TPA3116 / RuneAudio Project

[Bjarne]

Hi
What about this one?
http://www.yuan-jing.com/tpa3116-class- ... rd-50w-50w

Regards Bjarne

[Downunder55]

Hi
What about this one?
http://www.yuan-jing.com/tpa3116-class- ... rd-50w-50w

Regards Bjarne

It looks like the first red board that initially got everyone excited, http://www.diyaudio.com/wiki/TPA3116D2_Boards plenty of info on individual boards here http://www.diyaudio.com/forums/class-d/ ... 2-amp.html and here http://www.audiokarma.org/forums/showth ... p?t=574806 ...... many hours of reading fun !

Another board seeming to get a following at the present is http://www.ebay.com/itm/2-x-50-Watt-4-O ... 51c40ea5e7

People do all sorts of mods to "improve" the sound on the various boards as detailed in the links above, but a general conclusion seems to be that the Audiobah board sound fine as they are.

[Downunder55]

Although for those who don't want to tinker and a get a simple single sourced solution (integrated DAC & AMP) I think these guy's could be worth watching .....

http://iqaudio.com/

http://www.hifiberry.com/

[Bjarne]

Hi

About the Audiobah board. Does it need a preamp or can I just put in my Attenuator between the amp and dac?

/Bjarne

[Hove]

Sorry about the late arrival to this thread and the simple question, but how did you drill out a 16mm hole through the 8mm aluminium front face for the switch?

Do you have a milling machine, or is there a drill bit that can be used with caution?

In a similar vein, how would you drill the front face to volume knob diameter at the front, but volume control shaft at the rear?

The case from my last project 15 years ago only had a 3mm thick rack-style case, so the switch hole was easy and the second wasn't possible due to the thin case meaning the volume knob couldn't be sunk into the case.

Thanks

[skrodahl]

First reply @Bjarne:
No, the TPA3116 does not need a preamp. It sounds really nice by itself with a pot as a volume control. A preamp will take it to another level though.

@Hove:
I used a drill step bit. When I reached the desired hole size, I turned the panel around and drilled the same diameter from the other side.

Off-topic warning: I ordered a number of professionally made PCBs of the Audiokarma CNC MM Phono Preamp from a PCB manufacturer:

IMG_20141021_235214.jpg (137.4 KiB) Viewed 7806 times

IMG_20141021_235138.jpg (135.45 KiB) Viewed 7806 times

Apart from the variable input, it also has variable gain according to my post at Audiokarma.

They turned out really nice, it was a considerable improvement from the home-etched boards.

[Downunder55]

It would seem there is now a clone of the Audiobah board by Yuan Jing Audio http://www.yuan-jing.com/tpa3116-class- ... d-anti-pop

My new board arrived during the week, looks well made and I think sounds every bit as good as the original Audiobah, but dont really don't have the ability to do a real side-by-side comparison. The CAPS are physically a bit smaller, don't know if that means anything, they are RED so using a car analogy they must go faster !

Clone.jpg (252.36 KiB) Viewed 7767 times

The original is on the left

One thing to note is the input connector is the other way round so in my short listen to the board the channels were in fact reversed which wouldn't have helped in the comparison !

Still no progress on the other projects, too many other priorities unfortunately.

[matt]

My "red" TPA3116 turned up today,I'm still waiting for a couple of other things before I can get into my projects properly.
Anyway, I quickly hooked up some speaker teminals and my pi and grabbed a 19v laptop power supply I have lying around.Unfortunately the plug was too big for the recepticle on the board so I ended up using a 12v 1.5a supply.
Wow! I wasn't expecting much for $15,with only 12v and 8ohm speakers (admittedly with 98db sensitivity) but it certainly pumps out the volume.
I have only had a fairly quick listen and play around with it and my first impression is that it seems a little harsh on the highs particularly at increased volumes.
My speakers (Klipsh rf35) are naturally quite bright also, so they may not be a good match.
Is a beefier power supply likely to alter the sound at all , perhaps its straining a bit at high volume with only 12v?
I'll see what other power supplies I can dig up to try, I'm not gonna give up on it yet.
Happy to hear others thoughts or suggestions.

[skrodahl]

My "red" TPA3116 turned up today,I'm still waiting for a couple of other things before I can get into my projects properly.
Anyway, I quickly hooked up some speaker teminals and my pi and grabbed a 19v laptop power supply I have lying around.Unfortunately the plug was too big for the recepticle on the board so I ended up using a 12v 1.5a supply.
Wow! I wasn't expecting much for $15,with only 12v and 8ohm speakers (admittedly with 98db sensitivity) but it certainly pumps out the volume.
I have only had a fairly quick listen and play around with it and my first impression is that it seems a little harsh on the highs particularly at increased volumes.
My speakers (Klipsh rf35) are naturally quite bright also, so they may not be a good match.
Is a beefier power supply likely to alter the sound at all , perhaps its straining a bit at high volume with only 12v?
I'll see what other power supplies I can dig up to try, I'm not gonna give up on it yet.
Happy to hear others thoughts or suggestions.

How is your TPA3116 holding up? It really is amazing what you can get for very little money.

Many people are happily running their boards at 12V, but you should have more than 1.5A if you're playing at very high volume. I'm using a 19V/3.5A PSU from an old laptop, it works beautifully. The consensus seems to be at 19-21V for best sound quality.

I'm not a believer in "burn-in"... If there is such a thing, it's more likely to happen in the brain of the observer. The amp's clarity is amazing, and maybe that translates into harshness at the beginning?

[matt]

My "red" TPA3116 turned up today,I'm still waiting for a couple of other things before I can get into my projects properly.
Anyway, I quickly hooked up some speaker teminals and my pi and grabbed a 19v laptop power supply I have lying around.Unfortunately the plug was too big for the recepticle on the board so I ended up using a 12v 1.5a supply.
Wow! I wasn't expecting much for $15,with only 12v and 8ohm speakers (admittedly with 98db sensitivity) but it certainly pumps out the volume.
I have only had a fairly quick listen and play around with it and my first impression is that it seems a little harsh on the highs particularly at increased volumes.
My speakers (Klipsh rf35) are naturally quite bright also, so they may not be a good match.
Is a beefier power supply likely to alter the sound at all , perhaps its straining a bit at high volume with only 12v?
I'll see what other power supplies I can dig up to try, I'm not gonna give up on it yet.
Happy to hear others thoughts or suggestions.

How is your TPA3116 holding up? It really is amazing what you can get for very little money.

Many people are happily running their boards at 12V, but you should have more than 1.5A if you're playing at very high volume. I'm using a 19V/3.5A PSU from an old laptop, it works beautifully. The consensus seems to be at 19-21V for best sound quality.

I'm not a believer in "burn-in"... If there is such a thing, it's more likely to happen in the brain of the observer. The amp's clarity is amazing, and maybe that translates into harshness at the beginning?

Hi skrodahl,
I am now using a 19v 4.7a laptop power supply with my TPA3116. I haven"t bothered doing a back to back comparison with the 12v power
supply,
It holds up pretty well at higher volumes now but I still tend to think it's a little bright when loud, but at sensible volumes its simply outstanding.
I'll have to buy another one soon as I am nearly ready to put my projects together and I have this amp earmarked for my son.