collinTHEbrewer
Active member
- Joined
- Jul 29, 2013
- Messages
- 35
In the last few months I've assembled 2 Hairball Audio Elements Coppers, 2 Hairball Audio Lolas, 2 DIYRE CP5s, and 1 CAPI VP28. I thought I'd post a quick summary for anyone interested in DIY 500 series preamp kits.
DIYRE CP5 ($150) - By far the easiest kits to assemble in the bunch. The guides are incredibly well written. It even comes with a simple component identifier so you can group your parts together quickly if you're not adept with resistor and capacitor codes. The PCB is labeled incredibly well. The payoff is pretty excellent. Clean pres with the standard features (phantom, pad, polarity) plus the added addition of the colour control. The colour module must be purchased separately, but it's functional without it. The final product feels of equal quality to the other kits, but cost much less.
Hairball Audio Elements Copper ($320) - This was the second easiest build to do. The main board was about as complex as the Lola and VP-28, but the op amps are pre-assembled for you, so that shaved off some time and components. All the Hairball kits have excellent build guides as well as well-labeled PCB's. I chose the Copper because it promises that Neve-ish character without the hassle of "staying true to the original" in every aspect like some preamps do. You get the standard 3 switches, a DI, gain and output controls, and, of course, transformers. This allows you to drive the Copper into saturation bliss. I also opted for the stepped gain control for more even control. That costs $25 over the stock $295 kit. The build quality is excellent, it feels sturdy, and the unit is completely shielded with sheet metal. I highly recommend it!
Note: The only complicated part is the base kit for each of Element preamps is the same across all models, so there are a few components that are different between the Copper, Brass, and Gold. Just pay attention to the BOM.
Hairball Audio Lola ($335) - This was a complicated build. You have to chose DOA options, and I chose the DIY 990's for cost purposes. Now if you don't know, the DOA boards cram a lot of components into a small package, and the PCB's are labeled about as well as they can be. However it's not super legible. Make sure you stick to the build guide on this one. Populating the Lola was straightforward. No real issues if you follow the build guide. Placing the attenuator and DI jack is slightly tricky as they are not flush-mounted to the PCB. With this preamp, you get all the features of the Element series with stepped gain control plus a dual DOA design complete with an LED meter. This preamp was a time killer, but if you look around the web, the Lola is getting a lot of love from engineers everywhere.
CAPI VP28 ($326) - This was the toughest build of the bunch. Compared to DIYRE and Hairball Audio, CAPI is lagging behind in documentation and the PCB overlay. It gets you there, but I found myself a little confused at parts. Plus the PCB overlay only gives you component numbers without component values. That's normal, but it requires you to flip through the BOM constantly. I ordered the kit with Litz wire output transformer and gar1731 DOA kits. The assembly was time consuming, but it was fairly straightforward. There are lots of components, but if you know how to read the resistor codes, it becomes easy to populate the PCB. Make sure you have a decent DMM handy though. It makes your life a lot easier if you test your components from the beginning. The final project is very sturdy. The finished kit looks and feels like an API preamp. If you're not scared of a little hard work, this preamp is a joy. It has the standard 3 buttons plus an output control, line/mic modes, and a HP filter with slope and frequency options. All-in-all, an excellent, full-featured preamp with amazing tone!
tl;dr:
CP5 - Easy and clean.
Copper - A little harder to build than the CP5, but #neve.
Lola - Harder to build than the Copper, but sooo goood.
VP28 - Hardest to build, but stands with the Lola in quality with a few added features.
DIYRE CP5 ($150) - By far the easiest kits to assemble in the bunch. The guides are incredibly well written. It even comes with a simple component identifier so you can group your parts together quickly if you're not adept with resistor and capacitor codes. The PCB is labeled incredibly well. The payoff is pretty excellent. Clean pres with the standard features (phantom, pad, polarity) plus the added addition of the colour control. The colour module must be purchased separately, but it's functional without it. The final product feels of equal quality to the other kits, but cost much less.
Hairball Audio Elements Copper ($320) - This was the second easiest build to do. The main board was about as complex as the Lola and VP-28, but the op amps are pre-assembled for you, so that shaved off some time and components. All the Hairball kits have excellent build guides as well as well-labeled PCB's. I chose the Copper because it promises that Neve-ish character without the hassle of "staying true to the original" in every aspect like some preamps do. You get the standard 3 switches, a DI, gain and output controls, and, of course, transformers. This allows you to drive the Copper into saturation bliss. I also opted for the stepped gain control for more even control. That costs $25 over the stock $295 kit. The build quality is excellent, it feels sturdy, and the unit is completely shielded with sheet metal. I highly recommend it!
Note: The only complicated part is the base kit for each of Element preamps is the same across all models, so there are a few components that are different between the Copper, Brass, and Gold. Just pay attention to the BOM.
Hairball Audio Lola ($335) - This was a complicated build. You have to chose DOA options, and I chose the DIY 990's for cost purposes. Now if you don't know, the DOA boards cram a lot of components into a small package, and the PCB's are labeled about as well as they can be. However it's not super legible. Make sure you stick to the build guide on this one. Populating the Lola was straightforward. No real issues if you follow the build guide. Placing the attenuator and DI jack is slightly tricky as they are not flush-mounted to the PCB. With this preamp, you get all the features of the Element series with stepped gain control plus a dual DOA design complete with an LED meter. This preamp was a time killer, but if you look around the web, the Lola is getting a lot of love from engineers everywhere.
CAPI VP28 ($326) - This was the toughest build of the bunch. Compared to DIYRE and Hairball Audio, CAPI is lagging behind in documentation and the PCB overlay. It gets you there, but I found myself a little confused at parts. Plus the PCB overlay only gives you component numbers without component values. That's normal, but it requires you to flip through the BOM constantly. I ordered the kit with Litz wire output transformer and gar1731 DOA kits. The assembly was time consuming, but it was fairly straightforward. There are lots of components, but if you know how to read the resistor codes, it becomes easy to populate the PCB. Make sure you have a decent DMM handy though. It makes your life a lot easier if you test your components from the beginning. The final project is very sturdy. The finished kit looks and feels like an API preamp. If you're not scared of a little hard work, this preamp is a joy. It has the standard 3 buttons plus an output control, line/mic modes, and a HP filter with slope and frequency options. All-in-all, an excellent, full-featured preamp with amazing tone!
tl;dr:
CP5 - Easy and clean.
Copper - A little harder to build than the CP5, but #neve.
Lola - Harder to build than the Copper, but sooo goood.
VP28 - Hardest to build, but stands with the Lola in quality with a few added features.
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