[cjr888]

Few products that caught my eye lately and curious for others comments.

The first is the TriPath TIO.  This is a PC card with a TA110B Tripath chipset.  Has an on board customizable EQ, no need for drivers,  does not plug into the system's bus, and it meant to use the PC power supply, but I see no reason why you couldn't use your own.  Just use one of your empty slots, but there's no need for it to be tied to anything but your sound card or transport.  I'm not sure if these are even in production anymore, as literature and news releases are old.  I can't find a seller in the US, but have exchanged emails with a company in Finland that can provide them.

I think it would be fun to essentially do the PC as source, but including the amplifier in the unit.  A one box solution that you could do HD playback using a nice looking case like the offerings from www.ahanix.com, and power the amplifier from something other than the PC supply.

http://www.tripath.com/downloads/TIO.pdf
http://www.tripath.com/downloads/TioGuide.pdf
http://koti.mbnet.fi/hsaari/LRS%20Tutorials/TRI-PATH%20TIO.htm

One thing I have wondered is this.  People have been amazed at the little Powerwave unit, and meanwhile the Macintosh's out there come with a TriPath TA2024 based 16w amplifier built in.  Any Mac users out there care to comment?

In the same light, it seems like every LCD/Plasma TV maker out there is including the little TriPath amplifier modules in the TV itself.  Maybe this is how I justify buying the big LCD/Plasma -- just sell eliminate an amplifier, set of interconnects and cables, and whatever difference is leftover goes to the nice TV...  Hmmmm...

Then there's also the beyond ugly, beyong cheap looking Apex HT100W DVD Home Theatre system that you can pick up complete for $150.  So 5 speakers to use as paperweights, DVD playback, and TriPath guts, or the $300+ ugly Motorola unit....

http://www.thebuzzelectronics.com/item.asp?item_id=103887&scid=163
http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:eZqAYA3X4N8J:www.eedesign.com/pressreleases/bizwire/18517+teac+tripath&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Outside of the more well known little units, there's another one that interests me.

First, Teac offers the DR-L700 and AG-800 all in one DVD receivers -- amplifier, tuner, DVD/CD player, progressive scan. 40-50w channel setups.  In the same light as the Sharp and Sony units out there.  They are very attractive small units and are TriPath ased.  Transport is from RayMedia/RMC, which I know little about.  They go for $300-450, which isn't bad for a complete system, but there's obviously plenty of competition from Sharp, Sony, Panasonic, etc at this price point...and initially, these units are only two-channel, but HT capable.  On closeout, I'd be interested.  As a suggestion for someone looking for simplicity, I'd throw it out there, but no ultimate interest at that price.

The unit I am interested in is the A-L700P.  The receiver units are 2-channel, HT ready, and they offer the A-L700P as a surround channel amplifier to compliment the main units.  Just a 3-channel amplifier without gadgets.

Why does this interest me?

It appears you can use the amplifier on its own, it too is TriPath based, and it appears that you can pick them up for $99, just like the Griffin Powerwave.

From a quick glance, what differs between it and the Griffin?

It actually looks nice, there is actually space in the little chassis, and it comes with RCA's and binding posts.

http://216.239.41.104/search?q=cache:eZqAYA3X4N8J:www.eedesign.com/pressreleases/bizwire/18517+teac+tripath&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

Here's a link to pictures, both inside and out, including close ups.

http://www.ixbt.com/dvd/teac-l-700.shtml

I'm not sure which chipset the Powerwave uses, but the AG-L800 uses the TA2022 for 50w/6ohm, the DR-L700 uses the TK2050 for 30w/6ohm.

If the unit can be used alone, I'm tempted to grab one for the heck of it.  For $99, not having to futz with wires, having a unit that actually looks attractive, and if you wanted to mod it, being able to do some work in the existing chassis would be nice -- say installing a volume pot, a buffer stage, or say a Nixon DAC + volume control....or maybe using all three channels with some sort of crossfeed and three Omega speakers.........

http://www.jandr.com/JRProductPage.process?RestartFlow=t&Merchant_Id=1&Product_Code=TEA+AL700P&JRSource=google.datafeed.TEA+AL700P#productTabDetails

It sounds like my ideal system is talking Plasma makers into spending a couple extra bucks and putting higher powered Tripath's in the units, flanking them with those $300 Maggies and a subwoofer, and having an entire system that can hang on the wall and be 'OK' enough.

Last one -- anyone know about the DAC used in this Teac unit C-1D (below) that uses a 16-bit DAC?  Actually looks nice, and wondering if this could easily be converted to a non-OS output.
http://shopping.netsuite.com/s.nl/c.ACCT106601/sc.2/category.101/it.A/id.2198/.f

Thoughts?

[cjr888]

Sounds like there's a handful of people playing with the tripath receivers this week, but that some other people have purchased the little Teac's to toy around with.  Curious if anyone has attempted removing any filters or other circuitry from these smaller, lower power units in the same manner that RAM and others are doing with the Carvers.

By looking inside ( http://www.ixbt.com/dvd/teac/l-700/inside.jpg ) there's certainly plenty of room to work with, especially if you reconfigure the internal layout, and simple enough to transfer everything into any custom chassis.  

I may sell mine off and the little Sonic Impact because I don't have time to toy with them, but I'm still tempted to rip the guts out of the unit, and transfer them to a defunct integrated amplifier chassis, include a decent volume pot, and do some minor messing around with the unit..  Would certainly be easy enough size wise to also drop a little non-OS DAC directly in the unit..

With the total space of the guts of the unit, if you could heavily shield everything, it would be fun to drop them in a large HTPC case and have a full all-in-one receiver that in one box house hard drive as source, CD/DVD source/player, FM tuner, online station tuner, amplification, TV/DVD/ output, PVR, and depending on your soundcard inputs for anything else almost...

[ASi_TEK]

Hi,

The inside pic link above isn't working.

We are finding out just how good the Tripath chips can sound!  Absolutely spectacular!

These are fun little chips and can bring many fun projects.

These chips pretty much have a similar topology in usage, but the lower powered versions are pretty much all self contained circuits (gate resistors, power transistors and any diodes,,etc...)  so any thing that one would be doing to any of the Carver pro applications would be duplicated to a point here, but they all will require some type of output filters. These will be in everything soon, you watch! I wouldnt doubt that computer monitors will have them with built in speakers.

Sooner than you think they will be selling small LCD screens at the supermarket check outs  (of course with Tripath technology built inside them!)  

[cjr888]

Pictures can be seen here http://www.ixbt.com/dvd/teac-l-700.shtml if you scroll down.

As for this mention:

These will be in everything soon, you watch! I wouldnt doubt that computer monitors will have them with built in speakers.....Sooner than you think they will be selling small LCD screens at the supermarket check outs (of course with Tripath technology built inside them!)

If you peek around, you will see that the 20-25w TriPath configuration is already included in a large number of the LCD/Plasma TVs for sale on the market, as well as powering the Mac/iMac's out there.

Real fun would be a slim-line box (ala B&O style) containing high powered tripath or ICEPower chips, paired with the Magnepan MMG-W's.  Since you'd still need a source, the amps might as well be in the same place....  So modify one of the Sony all-in-one dream systems, power a crossover-less pair of wall mounted speakers for $299, and then drop $2-3k on a DLP or LCD.  You now have a complete audio/video system that takes up zero floor space whatsoever.  WAF with half-decent sound.

[mcgsxr]

I have a pair of the Teacs, though currently only using 1, awaiting the arrival of my preamp.

Here is a pic of the rear, showing the real binding posts, rca connections, and small volume (gain?) pots for each channel.

Yes, I did paint it black, all my other gear is black, and I will not be trying to sell them, I am interested to see where the sound goes.

[Tbadder1]

CJ

I'm in the market for a new MAC.  Do they come on all models, or just specific ones?

Thanks for any help you can give me.

Dan

[cjr888]

I'm not 100% sure to tell you the truth.  I know they were in the Power Mac G4's and advertised as such, though I'm not sure on the G5's.  If you put in 'tripath mac' without the quotes into google you'll get back pages upon pages of new releases.  Same goes for eBay if you have the search also search descriptions.

[cjr888]

Rather than starting a new thread, I'll tack on a previous.

After owning an EAR2, I try and keep an eye on new amplifiers and companies utilizing ICEPower..  One implementation I didn't catch previously, which has been around for a bit is in the Focal Professional line of active monitors.

The first thing that caught my eye was the digital input, equalization, and tri-amplification....using ICEPower, in addition to the fact that the speakers have a Palm PDA based remote control to control aspects of EQ, cutoffs, sweet spot, balance, etc.

Short story -- pretty darn slick.

The one thing that did throw me for a curve, which they do explain is that the tweeter is run off an Class A/B amplifier, and not ICEPower...

I only found one reference to price, that looked like around $3k though I may be completely off, and I have no idea if that's for one speaker or a pair.  Guessing for one.

http://www.focal-fr.com/gb/pro/sm/index.htm
http://www.focal-fr.com/gb/pro/sm/tek/pda.htm

Adam Audio appears to be using ICEPower in a couple speakers, the MP1 HiFi speaker and a few studio monitors as well.