soapfoot
Well-known member
I was reading around in the Meta trying to gain some insight into good layout practices for laying out quiet audio power supplies. I'm particularly interested in tube circuits. I ended up raising more questions than answers.
In particular, on this thread: http://www.groupdiy.com/index.php?topic=22780 there was a quote from John Roberts which made me very curious for specifics. He says:
I'd like to know more about this, if possible, as well as anything else that could help me squeeze the last few dB of quiet out of power supply designs.
Again from reading the meta, I understand that the concept of "ground" can be misleading, because there can be many return paths that you might not necessarily want together. I see a lot of people advocate star grounding, but I see others maintain that certain high-current grounds should be located away from low-level audio grounds. I'd love to know more about what types of grounds should be grouped together, and what types should be kept separate-- and how they should be kept separate.
Another question would be-- what is the functional difference between two chassis grounds some distance apart on an aluminum chassis, and connecting those two points with wire or buss bar in a star-grounding scheme?
Also, the phrase "ground contamination from charging current" is interesting. I take this to mean that large charging capacitors can cause contamination of ground? I'd like to know more.
Thanks for any insight at all. There's a lot about this that's mysterious to me.
In particular, on this thread: http://www.groupdiy.com/index.php?topic=22780 there was a quote from John Roberts which made me very curious for specifics. He says:
In unregulated circuits this ripple can get into the audio via PSR, so in principle reducing ripple voltage could reduce noise floor, but as often as not ground contamination from charging current and PS layout will dominate, so as always, life is a simultaneous equation with many parts. Optimize one at the expense of another.
I'd like to know more about this, if possible, as well as anything else that could help me squeeze the last few dB of quiet out of power supply designs.
Again from reading the meta, I understand that the concept of "ground" can be misleading, because there can be many return paths that you might not necessarily want together. I see a lot of people advocate star grounding, but I see others maintain that certain high-current grounds should be located away from low-level audio grounds. I'd love to know more about what types of grounds should be grouped together, and what types should be kept separate-- and how they should be kept separate.
Another question would be-- what is the functional difference between two chassis grounds some distance apart on an aluminum chassis, and connecting those two points with wire or buss bar in a star-grounding scheme?
Also, the phrase "ground contamination from charging current" is interesting. I take this to mean that large charging capacitors can cause contamination of ground? I'd like to know more.
Thanks for any insight at all. There's a lot about this that's mysterious to me.