Posted by Lew on February 20, 2003 at 07:15:56:
In Reply to: Re: Anyone heard of Chapter Audio Amps? posted by Al Sekela on February 16, 2003 at 14:40:27:
In addition to Al's erudite comments, according to the website, the Chapter amps use a switching power supply. The major advantages of such a supply are light weight and compact size. However, a switching supply can be problematic unless properly devised. (Again, a listening session is recommended.) Adding up its power supply with its driver stage, I would NOT say that these amps break new ground with respect to other ss designs or to tube amplifiers. For example, David Berning has been using switching power supplies in his TUBE amplifiers for some time now, and as for the balanced output circuit, tubes do it better and more symmetrically than the chosen FETs. Of course, NFB is nothing new either, nor is it a new idea to apply NFB locally (around each discrete gain stage) rather than globally (between output and input).