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Post by imagemaker18 on May 22, 2013 12:20:19 GMT
Hi, All Have been absent a while. Some health issues with long chemotherapy sessions, but am surviving those, and thankfully feel better. During those long 4-6 hour long treatments, I found myself having to resort to bringing along playback gear of better than average quality to help keep me sane! Listening to music has been a true lifeline for me always, but this time the tinkerer in me started stirring. The idea of being able to carry my whole music library with me intrigued me, and during the times when, after having recovered some from the chemical assault on my body, my mind never let me rest. I started picking up and accumulating some iPods that were in less than perfect condition from eBay, popped them open (a no small feat, requiring patience, proper tools, and more brain than brawn, if one wants to keep from mutilating them), and started repairing and upgrading them despite Steve Jobs' beautiful, elegant and very clever bank-vault-like proprietary design, aimed to keep DIY'ers out, and entrapping them to be dependent on Apple Service Centers for even simple battery replacements, at $100 a shot! I have rebuilt and modded several iPods with various sizes hard drives. Modded 3 video iPods from 60 GB to 240GB (one of them for my wife, who also likes to carry my entire music library in mostly Apple lossless and WAV format. I am about to convert a Classic 6th generation Classic from 80GB hard drive to a 128GB solid state by adapting a 128GB CF Card via a CF to ZIF adapter. The card is a bit more expensive than the 240GB hard drive, but well worth it, for it will be impervious to knocks and bumps, unlike the hard drives with which one must be careful. Here are some photos of a modded 240GB iPod, opened, and assembled: Here is to a Long, Happy, and Musical Life! CHEERS!!! Israel
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Rabbit
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Post by Rabbit on May 22, 2013 15:44:38 GMT
Hi Israel,
Welcome back. I always worry when I don't see you and you seem to take it all in your stride!!
Now you see why I'm so keen on portable music. When you're away, it's really nice to have it all at your fingertips in pretty good quality too.
I played around with an O2 coming from Ipods. I have to say, I was very impressed. It seems very neutral, but the power ..... brilliant. It enables you to use a decent headphone properly. Battery life isn't brilliant, but when it's going, it's very good. Then when it's down, you just plug in and continue listening. It's fine.
So for me with the Ipods, I really liked the O2 going into any headphone I chose tbh. However, I have been using the Beyer DT1350 portable and even put the T50 and T40 onto it. (They take some driving, I can tell you)
You're very brave taking Ipods apart. Mike offered at one time to replace the battery in my Ipod Touch but ended up not wanting to do it because once he saw how thin they are, he thought he might damage it.
In the end, I found someone to do it for me. It is VERY tricky. Now my Touch is fine again. I also have the Classic and a few others.
The Touch is brilliant in that it is WiFi connectable, so I have Music stored in the Cloud as well, so if you go to a hotel with WiFi, the whole lot is there for you and you can download it to the Touch directly if you want.
They're expensive, but their functionality is brilliant. I don't use Itunes for it at all. I even download podcasts straight to it.
It's nice to be free of the computer (and Itunes).
Only thing with them is that the dock does put out very low level noise (digital artifacts I think) and you become aware of it if you turn the amp up loud. It fizzes and makes digital noises, even when not playing music!!! However, at normal volume, not a big issue.
I would love to get the digital signal away from the Ipod and put it through a decent DAC/Amp to clean that up.
Anyway, for good amping mobile, the O2 is pretty good.
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solderdude
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Post by solderdude on May 22, 2013 16:14:15 GMT
Hi Israel, Good to hear things are looking up again. Nice going with the 'upgrade' 240GB seems a bit small ;D ... only 19GB open space left . I only have 16GB tucked away in my Sansa though. With 320k MP3 that's still a LOT of music.
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Post by imagemaker18 on May 22, 2013 21:12:01 GMT
Hi Israel, Welcome back. I always worry when I don't see you and you seem to take it all in your stride!! Now you see why I'm so keen on portable music. When you're away, it's really nice to have it all at your fingertips in pretty good quality too. I played around with an O2 coming from Ipods. I have to say, I was very impressed. It seems very neutral, but the power ..... brilliant. It enables you to use a decent headphone properly. Battery life isn't brilliant, but when it's going, it's very good. Then when it's down, you just plug in and continue listening. It's fine. So for me with the Ipods, I really liked the O2 going into any headphone I chose tbh. However, I have been using the Beyer DT1350 portable and even put the T50 and T40 onto it. (They take some driving, I can tell you) Thanks for the welcome, Ian and Frans! I have been carrying my modded Denons with the mahogany cups to the chemo sessions, along with my portable Neco. Without Frans' active filter, which needs to be plugged in, etc... I miss the expanded FR on the Fostex HPs, so the former are an OK compromise. I am, however intrigued by the O2. Do you know of a good source for it? You know by now that I have learned to live dangerously! My motto has always been "It is better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all!" I also have an iPod touch, which, for some reason, I rarely use. Frans, you noticed that I really loaded up my Monster 240GB iPod. It is really an experiment in which I loaded thouands of HiRez photos to see how it can handle massive data. My other Monster 240GB has plenty of room left for music.
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Rabbit
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Post by Rabbit on May 22, 2013 21:24:40 GMT
I am, however intrigued by the O2. Do you know of a good source for it?
JDS Labs sell kits if you want to put it together Israel. I quite like it. Lots of power and the Ipods don't overload it which it has the potential to do with the way that the gain is designed.
However, it seems very neutral. The one that they sell is a strange shape - it's like a sideways amp in that the controls are all on the front, on the long side, not as is usual, on the short side. Not a problem though.
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Post by clausdk on May 22, 2013 22:38:41 GMT
Hi Israel So good to see you here also..
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Post by imagemaker18 on May 23, 2013 1:33:12 GMT
Hi Israel So good to see you here also.. Thank you, Claus! It is good to be back!
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Post by imagemaker18 on May 23, 2013 1:34:58 GMT
I am, however intrigued by the O2. Do you know of a good source for it?JDS Labs sell kits if you want to put it together Israel. I quite like it. Lots of power and the Ipods don't overload it which it has the potential to do with the way that the gain is designed. However, it seems very neutral. The one that they sell is a strange shape - it's like a sideways amp in that the controls are all on the front, on the long side, not as is usual, on the short side. Not a problem though. Thank you, Ian! I will check it out.
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Post by imagemaker18 on May 23, 2013 16:20:21 GMT
I am, however intrigued by the O2. Do you know of a good source for it?JDS Labs sell kits if you want to put it together Israel. I quite like it. Lots of power and the Ipods don't overload it which it has the potential to do with the way that the gain is designed. However, it seems very neutral. The one that they sell is a strange shape - it's like a sideways amp in that the controls are all on the front, on the long side, not as is usual, on the short side. Not a problem though. Hi, Ian I checked the JDS Labs site, and one of two ways they seem to offer the O2 is as a pre-assembled unit, or a PCB and no parts kit that I could see. I would buy the PCB if I could also obtain a B.O.M. from somewhere. I must have missed something, or not looked hard enough. I may have to do a little more research on the Internet, since this is an open source design. It would be fun to put something like this together. Frans, perhaps you happen to know, or have a B.O.M. for it? Thanks! Israel
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solderdude
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Post by solderdude on May 24, 2013 14:15:15 GMT
Frans, perhaps you happen to know, or have a B.O.M. for it? Thanks! Israel I do not have a BOM list but think it is the best documented amp out there and believe I have seen BOM lists from a few USA suppliers. All the info should be here: nwavguy.blogspot.nl/ It was developed in July and august 2011.
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Post by imagemaker18 on May 29, 2013 20:57:05 GMT
JDS Labs sell kits if you want to put it together Israel. I quite like it. Lots of power and the Ipods don't overload it which it has the potential to do with the way that the gain is designed. However, it seems very neutral. The one that they sell is a strange shape - it's like a sideways amp in that the controls are all on the front, on the long side, not as is usual, on the short side. Not a problem though. I contacted John Seaber, the CEO of JDS Labs about an O2 kit, which they sell for $89US, and the assembled one on a PCB only for $99US. Neither of these includes the casing or front panel, so I decided to get a preassembled O2 fully encased, complete with batteries and a wallwart, bench-tested (I hope) , and guaranteed, for $161US delivered. Of all the DIY'ers out there, who sell these, JDS, who looks to be selling a lot of amps, incl. their BBCmoys, the C5s, and the O2, appears to be a pro business, and seems the most experienced and credible IMHO. The reviews of their products are also quite positive. But, as a wise gourmand has once said, "The proof of the pudding is in the eating!" The O2 is due here tomorrow or Friday, and I will report after I have a few tastes of it with various HPs. The reason I decided to go the ready-made route is because at this point I have too many other projects lined up, etc. to start hunting for parts, case, front panel, and so on...So many projects - so little time! I am also a little tired after all that chemo. Had the last treatment yesterday, which literally wiped me out, and it will take me a while to recover from that whole ordeal! Cheers!
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solderdude
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Post by solderdude on May 29, 2013 21:06:06 GMT
Take your time to recover.
use the time to listen to music with the O2 and a few headphones and let us know what you think.
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Rabbit
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Post by Rabbit on May 29, 2013 21:10:14 GMT
I'm sorry to hear that, Israel. I don't know how you find the energy to do what you do in any case!! You're a lively patient to say the least.
JDS Labs are very good and the one I have is fine. Actually, I quite like it and it is a great solution for difficult to drive headphones. It certainly packs some power for a mobile unit. However, the price paid for the power is that it needs charging every 10 or so hours. Actually, I just plug it in when I feel like it. Of course, it works plugged in, in any case.
Biggest issue for me was the quality of the sockets on the front. They felt a bit rickety at the start but now, they've become a lot smoother.
It has a large amount of power which is great for headroom and to my ears, it's pretty neutral as well. Then again, most amps nowadays are pretty good in this respect tbh.
It is as quiet as a mouse in operation. Full whack - no hiss or noise comes through. My Ipods make more noise than the amp. It is seriously quiet. That's to do with the way that the gain is set up which can introduce distortion at full power with some sources but not from Ipods. None at all. In fact, I have had no problems whatsoever with it.
I borrowed one and liked it so much I got one.
It comes nicely packed in a sealed anti static bag. The UK price didn't seem too high with it built so hopefully, the USA price is the same? I have no idea of the value of dollars over there now.
Anyway, it does the job really well and is one of my favourite portable amps now. In fact, I'm listening to Arturo Sandoval on it at this very minute and the punch that you get from his album, 'Hothouse' is breathtaking.
Try some Sandoval - terrific player!!
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