# Nippon Chemi-Con KMH v.s. Rubycon USR



## rockcod

I come across some Nippon Chemi-Con KMH large can caps. I'd like to use them in the power supply section of my DAC. How does it compare to Rubycon USR in terms of sonic characteristic?

 Also, would NM HR series (now discountinued) of Nippon Chemi-Con be a good choice for same purpose as well?

 I don't feel like paying $40+ for a BlackGate Standard


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## Tomo

Hey,

 I think if you are gonna replace with those mediocre (upper end of it), it ain't gonna worth your effort. 40 bucks is rather "cheap" for serious upgrades.

 Besides, I think those are what your DAC uses to begin with.

 Personally, I would go for something like this:

http://www.diyparadise.com/oscon.html

 Heehee. Kinda expensive, but if ye gonna go "up", ye gotta go "up" high. (Its ma opinion)

 T


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## AudioCats

black gates for power supplys? wow......

 What is so special about the black gates anyway? low impedance? low ESR? flat frequency response?


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## threepointone

generally, all you have to look at are the ESR specs and rated life at a given temperature--find the datasheets, and compare to the standard low-ESR audio caps, the panasonic fm/fc and the nichicon he/pw. The OSCONs and other organic electrolyte capacitors generally will also have pretty low ESR, possibly lower than the standard aluminum electrolytics.

 There may be other voodoo-based sonic characteristics of these caps, which is where the black gates come in, but as I understand there is no reliable way to measure/calculate such voodoo characteristics from a datasheet, so you're going to have to rely on your ears and/or subconscious to figure that out


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## nikongod

you may not want BG's for the PSU on a dac. 
 they have pretty craptastic performance once you get into the digital signal ranges which is where you want them doing the most work to keep that noise out of the power supply.... there are better choices for the PSU in a dac.

 for what its worth, a lot of what makes them sound so good in the signal path (imho) is that they fuzz out the stuff above the audio band. better to "fuzz over" the distortion and digital noise that lives there than to hear it anyways.


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## rockcod

Quote:


  Originally Posted by *Tomo* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 
_Hey,

 I think if you are gonna replace with those mediocre (upper end of it), it ain't gonna worth your effort. 40 bucks is rather "cheap" for serious upgrades.

 Besides, I think those are what your DAC uses to begin with.

 Personally, I would go for something like this:

http://www.diyparadise.com/oscon.html

 Heehee. Kinda expensive, but if ye gonna go "up", ye gotta go "up" high. (Its ma opinion)

 T_

 

Yes, my DAC comes w/ Rubycon USR and I am wondering if I can kick it up a notch on the cheap 
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




 Sanyo OSCON is good, but it doesn't have the value I need -- 470uf 160V and it's difficult to source in the States.


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## rockcod

Quote:


  Originally Posted by *nikongod* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 
_you may not want BG's for the PSU on a dac. 
 they have pretty craptastic performance once you get into the digital signal ranges which is where you want them doing the most work to keep that noise out of the power supply.... there are better choices for the PSU in a dac.

 for what its worth, a lot of what makes them sound so good in the signal path (imho) is that they fuzz out the stuff above the audio band. better to "fuzz over" the distortion and digital noise that lives there than to hear it anyways._

 

Understood, but this is for the analog stage which drives the tubed buffer.

 Please enlighten me on the better choices for the PSU.


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## Pars

Panasonic TSHA would probably be a good choice there, as they are low ESR for HV caps, 105C rated temp, etc., and in general very good caps. I assume you need snap mount? Blackgates are obscenely priced when you get into the HV stuff, plus they do not publish ESR figures, etc. (at leat what I could find). They apparently resort to depending on the name alone 
	

	
	
		
		

		
		
	


	




. I almost went this route on my tube preamp (to the tune of ~$500 just for parts), but sanity kicked in (as well as wife and kids to feed... hehe). More disturbingly, I have read recently (can't recall where), of a couple of people having BG WKZs fail on them at 1/2 rated voltage... not good for a $100 cap


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## NelsonVandal

Those Sanyo organic semiconductor caps aren't that expensive. I use one 100uF in one of my amps (together with common Al-E's). I don't know what good it does. I don't know if there is any audible difference between caps in the power supply of battery powerd amps at all. I haven't done any A-B testings. Until then (or until I've seen a decent report of someone else doing it) I don't believe it. People claim dramatic changes while burning in small amps with large caps (read RSA and Xin). I think it's habituation to the unfriendly sound signature of AD8397, AD8620 etc. How does power caps alter the soud of of battery powerd amp's at all? I'm not sarcastic, just willing to learn.


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## Seaside

A friend of mine used that big fat Elna Silmic II at power section, and he swear by it. He claimed the cap makes sound richer. I am not entirely agree with him though, it is possible that good cap can contribute producing clear power, i guess. 
 Isn't that placibo? Can I hear the difference? I am not sure. For me, I think any mid range non-crap cap will do the job at power section.

 If the cap used in audio section, especially in signal path, I won't use anything less than nichicon HE series. I generally do not use chemicon caps in amp. That does not neccesarily means they are bad. I used a few of them and I do not think I liked them. Don't know about chemicon KMH series though, KMG series made sound real crappy when I accidentaly used them in audio path. No detectable problem when used in power section.


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## threepointone

funny, because personally I wouldn't use anything less than the nichicon HE series for the power section, simply because they're not that expensive, I've got a stockload of them, and because low ESR is probably most important in the power section and usually unimportant elsewhere. 

 However, the audio section most logically would be more effected by capacitor quality, so they do need to be taken care of--it's just that low ESR isn't something that should make a difference in most circuits. I'd look at dielectric absorption/dissipation factor as the criteria for quality--but then again, almost all electrolytics exhibit pretty bad qualities with respect to these two characteristics (except maybe blackgates/etc, but you'd have to check the datasheets to make sure). This does get close to the audio voodoo stuff, so I usually don't bother much with electrolytics in the audio section. Actually, now that I think of it, most of the circuits I've made simply avoid electrolytics whenever possible, so I've never really had to bother with them.


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## looser101

Just found this today.

capacitor-comparison

 ~Renato


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## rockcod

Quote:


  Originally Posted by *looser101* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 
_Just found this today.

capacitor-comparison

 ~Renato_

 

Very interesting -- I think I am getting closer to that BG stuff. I can see my wallet getting thinner


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## NelsonVandal

Rockcod, I see you have a B22. With such a great amp (I assume), did you ever experience dramatic changes in sound signature/quality while "burning-in"? Did it ever sound bad at times?


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## threepointone

interesting stuff. That's the first time I've ever seen someone try to prove BG claims--I was reading through the blackgate tech notes, and they do repeatedly claim "reduced noise," though I couldn't find any measurements. 

 With that said, however, I think the same results (and probably better) might be achievable by paralleling a higher-speed cap, which is what is usually done in most audio power supply designs. Additionally, in the first test, they haven't specified exactly which line of nichicon cap they used (nichicon makes both good and crappy caps)--if that's a nichicon uhe/upw, then I'd really be convinced. In the second test, it looks like they're comparing two junk caps with a new one that has a higher voltage rating than the other two. Doesn't seem too fair, does it?


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## LawnGnome

Quote:


  Originally Posted by *Tomo* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 
_Hey,

 I think if you are gonna replace with those mediocre (upper end of it), it ain't gonna worth your effort. 40 bucks is rather "cheap" for serious upgrades.

 Besides, I think those are what your DAC uses to begin with.

 Personally, I would go for something like this:

http://www.diyparadise.com/oscon.html

 Heehee. Kinda expensive, but if ye gonna go "up", ye gotta go "up" high. (Its ma opinion)

 T_

 


 Chemi-cons are a very good manufacturer. Don't know what your talking about.

 But for power supply, I would look for capacitors with specs ideal for a power supply. Not an audio amp.

 Look for something with low ESR and high ripple current.

 A higher end 105C low ESR/high Ripple current model from Rubycon(non BG), Chemicon, Panasonic, Samxon, or Nichicon are pretty much the only caps I have/would ever use when I build/mod computer power supplies.


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## Tomo

Hey, RockCod,

 I would really need to understand the application of your capacitors. You tell me you need 470uF 160V capacitors. Depending on the voltage tolerance you need, you need different capacitors.

 For example, at 160V, BlackGates and Chemicon are one of very few alternatives (of electrolytic caps). OS-CON will NOT operate at that voltage. Most of the time, it is very difficult to find electrolytics in such high voltage range. (Internet makes it easy, but you see the price tags.)

 OS-CON operates below 20V. It is most commonly used in switching PSUs and computer motherboards. Those are going around 12-15V and motherboards you all know operate at 5V/3.3V. (OS-CONs should be operated some what lower than rated values.)

 I recommended OS-CON because DACs generally operate well below 20V. 

 Tomo

 P.S. We should probably do sound off on general use caps that we use. I use:

 Panasonic HFQ (Discontinued. Know any alternatives?)
 Elna Aurex (Cerafine's expensive but this isn't.)
 "TK UTWRZ" (Some generic Japanese brand)

 They work fine and cost me very little.


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## LawnGnome

A good place for cheap parts is digi-key. Have bought a couple hundred dollars worth of capacitors from there. Good prices and selection, and they ship products quickly and packaged well.


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## threepointone

good high voltage caps for a power supply are definitely always hard to find--it's not just OSCONs--many very, very low ESR caps, lower than the FM/FC/PW/HE caps we normally use for amps are available but they're typically rated for less than 10V and designed for motherboard supplies. So, just as a side note, if anyone has some low-voltage audio project (alien DAC, for example), you might want to also consider these low ESR motherboard electrolytics which aren't typically used for amp power supplies.


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## AudioCats

are those motherboard caps faster than normal Tantalum caps?


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## threepointone

They're probably as "fast" as any other electrolytic cap; as I understand electrolytic caps by nature only work better at lower frequencies. These caps (for example, nichicon HM/HN/HZ series) have impedance much lower than even the Panasonic FMs. I was just doing a bit of hunting for these caps before, and unfortunately it seems that they're not readily available from any of the usual distributors. Oh well.


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## rockcod

Quote:


  Originally Posted by *NelsonVandal* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 
_Rockcod, I see you have a B22. With such a great amp (I assume), did you ever experience dramatic changes in sound signature/quality while "burning-in"? Did it ever sound bad at times?_

 

There is little change in signature and the quality to continues to improve. Nope, it never sounded bad to these ears.


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## rockcod

Quote:


  Originally Posted by *Tomo* /img/forum/go_quote.gif 
_Hey, RockCod,

 I would really need to understand the application of your capacitors. You tell me you need 470uF 160V capacitors. Depending on the voltage tolerance you need, you need different capacitors.

 For example, at 160V, BlackGates and Chemicon are one of very few alternatives (of electrolytic caps). OS-CON will NOT operate at that voltage. Most of the time, it is very difficult to find electrolytics in such high voltage range. (Internet makes it easy, but you see the price tags.)

 OS-CON operates below 20V. It is most commonly used in switching PSUs and computer motherboards. Those are going around 12-15V and motherboards you all know operate at 5V/3.3V. (OS-CONs should be operated some what lower than rated values.)

 I recommended OS-CON because DACs generally operate well below 20V. 

 Tomo

 P.S. We should probably do sound off on general use caps that we use. I use:

 Panasonic HFQ (Discontinued. Know any alternatives?)
 Elna Aurex (Cerafine's expensive but this isn't.)
 "TK UTWRZ" (Some generic Japanese brand)

 They work fine and cost me very little._

 

The reason why I need such a high voltage cap is because my DAC has a tubed buffer which uses a 6922.


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