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In the Forum: Audio Discussions
In the Thread: Two-stages, hybrid, small, powerful class “A”?
Post Subject: Ridley Audio's Ridley Effect™Posted by Romy the Cat on: 5/19/2006

 Bud wrote:
Perhaps this link and the information trumpeted within will help on this project. Certainly the leader of this pack has solid credentials in HF switching power supplies, though this particular link is actually about roasting transistors in an Audio Amp... http://ridleyaudio.com/Technology.htm

Very interesting, Bud! I neither heard about this company nor hear their products. They do not say a lot what the Ridley Effect™ is all about. I have no expertise to assess how real it might be but I know that generally there is some sonic “kink” at high temperatures. Perhaps it is what makes tubes to sound sometimes interesting – the fact that we BBQ the electrons…. The “overheated electricity” usually sounds more “civilized” and less mechanical…

With Zarathustra everything is not known yet. I mildly fight with Dima regarding how much we should heat the Zarathustra output stage. He accustomed to the “SS that operates warm” as he mostly design AB-operating amplifiers. I keep arguing that 70-75 Celsius is perfectly normal oration temperature, particularly for the type of the heat dissipation that we use. Anyhow, he knows what he is doing and I am sure that in the end he will put the Zarathustra in the optimum operation temperature with respect to the sonic yield for the transistors we use. Still, the question is wide open how different the amp will sound at different temperature and what would be the sonic difference if would be change the stabilized operation temperature for 10 Celsius up or down. It will be very interesting to hear, I personally do not know who has this knowledge, as particularly regarding the different SS devises… I spoke with few people I know but I do not know if their experience would benefit Zarathustra as Dima uses his own ”different” ways to control temperature and bias.

BTW, do you know where is possible to hear the Ridley Audio power amp?

Rgs,
Romy

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