Panasonic Electrolytic Caps different Series - Opinions

[abbey road d enfer]

This is becoming moot as modern powered speakers use active crossovers that if done in DSP don't even use any caps.

Not all. You'd be surprized at the number of passive components in high-end speakers.
A large proportion of stage monitors are passive, or even switchable between passive and active. Most fills are passive too.

I spent 15 years working at a "value" audio gear manufacturer (Peavey) and BOM cost mattered. Being good performance for the money is the crux of design engineering IMO.

I come from a different segment. The cost of capacitors is nothing compared to the costs of certifications, documentation and software maintenance.

 

[PermO]

Second floor on Cuyler. Sparrow mkII. There were a few versions. Great bunch.

Thanks man, love that thing !

 

[ricardo]

The most common happenstance being in passive speaker x-overs. IMO, electrolytic capacitors in x-overs are improper, period. Electrolytic capacitors should not be submitted to large AC voltages because they are definitely non-linear.

Here I have quite a bit of DBLT experience. High Quality NP electrolytics do sound different from Film Capacitors but there is no preference

(A DBLT is conducted in 2 stages. The first stage determines if there are people who CAN tell the difference reliably. You ask ONLY these people for their preference. If they have no preference, the DevicesUT are considered 'equivalent'. BTW, true golden ears, unlike da Audiophile wannabe Golden Pinnae, often say, "the difference is small and not worth noting".)

But the NPs we used were all specially made for us and very different from what's in da catalogues and available to DIYers or smaller makers. Those are quite laughable.

Rather than use NPs in an electronic circuit, I'd rather arrange for a 'small' long term voltage across electrolytics. That's why I like 5532/4s with their high input bias currents .. and hate OPAs with input bias cancelling.

The main audible characteristic of poorer NPs in crossovers is the ESR varies with level, time & temperature. So in a treble xover, the HF varied with signal. They were usually 'linear' (didn't introduce THD) but certainly not TI.

But speakers aren't generally LTI either. It's just convenient for us speaker designers to assume they are

If you are doing a passive xover below 1kHz, you are stuck with NP Electrolytics cos the large values required.

LTI : Linear Time Invariant. Buzzword liked by DSP gurus & pseudo gurus.
__________________________

Resuming normal service ...

The DIYaudio thread confirmed my liking for cheapo Aluminium electrolytics at -148dBV noise floor. (even $$$$ wet slug Tants come off badly in comparison)

I would choose 105C, long life, lowest $$$ Panasonic in whatever size you need. You can get low ESR simply by specifying a higher voltage without da new supa dupa technologies which often have hidden gotchas. Low leakage if you're replacing evil Tants.

 

[ricardo]

> Tants have 2 'types' of noise.

We tested them for 'popcorn noise.'

This might be what I describe as 'crackly noise'

Do you remember what levels you measured this noise? Was this present on all your Tants or just some?

 

[Whoops]

Hello,

For any interested party that reads this far in the future, compassionate condolences, the great cap debates/wars/quicksand are unfortunately endless

All kidding aside, I did the work, and found the answers that satisfy the “sound” question for me personally, in my devices. Wasn’t the first, won’t be the last. It was rewarding and revelatory and is an on-going process. I only suggest you can do the same.

Any truly interested party is free to contact me privately.

—Chris

Hello Chris,
you wrote a long post... But this is not a cap debate or war cap thread.
Actually besides the Brewery section, we try to not have any War threads around here.

I asked for opinions on the different Panasonic Electrolytic caps series, a simple and practical question because there's a lot of different series from Panasonic and not a huge price different in most of them.
Above all and as this is a community I wanted to know and listen to your opinions, experience and technical reasoning as to why choose one series over the other. That could help me to choose one series of Panasonic in my next order.

We are not here to discuss things privately, that's not the way this GroupDIY community works, we have threads and we all can share info and give our opinions, and everyone can learn from them now and in the Future. And also keep improving them as time moves on.
So if you have any relevant information regarding the different series of Panasonic Electrolytic capacitors please share it here.

 

[Whoops]

Sparrow mkII. There were a few versions. Great bunch.

Congrats for your work on that one.
It seems that BLA discontinued all their AD and DA converters, pretty strange. Do you know the reasons?

 

[JohnRoberts]

Hello Chris,
you wrote a long post... But this is not a cap debate or war cap thread.
Actually besides the Brewery section, we try to not have any War threads around here.

I asked for opinions on the different Panasonic Electrolytic caps series, a simple and practical question because there's a lot of different series from Panasonic and not a huge price different in most of them.
Above all and as this is a community I wanted to know and listen to your opinions, experience and technical reasoning as to why choose one series over the other. That could help me to choose one series of Panasonic in my next order.

We are not here to discuss things privately, that's not the way this GroupDIY community works, we have threads and we all can share info and give our opinions, and everyone can learn from them now and in the Future. And also keep improving them as time moves on.
So if you have any relevant information regarding the different series of Panasonic Electrolytic capacitors please share it here.

You named this thread "opinions"

The way the GroupDIY community "works" is loosely defined by Ethan's short list of rules.

relax, herding cats on the internet is impossible.

JR

 

[Whoops]

Hi JR, I'm pretty relaxed.

Don't you think that if MediaWorksOKC has some relevant info it will be better shared here than asking people to contact privately?

Well, I just asked him "please" to share here.
I would really love to know his opinion and experience, but here so that all of you could benefit and also everyone in the future, not just me by private message.

Don't you think that the info and discussions in threads are the foundations of a forum?

You remove the threads, you remove a forum.

I will not have any problem in a thread I started to bring attention, politely, that the discussion might be going out of topic if that's where you wanted to get.
People can then choose to focus and respect the initial subject of the thread or not. I will never cry about it, it's fine either way.
Although I personally respect the threads intentions and I'm quick to retract when someone calls to my attention that I'm spacing out. We all do that sometimes, without even noticing it or meaning any harm.

All good, Best regards

 

[abbey road d enfer]

Here I have quite a bit of DBLT experience. High Quality NP electrolytics do sound different from Film Capacitors but there is no preference

(A DBLT is conducted in 2 stages. The first stage determines if there are people who CAN tell the difference reliably. You ask ONLY these people for their preference. If they have no preference, the DevicesUT are considered 'equivalent'. BTW, true golden ears, unlike da Audiophile wannabe Golden Pinnae, often say, "the difference is small and not worth noting".)

Only once in my life I've been part of a DBLT. It bored me to death. All LT's bore me to death. Because most listeners listen to frequency response, which is the most fluctuating perception, and the most easily controllable. I concentrate on noise and distortion.
When in doubt with how it sounds, I choose the one that measures best.

But the NPs we used were all specially made for us and very different from what's in da catalogues and available to DIYers or smaller makers.
Rather than use NPs in an electronic circuit, I'd rather arrange for a 'small' long term voltage across electrolytics.

So what were the reasons for choosing custom NP's instead of readily available items?

The main audible characteristic of poorer NPs in crossovers is the ESR varies with level, time & temperature. So in a treble xover, the HF varied with signal. They were usually 'linear' (didn't introduce THD) but certainly not TI.

A good enough reason not to use them in this situation, in addition to tolerance and variation with time.

If you are doing a passive xover below 1kHz, you are stuck with NP Electrolytics cos the large values required.

Except for the previously mentioned DC protection circuit, I never had to use an electrolytic in a passive x-over.
One of my speakers had a 350Hz x-over transition between low and low-mid, which used 120uF caps. I used SCR film caps, not because they sound better, but because I had seen too many defective NP 'lytics before.

LTI : Linear Time Invariant. Buzzword liked by DSP gurus & pseudo gurus.

I hate gurus; they immediately block any possibility of a bilateral exchange.

The DIYaudio thread confirmed my liking for cheapo Aluminium electrolytics at -148dBV noise floor. (even $$$$ wet slug Tants come off badly in comparison)

I need to have a look at this thread. Which thread is it?
Problem is N/S ratio too high there. The two threads I found about caps there were like "midrange very forward, slightly grainy mids, blah-blah..."

 

[living sounds]

Rather than use NPs in an electronic circuit, I'd rather arrange for a 'small' long term voltage across electrolytics. That's why I like 5532/4s with their high input bias currents .. and hate OPAs with input bias cancelling.

But the polarity of the voltage the 5532/4 puts out all by itself ins unpredictable, right? This can bias a polar the cap the wrong way. I have a suspicion this accounted for some differences I was hearing...

 

[living sounds]

Congrats for your work on that one.
It seems that BLA discontinued all their AD and DA converters, pretty strange. Do you know the reasons?

I've got a Sparrow MK2 AD converter with very little use for sale, if anyone is interested. Shipping from Germany.

 

[abbey road d enfer]

But the polarity of the voltage the 5532/4 puts out all by itself ins unpredictable, right? This can bias a polar the cap the wrong way. I have a suspicion this accounted for some differences I was hearing...

The input pair is NPN's so they tend to drag the input offset towards negative. With some clever tweaking of the respective DC paths it's possible to use it for making the output offset predictable.
I think Ricardo's gripe is about opamps that include circuitry that compensates input offset current, generally with other consequences, which audio engineers don't necessarily appreciate.

 

[ricardo]

Only once in my life I've been part of a DBLT. It bored me to death. All LT's bore me to death.

Most DBLTs are flawed, including those by the false prophets Floyd & Olive. If I was testing, YOU would choose the music. You have complete control of the switching. You would be tested alone with no one else in the listening room ... I could go on but you certainly wouldn't be bored ... unless you are bored by listening to music you like under relaxed conditions.

Because most listeners listen to frequency response, which is the most fluctuating perception, and the most easily controllable. I concentrate on noise and distortion. When in doubt with how it sounds, I choose the one that measures best.

I think you would be surprised at what reliable listeners consistently pick as 'distorted' or not. Doesn't always correspond to what measures best.

So what were the reasons for choosing custom NP's instead of readily available items?

Readily available ones exhibit several audible (in DBLTs) faults. Some big makers still use these.

I need to have a look at this thread. Which thread is it?
Problem is N/S ratio too high there. The two threads I found about caps there were like "midrange very forward, slightly grainy mids, blah-blah..."

Richard Lee's Ultra low Noise MC Head Amp - diyAudio
Alas, you are right about N/S on diyaudio

 

[abbey road d enfer]

Most DBLTs are flawed, including those by the false prophets Floyd & Olive. If I was testing, YOU would choose the music. You have complete control of the switching. You would be tested alone with no one else in the listening room ...

I would certainly like the possibility to say "I don't hear a difference". People in listening groups feel obliged to hear a difference and utter an opinon...

I think you would be surprised at what reliable listeners consistently pick as 'distorted' or not. Doesn't always correspond to what measures best.

Some instruments (or voices) have an intrinsically "distorted" sound; I'm not talking of electric guitar, but some organ registers, bagpipes, cromhorn, cymbalum, harpsichord...sound naturally aggressive and actually dampening treble may be taken for a lower distortion path.

Readily available ones exhibit several audible (in DBLTs) faults. Some big makers still use these.

My question is why did you use custom BP instead of biased lytics, since you admit a preference for the latter...

Richard Lee's Ultra low Noise MC Head Amp - diyAudio

OK, I'll check that

 

[ricardo]

I would certainly like the possibility to say "I don't hear a difference". People in listening groups feel obliged to hear a difference and utter an opinon...

It's the true golden pinnae who aren't afraid to say this ... which is good as I don't do ABX tests but ABC tests. ie 2 of the 'presentations' may be the same.
BTW, you NEVER tell the subjects what they are listening to. Da Audiophool wannabe Golden Pinnae are the ones who hear chalk & cheese differences in everything.

Some instruments (or voices) have an intrinsically "distorted" sound; I'm not talking of electric guitar, but some organ registers, bagpipes, cromhorn, cymbalum, harpsichord...sound naturally aggressive and actually dampening treble may be taken for a lower distortion path.

This is a HUGE topic and there are nuances depending on whether you are assessing speakers/speaker parts, polarity, phase, dither, electronics etc. I could write several books on this but one tidbit is ...
For amplifiers, the THD profile of the original 1960s JLH 10W Class A at about 0.1% is detectable & preferred. But usually, if there is a difference in amps, it comes down to overload behaviour and stability on different loads.

Many (all?) audiophool amps do nasty things on overload and have bursts of oscillation on parts of the cycle on real speaker loads .. all subject to thermal & signal history. No wonder they all sound different. They are NOT usually preferred to well behaved amps in DBLTs

My question is why did you use custom BP instead of biased lytics, since you admit a preference for the latter...

This was for EVIL passive speaker crossovers. In electronics, I prefer tweaking the DC offsets as you describe.
___________________________________
.. back to our usual programme ..

Electrolytic capacitor - Wikipedia
suggests Panasonic SP-UE, SVP & ZA ranges are 'polymer'

I have no idea if these have the audible faults described in the diyAudio thread for 'polymer' electrolytics but its probably best to avoid them .. especially as they are more $$$ than cheapo Panasonics

 

[MediaWorksOKC]

I'm truly interested, but my experience is that every time a capacitor could be "heard", it was because it was unproperly implemented.
The most common happenstance being in passive speaker x-overs. IMO, electrolytic capacitors in x-overs are improper, period. Electrolytic capacitors should not be submitted to large AC voltages because they are definitely non-linear.
In line-level aplications, used for AC coupling, they should be of a sufficiently high value that no significant AC voltage develops, which means using values much higher (50-100x) than the value based on -3dB response.

Indeed Abbey, I think and advocate that only controlled like for like, apples to apples comparisons considering proper implementation are valid and useful.

I too also replace electrolytics in crossovers with films, with notably pleasing results. Some designers did build some of the shortcomings of the electrolytic in to the crossover design but I can't see that making that much of a difference, a touch brighter perhaps with the film as the electrolytic losses are effectively now gone. Add a resistor?

Hello Chris,
you wrote a long post... But this is not a cap debate or war cap thread.
Actually besides the Brewery section, we try to not have any War threads around here.

I asked for opinions on the different Panasonic Electrolytic caps series, a simple and practical question because there's a lot of different series from Panasonic and not a huge price different in most of them.
Above all and as this is a community I wanted to know and listen to your opinions, experience and technical reasoning as to why choose one series over the other. That could help me to choose one series of Panasonic in my next order.

We are not here to discuss things privately, that's not the way this GroupDIY community works, we have threads and we all can share info and give our opinions, and everyone can learn from them now and in the Future. And also keep improving them as time moves on.
So if you have any relevant information regarding the different series of Panasonic Electrolytic capacitors please share it here.

Oh but it is... Kidding. I was was referring to the many thousands of pages of back and forth on capacitors out in the world waxing caps upside down inside out for/against the futility/utility of various types/brands/series that is available for the researcher to mine, some here are very familiar I'm sure and certainly others will find this thread in the context of all that.

I simply say that if someone is interested they can acquire a good handful of caps and test them in a structured way to see what they think. Yes, Panasonic are my very happily unexpected choice for electrolytic signal coupling, all else being addressed properly. FR primarily and, FC, if need be. Others have come to the same conclusion, from their own direct listening comparisons. Panasonic likes to discontinue their best stuff though.

Among other many electrolytic caps from Panasonic, Nichicon, UCC/Nippon-Chemicon, Philips/BC, Rubycon, I also tried all the usual audio suspects from NICHICON; KW, KZ, KA, FW, FG, ES, ELNA; SILMICS, CERAFINE, others I don't remember the names of, plenty of nasty old stuff too, Sprague, Frakko, Ducati, Rifa, Siemens, Tesla, Russian this and that, etc, some Nichicon had merit but ultimately didn't do what I wanted which was/is essentially nothing, KL came the closest to somewhat close. I just missed the Black Gate boat as I didn't really get started seriously with all this until they were finally actually being discontinued for real way back when and delivery was not guaranteed as prices soared.

I intend to test NHG in the near future but it's getting pretty long in the tooth at this point and could disappear at anytime.

That's all I know, that is, to get something and test it.

Regards,
Chris

 

[dyamakuchi]

I do not expect that dielectric difference to be audible to 90% of Peavey's customers

I actually have a lot of respect for several models of Peavey amps, and speakers. Those 115 Internationals we used at the one place were good enough for many of the serious jazz players that came through town. IDK what kind of caps

That one mixer that quit in the middle of the gig...not so much.

It's like Abbey_Road said: a lot of it is just setting up proper gain structure.

love that thing !

Thanks amigo. I'll try and do a successor one day...

what levels you measured this noise? Was this present on all your Tants or just some?

WAAAAAAY down. -12x dBV. It was a noise floor test. Most units were fine, but we screened for it in production. 1-2% maybe IDK. The solution was a quick swap of the tantalum in question in rework.

It seems that BLA discontinued all their AD and DA converters, pretty strange. Do you know the reasons?

Don't know, but it was ten years ago. It would be unusual for the programmable logic to be still available in the same package, pinout, etc. for that long. Just a guess. I was just a contractor doing a couple one-offs.

I've got a Sparrow MK2 AD converter with very little use

Can I get some feedback? Likes/dislikes? You spent $1500+ on it and you just don't like it? Or did someone beat our performance/sound? Help a designer out eh?

P.S. It's OK to be critical. Please