Linus Tech Tips Pushes Audio Grade Capacitors

[legacy]

Oh, and seeing videos as an alternative to forums would be completely silly anyway.

I had a few words with a dude on Youtube today regarding this, but he seriously doesn't think so. And at the end, to avoid to feel depressed by such bullshit, I switched to a funny episode of "Because Science", where a crazy dude explains why we should put a small black hole inside Jupiter rather than applying the "Nuke Mars" plan.

Crazy theory, but crazy true, which no doubt is as useless as the other channel and based on bullshit, but if there are Bullshit and bullshit, at least here the intent is less arrogant, and offers you sane entertainment

[SiliconWizard]

Oh, and seeing videos as an alternative to forums would be completely silly anyway.

I had a few words with a dude on Youtube today regarding this, but he seriously doesn't think so.

The dude may think what he wants. He could also think that swiss cheese grows on trees. How is he ever going to justify that a monologue is equivalent to a discussion?
This would really be symptomatic of the relative schizophrenia of the way people tend to communicate these days.

[PlainName]

How is he ever going to justify that a monologue is equivalent to a discussion?

Video discussions merely involve reply videos instead of reply posts. The only thing videos don't currently do that forums do is thread the stuff.

I really hate videos for info. Sure, they can show how to do things which are tricky to describe properly, but you can't flick through or speed read them. Everything about them is just so slow. I guess the youth of today like them because they remove even the tiny effort of hitting a few keys.

[free_electron]

The AC coupling capacitors to the outputs and line in / mic, and front panel out / mic

People use headphones and external speakers, even computer monitors with speakers give a 3.5mm jack input option.

when is the last time you actually sent audio in to the computer ?

In all the years i have had computers i have never used the audio jacks.
i play back audio using built in speakers ( and they are without capacitors directly on the pcm class d amplifiers. )
headphones ? bluetooth.

Anyone serious about audio i/o does NOT use the on board hardware. They hook up MOTU machinery.

[wraper]

when is the last time you actually sent audio in to the computer ?

In all the years i have had computers i have never used the audio jacks.
i play back audio using built in speakers ( and they are without capacitors directly on the pcm class d amplifiers. )
headphones ? bluetooth.

Anyone serious about audio i/o does NOT use the on board hardware. They hook up MOTU machinery.

When you last time used desktop PC, not a laptop?

[legacy]

Video discussions merely involve reply videos instead of reply posts.

Youtube has not yet been structured to allow full comments. Have you ever commented on a video? More than two lines and you are out. Making a discussion is impossible, you cannot discuss anything, and this is not even the purpose of Youtube, neither Youtube is interested in "comments", they earn money by providing contents, therefore more videos they get, more money they make. And! more money they get this way more they are happy to not spend time and effort at implementing chat and better comments.

Comments are literally useless for making money, to keep the audience, to make a discussion, they are only useful to express brief likes or dislikes, but it's all what they mean, and nobody cares.

[legacy]

The only thing videos don't currently do that forums do is thread the stuff.

I do believe this depends on the platform you use to access the information and on the platform implementation itself. Do you use a smartphone? With a 5" display? Youtube is better than any forum on the earth simply because you can "listen" when you LCD is too small. And of course, you can even listen Youtube when you drive your car. Doesn't the platform care about "mobile devices", isn't optimized or capable of rearranging pages considering small LCDs? Yet again, forget forums because scrolling pages with your finger in order to read each line of the text becomes too annoying after 2 seconds.

[legacy]

Then we have a second order of problem: do you prefer to be active and actively look for information? (you digit something, and access something), or do you prefer to be passive and let the information knows doors at you?

In the second case ... the mailing list is preferred to the forum, unless you program Erlang agents, like on modern experimental apps on Facebook, to "collect" information for you.

This means also you need artificial intelligence to understand what you are interested in and manage the collecting of information in the background.

Note: Youtube has already implemented a kind of algorithms, collaborating with Google, hence they know what you are interested in, and they accordingly try to provide custom-driven contents.

[PlainName]

do you prefer to be active and actively look for information?

It's not an either/or thing. If one is in need of info right now for some specific purpose then there is no substitute for actively seeking it out. But at other times, passively digesting random info can be very productive and lead to actively learning about a subject. That's one of the things about Youtube that suckers people: you go there to see some video and get sidetracked by other things, then before you know it you're down a rabbit hole digging out further similar videos.

[free_electron]

When you last time used desktop PC, not a laptop?

I still use  a desktop. It streams audio over tcp/ip to a dedicated player. My headphones with microphone use USB.
I can honestly say i have never used the analog audio ports in any of my computers. Even when i had dedicated computer speakers it was a Logitech Z680 running a fiber link from a Soundblaster Audigy 2.
Even for video editing the streams all came over firewire or usb. Why convert that stuff ?
And now with modern systems most amplifiers are PCM so the pathway remains pure digital all the way to the speaker. They don't even need capacitors going into the speaker from the differential PCM output.
Even microphones these days are mems and spit out digital streams. Bye bye capacitors. There is not a single capacitor in the signal path from mems element to voicecoil.

[wraper]

When you last time used desktop PC, not a laptop?

I still use  a desktop. It streams audio over tcp/ip to a dedicated player. My headphones with microphone use USB.
I can honestly say i have never used the analog audio ports in any of my computers. Even when i had dedicated computer speakers it was a Logitech Z680 running a fiber link from a Soundblaster Audigy 2.
Even for video editing the streams all came over firewire or usb. Why convert that stuff ?
And now with modern systems most amplifiers are PCM so the pathway remains pure digital all the way to the speaker. They don't even need capacitors going into the speaker from the differential PCM output.
Even microphones these days are mems and spit out digital streams. Bye bye capacitors. There is not a single capacitor in the signal path from mems element to voicecoil.

Then don't you get that most people have cheap speakers with analog input?

[mcinque]

https://static.wixstatic.com/media/3e7c3b_e22dd850df9e4b3a9cc014778c2e4e38~mv2_d_2997_2000_s_2.jpg
Are those Rifa caps?  My ears deserve better!

Those voltage select jumpers... my eyes deserve better!

[Cerebus]

I went to Audionote.co.uk, the website that Linus says helped him with this video. One of their products is tantalum resistors (audionote.co.uk/resistors). Never heard of these and sounds bogus, so I did a google search just to make sure. The search only turned up audiophoolery sites. Audionote says these resistors are "tone-full components", whatever that means. Audionote also sells non-magnetic tantalum resistors, which the say "provide increased texture, a darker background and a greater sense of immediacy". I need to order some for my next project.

You didn't search hard enough. Tantalum Nitride (TaN) is used to make low tempco high stability thin film resistors. IRC (now part of TT electronics) have had a range of thin film TaN resistors for years, IIRC Vishay make some of their resistor networks in TaN too. Less moisture sensitive than the more common materials such as Nichrome.

It's not uncommon for components that are intrinsically relatively expensive (because of some legitimately necessary characteristic for some applications - like very low tempco)  to find their way into audiophoolery where the special characteristics are wasted. There's a fashion for using Vishay's high stability hermetically sealed resistors (£20+ each from Vishay) for audiophoolery where a 1% 100ppm/C metal oxide resistor would do just as good a job and clock in at a fraction of a penny in commercial quantities.

[free_electron]

Then don't you get that most people have cheap speakers with analog input?

yes i do ... but then why use audio grade capacitors on the motherboard if you are going to send it through crap amplifier/speakers ?
i'll put the most expensive high octane fuel in my trabant so i can pretend i drive a ferrari

[PlainName]

why use audio grade capacitors on the motherboard if you are going to send it through crap amplifier/speakers

You gotta start somewhere and it's jolly difficult, not to mention expensive, to have the best of everything everywhere in one hit. Start with one small thing and build from that.

[rjp]

I always think of the Gibson scandal when i see special Audio Caps.

https://www.mylespaul.com/threads/historic-gibson-faux-bumblebee-caps.118027/

50c cents worth of caps put inside fake fancy cases and sold for $100 and people claiming to hear the differences.

[dmills]

A good rule of thumb is to read "Audio Grade" as "Not good enough for anything that matters".

I design broadcast gear professionally and don't think I have EVER deliberately specified an "Audio Grade" anything.

Sure, a poorly chosen cap can be measurable (and sometimes audible), but really picking an elco big enough to keep the ac across it down to below 80mV or so (which is what it takes to get the distortion down to really negligible) is not hard.
C0G is mostly blameless, for up to maybe 1nF or so use them, stop worrying.
Film is a PITA on SMT boards, but PPS is available in SMT and works if you get the profile right.

The 'philes worry about caps and swap opamps because most of them are incapable of figuring out when the part matters and when what is in there is what should be in there.

 

[The Soulman]

I'll throw something in here:

Why do have electrolytic caps have limited shelf live?
How much dc bias voltage is there across a typical audio signal coupling capacitor?
What could go wrong?

 

[dmills]

What does the tendency of an electrolytic to dry out have to do with anything?
The reforming thing is a basically high voltage part thing, meaningful for power supplies in valve gear, and maybe dc bulk caps, but not particularly relevant for audio coupling.

I would typically expect a small offset (typically mV) if using the cap to block dc from a pot wiper or such, and no that will not cause the plate to loose its insulating film even if the wrong polarity. The chemistry needs move voltage then that to activate.

If it is being used to bypass a Vbe multiplier or such that might be different, or as a bootstrap cap, but for small signal coupling in most split rail audio? Meh.