3 ms·

Where did I say there aren't people who would pay for this? I said he couldn't make a killing. Depending on the price-point... if he offered it at $500, there

Where did I say there aren't people who would pay for this? I said he couldn't make a killing. Depending on the price-point... if he offered it at $500, there's probably a market of 25 people. $300, probably 50. $150, probably a couple hundred. I've owned about 20 headphone amps over the years that cost between $50 - $2500. Some of these amps have serial numbers in the double digits, many hand-built PTP tube amps, and the designers tend to be pretty transparent about the numbers sold, as many are headphone enthusiasts themselves and they come from the DIY-world then transition into small businesses. Very few of the small shops make anywhere close to a killing - most are just barely making a living doing what they love. There have been tons of Kickstarter-esque pre-orders threads on head-fi, where a well-known designer has a goal of selling something like 100-500 amps before beginning production and offers early-bird discounts. Usually the product in question changes the game in some way whether it comes to sonics/power/battery life/portability (if we're talking about portables). It's a poor assumption that novelty-factor is high on the list of an audiophile. As cool as this design is, what it does does not add any functionality or utility to the amp. At the extreme upper end sure novelty may become more of a factor. But even when you get to kilobuck amps the component and labor costs are still quite high, ie. the designer of a $5000 amp usually has $2500 sunk into the amp, and he might sell a dozen of them. And to do that, the company has to have a ton of cachet in the industry. There is a very large and active community around headphone audio if you're interested in this field... in excess of a quarter million members with about 10M posts - http://www.head-fi.org/ http://www.head-fi.org/. I've been an active member there for over 7 years and into this hobby for over a decade. I've hosted a meet with about 30 members w/ almost $100k in equipment. I personally have owned over $20k in equipment over the years. I think I can speak with some authority on this.

kragen 15y ago
"As cool as this design is, what it does does not add any functionality or utility to the amp." Well, it looks like you could drop the amp off a bridge, run over it with some trucks, and attack it with a blowtorch, and still have it work fine afterwards, as long as you didn't hit the jacks directly with the blowtorch. That may not be functionality you're interested in, but I think it probably counts as added functionality!
- TylerE 15y ago
  It might LOOK that way, but I suspect it's more likely the opposite is true. If this device landed on a hard surface it would be a very high deceleration, as there is no way for it to deform and absorb the energy. A device of more traditional construction can deform and actually stress the components much less. If the outer case could deform even a few mm on impact (which most consumer plastics would instantly rebound from), that could mean the difference between a 100g deceleration and a 2000g deceleration.
  - kragen 15y ago
    This kind of encapsulation, filling the empty spaces in the device with a thermoset resin, is called "potting", and it's been used for decades to improve the shock, vibration, and impact resistance of electronic circuits. It's true that the actual deceleration experienced by the components is much greater, and potting is not without its problems (a friend of mine told me about a problem he tracked down at his company in the 1970s, where potting in too-hard epoxy caused many of their circuits to fail in the field due to a sort of thermal shock), but it does generally work. The issue is that acceleration in itself doesn't damage chips, capacitors, resistors, etc. What happens is that the things that hold those components in place — their leads — experience large forces from trying to hold those components in their relative position. Those forces are generally greatly reduced by potting. There are probably exceptions. It wouldn't be surprising if MEMS gyroscopes and accelerometers were more subject to damage after potting.

kragen 15y ago

"As cool as this design is, what it does does not add any functionality or utility to the amp." Well, it looks like you could drop the amp off a bridge, run over it with some trucks, and attack it with a blowtorch, and still have it work fine afterwards, as long as you didn't hit the jacks directly with the blowtorch. That may not be functionality you're interested in, but I think it probably counts as added functionality!

TylerE 15y ago
It might LOOK that way, but I suspect it's more likely the opposite is true. If this device landed on a hard surface it would be a very high deceleration, as there is no way for it to deform and absorb the energy. A device of more traditional construction can deform and actually stress the components much less. If the outer case could deform even a few mm on impact (which most consumer plastics would instantly rebound from), that could mean the difference between a 100g deceleration and a 2000g deceleration.
- kragen 15y ago
  This kind of encapsulation, filling the empty spaces in the device with a thermoset resin, is called "potting", and it's been used for decades to improve the shock, vibration, and impact resistance of electronic circuits. It's true that the actual deceleration experienced by the components is much greater, and potting is not without its problems (a friend of mine told me about a problem he tracked down at his company in the 1970s, where potting in too-hard epoxy caused many of their circuits to fail in the field due to a sort of thermal shock), but it does generally work. The issue is that acceleration in itself doesn't damage chips, capacitors, resistors, etc. What happens is that the things that hold those components in place — their leads — experience large forces from trying to hold those components in their relative position. Those forces are generally greatly reduced by potting. There are probably exceptions. It wouldn't be surprising if MEMS gyroscopes and accelerometers were more subject to damage after potting.