JE Labs

Wednesday, April 1, 2020

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly TDA1543 NOS DACs

In spite of its humble origins, I praised the musical abilities of the Philips TDA1543 DAC chip found in late 80s to early 90s budget CD players. Below are two affordable (under $30) Non-OverSampling DAC boards I sampled that use this ubiquitous chip.

Non-Oversampling 16bit/44.1kHz TDA1543 DAC Boards

Don't even consider the DAC board to the left, which can be found all over eBay

for $16-$20/shipped. Powered by this beefy linear wall wart PS, this is by far the worst-sounding DAC I ever heard! It has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. Enough said. 😣

For another $10 + the same linear PS, the DAC board to the right is a decent music maker. Unfortunately, it went out of stock as soon as it was delivered to my doorstep. Even if the Muse Mini TDA1543x4 (more info) sounded dynamically more appealing, this single chip'd DAC board seemed harmonically purer and more authentic. In hindsight, I should have hoarded all the units offered by that lone seller. 😆

!!!WARNING!!!

The voltages found in this circuit can be lethal! Build at your own risk!!!

Tube Buffer Circuit (one channel)

Since this TDA1543 DAC was configured with a passive I/V converter that already has a decent voltage output, I thought a med-mu 6CG7 tube buffer/cathode follower might mitigate the slight opaqueness in the midrange, improve both dynamics and the (lack of) definition in the frequency extremes - qualities which betray the budget origin of this rather musical DAC chip.

The Ugly 😄

Even if the TDA1543 was [and always will be] a budget DAC chip, the experiment paid off, taking this NOS DAC board to another level. 😊

Listen to lots of music, build a project or better yet, do both!
Stay safe! 🍻

Monday, March 16, 2020

Our Man in Japan - JP

The title is a tribute to James May's series on Amazon Prime. I've been a fan of this classically trained musician turned TV presenter, author, and journalist since his Top Gear UK days.👍

However, this blog entry isn't about cars, reverse engineering or fine wine. It's about the other man in Japan.😄

JP in Akihabara

The man is John Piro. Right before the COVID-19 outbreak, he chronicled the Japanese audio hobby scene to share with us. This came as a timely follow-up to my Tokyo adventure almost half a decade ago.

Tokyo Radio Department Store

JP's view of the basement from the escalator in early 2020

As I saw it in late 2015

The former Noguchi stall in the basement is now occupied by General Transformer Sales Co. Ltd or Gtrans. Based on this, we can conclude that Power Max is the transformer manufacturer formerly represented by Noguchi and now distributed by Gtrans.