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The Paul Hynes SR7


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46 minutes ago, Superdad said:

 

 

 

Well I don't want to rule anything out yet gents. 9_9  Compared to the crazy-sophistication of our UltraCap supply, doing a more conventional supply would be a piece of cake.  It mostly is a matter of physical design and doing what makes the most sense.  

 

Right now, our choke-filtered JS-2, with two user-adjustable, 4-level outputs and current ranging from 5A/5V to 7A/12V covers a lot of applications.  And the deceptively simple choke design competes technically and sonically at the top levels--with the likes of Paul's fine units.

 

What I would like to understand is what sort of power supply niche you fellows are looking for someone to fill.  If there was consensus on how many rails, what output voltages, and how much current, then at least that would give us parameters to sketch and calculate size, cost, etc.

 

At the moment I can't tell if some of you are wanting a 10A supply or a 3-4A supply.  One rail or four.  

I mean looking at the Custom Hi-Fi Cables DC3 mentioned, I see a $725 single fixed output supply offering just 1.5 amps and no real details about the regulator circuits and a lot of talk about fancy electrolytic caps. (Though I am sure they are fine units, much better than all the generic stuff that comes out of China.)

 

Now I see the word "custom" has been mentioned a bunch.  The geekier among you like to be able to specify all sorts of fancy upgrades and extras.  For any busy audio manufacturer--small or large--that way lies madness and I'm not going there.  Look no further than Paul Hynes or--and I don't mean to put him in the same pot at all--Light Harmonic, each with a dozen different customization tweaks.  It is a road to ruin!  Right now we build about 230 JS-2s per year, and I can assure you that while it is a reasonably profitable product, the labor involved (which includes parts procurement, prep, build, test, etc.) is extensive.

 

So I would much rather figure out what exactly is desired and build one model that covers those bases.  As I see it, with just the JS-2 and the 1.1A UltraCap LPS-1.2 (now 5/7/9/12V), there are two segments we are not now covering:

The 3-4 amp range and the 3+ rail 8-12 amp range.  Those would be two very different beasts, with very different price points.

 

Please tell us what you are really looking for and also what your applications would be.  Small devices?  Big ATX computers?

 

Apologies for crashing in on a Paul Hynes thread (I think the world of him and wish him well).  But since UpTone was brought up and since I follow the LPS market closely to try to understand user needs, this seemed like a good place to ask the questions.

 

Thanks,

--Alex C.

 

 

 

 

 

As Paul will no longer be making the SR7 or custom builds I'd be happy to use this thread to discuss what was being done for those builds to help UpTone create a model. 

 

I have some very specific ideas and will list them in the next day or so. I think we could narrow specs down to fulfill the majority of people's needs in a single model considering the LPS-1. 2 already fills an area of need. 

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1 hour ago, Superdad said:

 

 

 

Well I don't want to rule anything out yet gents. 9_9  Compared to the crazy-sophistication of our UltraCap supply, doing a more conventional supply would be a piece of cake.  It mostly is a matter of physical design and doing what makes the most sense.  

 

Right now, our choke-filtered JS-2, with two user-adjustable, 4-level outputs and current ranging from 5A/5V to 7A/12V covers a lot of applications.  And the deceptively simple choke design competes technically and sonically at the top levels--with the likes of Paul's fine units.

 

What I would like to understand is what sort of power supply niche you fellows are looking for someone to fill.  If there was consensus on how many rails, what output voltages, and how much current, then at least that would give us parameters to sketch and calculate size, cost, etc.

 

At the moment I can't tell if some of you are wanting a 10A supply or a 3-4A supply.  One rail or four.  

I mean looking at the Custom Hi-Fi Cables DC3 mentioned, I see a $725 single fixed output supply offering just 1.5 amps and no real details about the regulator circuits and a lot of talk about fancy electrolytic caps. (Though I am sure they are fine units, much better than all the generic stuff that comes out of China.)

 

Now I see the word "custom" has been mentioned a bunch.  The geekier among you like to be able to specify all sorts of fancy upgrades and extras.  For any busy audio manufacturer--small or large--that way lies madness and I'm not going there.  Look no further than Paul Hynes or--and I don't mean to put him in the same pot at all--Light Harmonic, each with a dozen different customization tweaks.  It is a road to ruin!  Right now we build about 230 JS-2s per year, and I can assure you that while it is a reasonably profitable product, the labor involved (which includes parts procurement, prep, build, test, etc.) is extensive.

 

So I would much rather figure out what exactly is desired and build one model that covers those bases.  As I see it, with just the JS-2 and the 1.1A UltraCap LPS-1.2 (now 5/7/9/12V), there are two segments we are not now covering:

The 3-4 amp range and the 3+ rail 8-12 amp range.  Those would be two very different beasts, with very different price points.

 

Please tell us what you are really looking for and also what your applications would be.  Small devices?  Big ATX computers?

 

Apologies for crashing in on a Paul Hynes thread (I think the world of him and wish him well).  But since UpTone was brought up and since I follow the LPS market closely to try to understand user needs, this seemed like a good place to ask the questions.

 

Thanks,

--Alex C.

 

 

 

 

Hi Alex

I will wait for you to let us know where you would like us to post our feedback.

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I agree on discussing this on another thread. Besides, there's not much we can do to help. What we were doing was simply spec-ing out the models we want. I've seen SR7's with single rail, dual rail, and multi-rail. I've seen dual regulation (two rails for one output). I've seen a 9-19v rail, a 2-12v rail, and all manner in between (heat is the limiting factor). I've seen one trafo per rail, or one really huge trafo for all rails. We also got a choice of which output module to use (S, HD, EHD), and IEC sockets, DC wire leads, etc etc. You can even choose your own custom chassis, which I did. Really what made this product special was that it was a journey. It was a bespoke tailored suit, not off-the shelf (which also makes refunds extremely difficult because someone needs to want your exact build). And as everyone knows half the fun of a bespoke suit is that it's yours and yours alone and nobody has something *quite* like it. I imagine many of us have overlapping opinions, but we probably arrived at them in different ways. I've had a lot of fun exchanging many PMs with different people who had bought their own SR7, and also got advice from Paul over a great many emails. It's been a hoot! But then again I have so many toys to play with that I'm really patient with my audio purchases...

 

As a product? I guess the real magic sauce lies in Paul's circuit and design, which we have no access to. Another thread is a good start; but Uptone could probably also contact Paul directly to ask if he wants to license his designs out for manufacture. He's done that in the past with other partners, though always with him fronting the business.

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1 hour ago, jelt2359 said:

I guess the real magic sauce lies in Paul's circuit and design, which we have no access to. Another thread is a good start; but Uptone could probably also contact Paul directly to ask if he wants to license his designs out for manufacture. He's done that in the past with other partners, though always with him fronting the business.

 

I agree and think licensing Paul's designs is a great idea.

 

 

 

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2 hours ago, Johnseye said:

I have some very specific ideas and will list them in the next day or so. I think we could narrow specs down to fulfill the majority of people's needs in a single model considering the LPS-1. 2 already fills an area of need. 

 

We'll look forward to that.

 

2 hours ago, The Computer Audiophile said:

I think the best place to do this would be in the UpTone forum or at least a new thread with a better title. 

 

Quite right, thanks.

 

2 hours ago, mozes said:

Hi Alex

I will wait for you to let us know where you would like us to post our feedback.

 

Any of you can start a thread in our forum I guess.

 

1 hour ago, auricgoldfinger said:

I agree and think licensing Paul's designs is a great idea.

 

As @jelt2359 described, a good portion of what everyone seems to like about Paul's unit is that they are "bespoke" builds, based on individual user selection of options,be they number of rails, output voltages, connectors, wiring, etc.  That's simply not a business I am interested in getting into at all.

As far as Paul's very fine discrete regulator design, it is hard for me to picture licensing of it to be economically viable--for Paul, for UpTone, or for the users, since profits need be factored in.  Besides, John Swenson and I are not convinced that absolute lowest noise is required for a high-current PS.  Very low output impedance and lack of kicked-back AC mains harmonics are also important and our simpler choke-filtered designed accomplishes that.

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4 minutes ago, Superdad said:

 

We'll look forward to that.

 

 

Quite right, thanks.

 

 

Any of you can start a thread in our forum I guess.

 

 

As @jelt2359 described, a good portion of what everyone seems to like about Paul's unit is that they are "bespoke" builds, based on individual user selection of options,be they number of rails, output voltages, connectors, wiring, etc.  That's simply not a business I am interested in getting into at all.

As far as Paul's very fine discrete regulator design, it is hard for me to picture licensing of it to be economically viable--for Paul, for UpTone, or for the users, since profits need be factored in.  Besides, John Swenson and I are not convinced that absolute lowest noise is required for a high-current PS.  Very low output impedance and lack of kicked-back AC mains harmonics are also important and our simpler choke-filtered designed accomplishes that.

 

I'll let you know once I've had a chance to compare my Paul Hynes to my JS-2 (probably late summer based on my position in the queue).  9_9

 

 

 

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I put my order (SR7 Power Supply in Streacom Chassis) here if any body would like to get it from Paul , i guess this order could be customized for you :

 

Main AC Voltage: 240V
SR7DRMR3XLFC9 (DR version, XL Version)
—» output 1: 12v , 10A module
—» output 2: 9v , 6A module
—» output 3: 5v , 6A module
FC9 Streacom (silver no optical slot) (SKU: ST-FC9S-ALPHA EAN: 8718469091010)
DC Cables:
60cm DC10FSXL (1PC) 5.5mm OD, 2.5mm ID DC adaptor jack (12v)
60cm DC6FSXL (1PC) 5.5mm OD, 2.1mm ID DC adaptor jack (9v)
60cm DC6FSXL (1PC) 5.5mm OD, 2.1mm ID DC adaptor jack (5v)

Sum : £3180

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3 hours ago, auricgoldfinger said:

 

What are your early impressions?  What have you compared to it?

It's still burning in but yes I immediately noticed an increase in SQ but, I guess that was to be expected as I was using a SMPS for my server and some battery supplies for ancillary equipment. 

Problem is I'm swapping things around and trying new cables etc so it's hard to judge how much effect the SR7 is having.  I might try the other way round and settle on a setup I like and then put back the old SMPS and battery PS's and see how much of a downgrade in SQ I get with the SR7 removed (hopefully a lot!).

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