LessLoss Firewall Module uses the company's proprietary skin filtering technology first seen in their power cords. The wire surface is treated to allow the mains frequency to travel through efficiently (50 Hz or 60 Hz as the case maybe), while attenuating high frequency noise. Since no capacitors are used in the process, there is no limiting of current. The LessLoss Firewall Module (hereinafter referred to as "Firewall") is available in two versions, a module with C13 and C14 connectors, and a module with screw t...

Introduction Interconnects are a nice introduction to the world of DIY. The difficulty factor can vary according to your preference, and very little electronics knowledge is required. All you need are the raw materials, a soldering iron, and good soldering technique. You can easily make good interconnects that can perform well beyond your investment in material costs. RCA Plugs Your choice of plugs should have decent construction quality, precious metal plating to prevent corrosion (e.g. gold, silver or rhodium), and easy to use solder tabs. My favourite low cost RCA plugs are the Neutrik / Rean NYS-373. If you are willing to spend a little more, consider the Canare F-10 or the Neutrik Pro-fi. For cost no object experiments, I have been very impressed by KLEI Innovations' Harmony plug. I have found the Neutrik / Rean NYS-373 to be a little tight fitting on some RCA sockets, necessitating a bit of adjustment of the ground blades with needle nose pliers (protect the plated surface wi...

A short round up of some popular (and well, not so popular) AC Power Cables available off the reel for DIY projects. 1. Acoustic Revive Powermax 5000 This is a nice purple cable and is reasonably easy to handle in terms of flexibility, stripping the insulation, etc. Otherwise identical to the Power Max Standard offered by Acoustic Revive, the Powermax 5000 lacks the carbon infused mesh used in the retail offering. Wire gauge is 3.5 square mm per conductor, and the sheath is infused with tourmaline. This is a very smooth and inoffensive cable. It has a laidback and very refined sound that makes it perfect for countering digital and/or solid state glare. The level of detail is quite good but this cable lacks dynamic snap and drive. 2. Acrolink 7N-4030 A personal favourite of mine, the 7N version of the 4030 is far superior to its 6N predecessor. Apart from tighter bass and better dynamics, the 7N version has superior high frequency extension and control. High frequency extension and air ...

I've had a sufficient breather since the pain of my capacitor shoot-out, so the time is ripe for another round-up, this time of AC receptacles and plugs. Now, this is almost as fun as watching mould grow on walls - yippee ! A generic aluminium distributor chassis will be the unfortunate test platform for AC receptacles (installed one at a time only), while two spare Acrolink 7N-4020 power cables will be used to try out the AC plugs. The 7N-4020 was chosen as its wire gauge is relatively thin, and plugs can be removed and replaced in less than 10 minutes. It is also useful to be able to switch back between two sets of cables for comparison purposes. All outlets and plugs will be burnt-in for at least 200 hours prior to testing. Some of the test subjects have been in use in my system for a few years. For receptacles which allow split wiring, only the "direct" wired outlet will be used. The participants for this slug-fest will be the following, AC Receptacles 1. ATL ETP-1000...

DIY your own balanced interconnects with Mogami Neglex 2534 ! Neutrik XLR plugs, Mogami 2534 cable, paper cutter, Kester 44 solder and Teflon plumbers tape The Mogami Neglex 2534 is a flexible shielded star quad cable, i.e. separate shield and four individually insulated conductors. I have used this cable in both single ended and balanced applications, and this cable really shines in balanced form. Singapore readers can get this cable from Team 108 in Macpherson. You can have a look at their website for contact details and opening hours,   http://www.team108.com/ Once you have cut your cable to length, slide the rear plug housings on to the cable. I have lost count of the number of times I have soldered cables happily only to realise that I forgot the backshell ! Strip the cable and conductors, and twist the same coloured conductors together, i.e. form two conductors by twisting the clear cables together, and repeat with the blue cables. Bundle the shield wires ...

Here is a nice project for a lazy Sunday afternoon. Frustrated with your stock DC cable that comes with your Kingrex PSU ? Come on guys, the cable is far too short ! Parts List 1x Neutrik Male XLR socket 2x 1m 18 AWG Neotech 7N Teflon insulated PCOCC copper cable or silver cable 1x Switchcraft 760 DC jack (fits my Squeezebox Touch just fine) Instructions Step by step instructions are probably unnecessary for this simple project. I twisted the cables together lightly to provide a bit of RF rejection. It is worthwhile to also consider using shielded cable for this purpose. Impressions Initial impressions were that of a more detaled midrange and larger image size. Unfortunately, the high frequencies also sounded a bit hashy and the overall sound is quite grainy. In comparison, the stock cable is smooth, with a relatively laidback soundstage. The stock cable also sounds a little bit vague and the tonal contrast is lacking. After 10 hours of burn in, things got ...

No money for fancy power distributors ? Why not make your own ? I saw a very nice solid aluminum power distributor casing in one of our local electronics surplus stores. It certainly could not be considered as refined, but was made from solid 5 mm thick sheets and had nice cut out holes for US sockets and an IEC inlet. Choose your favourite sockets and your internal cabling of choice, and you are ready to go. In my case, I used the following :- 1 x Oyaide SWO-XXX AC outlet 1 x Hubbell 8300 Hospital Grade AC outlet 1 x Hubbell 5362i AC outlet 1 x IEGO gold plated IEC inlet Neotech 12 AWG PC-OCC teflon insulated solid core copper wire Raw materials before assembly.  Fit and finish is a bit rough Close-up of the Iego IEC gold plated inlet. Silver plated o-ring terminals are provided. You can also put in your choice of damping material, e.g. Fo.q, bitumen sheets. Feel free to put in other stuff like AC line filters (X-rated capacitors only please and make sure that your leads are well ...

Oh No ! Not another capacitor comparison test ! Actually, no one likes comparing capacitors. Do we really have nothing better to do in life but to swap capacitors in and out of circuit, burning in numerous capacitors just to find out how they sound ? Right now, the stock Wima MKP10 output coupling caps in my Diva Audio M7 have been taken out and the wires soldered to alligator clips instead, to facilitate ease of swapping the caps in and out. Unlike some testers than undergo thorough and scientific methodology, there was no blind testing, or gruelling 500 hours burn in test. Neither are all caps of identical value because many of these caps just happen to be lying around for trial. But according to my calculations, all of the capacitors tested are large enough in value to not cause any audible degradation to the bass response in my system. I also happened to need to conduct some tests on the power supply, so some of these caps were used as a bypass cap in the last stage of the C-L-C po...

I managed to acquire an almost mint condition pre-owned Marantz CD6003 recently. Brand new, this CD player is priced at a modest SGD 388 in Singapore, pricing it in the mid-entry level category. Once upon a time, long long ago, a CD player of this build and sonic quality would cost at least two to three times the retail price of the CD6003. It's nice to see that the price of quality kit like this has come down over the years. The CD6003 is quite a handsome player and has good build and heft (slightly over 5 kg). The chassis is fairly rigid with a double layered bottom plate and compared to the SA8003, the immediate giveaway in cost cutting is an extremely flimsy CD tray. Based on the Cirrus Logic CS4398 DAC and Marantz's proprietary HDAM SA2 analog output stage, the CD6003 packs fairly advanced technology for a player of its modest price. An IEC socket permits you to play around with after market AC cords if you wish. Popping the hood yields no surprises, with three circuit boa...