- Joined
- Jan 14, 2011
- Messages
- 74,244
- Location
- Gillette, Wyo.
- Tagline
- Halfbiass...Electron Herder and Backass Woof
My Father's Continuing Saga........
- Thread starter Phase Linear Phanatic
- Start date
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
Yep. I’m fighting the temptation right now. It’s more like 11 amps. The ninth is sitting there on top of boxes (above) and my brother saw fit to remind me of HIS two. Sooo I’d surely be busy for a while. And broke. I’ll steal one of Lee’s quoted lines....
“You’ve not reached the point of diminishing returns, you’ve just ran out of money”......
“You’ve not reached the point of diminishing returns, you’ve just ran out of money”......
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
Alright. So Joes Rev C Light Board FINALLY showed up two weeks ago. My fathers old Rev A. Board came out and the one I ordered December 4th (Rev C) went in. With almost 70hour work weeks I just haven't been able to get to it and other matters a couple weekends shot that. But TODAY I finally COMPLETED this thing.
First off: The Optional VU Meter attenuation switch; I decided to place in a good locale under the speaker posts between the RCA's. Logic dictated this as well as a Vote by the wife and brother. Two main reasons. One, you will NOT be fidgeting with the toggle between speaker posts where wires are in the way and the speaker wires may get messed with from hooking and unhooking in the future; whereas you more than likely will not be doing so with the pre-amp RCA's. These are the only two places in the back of a 400 that will work.
Second, If you should consider a wood case; and you mounted the thing on the SIDE; then you're boned, cause now you can't access it on a whim. I put the case on the amp and could still feel my way to the switch. The LAST thing I want to do is DRILL into the factory faceplate and stick an attenuator pot there. It just doesn't look right on the 400's IMHO. I prefer the discrete switch Joe recommended.
I also did NOT want to de-solder his pins and hard-wire in my own. I REALLY like his plugs. It's WAY cleaner of a look and simple to unhook since you can't do so at the switch. The STAND-OFFS came in also that I ordered and I used them to lift Don's DC protect Board up and thus; made room for my switch. I think it looks like it should be there more than any other option. I hope the whole bundle becomes a "Kit" for Joe to offer potential builders should a customer or (them) desire one. Fo ME it doesn't matter since I only have 700B's; but this amp is for my Father and I wanted him to have ALL the bells and whistles. All the BEST of the BEST in this amp, no option unchosen.
My brother made a good point. "Meter illumination....why can't you add a switch to adjust that so you don't have to take the amp apart to change it?" Well.......I said, at this point why don't we just call it a White Oak PL400B? A new faceplate that you'd have to have FIVE knobs?? 1.Power, 2.Meter Attenuation, 3.Brightness Control, 4.Left Channel Gain, 5.Right Channel Gain. I mean if we follow that logic, lets just do it ALL?? I'm sure someone out there would go to the trouble?
I think this will be fine. No alteration of the face. That's as humble as a PL400 needs to be. Below are my pictures of the Final-FINAL build. After this; the amp will take a trip to my father. BUT, because of COVID....he's not willing to allow anyone over until round#2 of vaccines happen and he gets it. So I haven't physically seen him since I can't recall, and he's sticking to that. Soooooo a couple weeks into March is the soonest I can get this amp to him. In the mean-time......I'll enjoy if FOR him. I shall update this posting once the trip has been made. See below for Meter Switch and Light Board final Installation........
First off: The Optional VU Meter attenuation switch; I decided to place in a good locale under the speaker posts between the RCA's. Logic dictated this as well as a Vote by the wife and brother. Two main reasons. One, you will NOT be fidgeting with the toggle between speaker posts where wires are in the way and the speaker wires may get messed with from hooking and unhooking in the future; whereas you more than likely will not be doing so with the pre-amp RCA's. These are the only two places in the back of a 400 that will work.
Second, If you should consider a wood case; and you mounted the thing on the SIDE; then you're boned, cause now you can't access it on a whim. I put the case on the amp and could still feel my way to the switch. The LAST thing I want to do is DRILL into the factory faceplate and stick an attenuator pot there. It just doesn't look right on the 400's IMHO. I prefer the discrete switch Joe recommended.
I also did NOT want to de-solder his pins and hard-wire in my own. I REALLY like his plugs. It's WAY cleaner of a look and simple to unhook since you can't do so at the switch. The STAND-OFFS came in also that I ordered and I used them to lift Don's DC protect Board up and thus; made room for my switch. I think it looks like it should be there more than any other option. I hope the whole bundle becomes a "Kit" for Joe to offer potential builders should a customer or (them) desire one. Fo ME it doesn't matter since I only have 700B's; but this amp is for my Father and I wanted him to have ALL the bells and whistles. All the BEST of the BEST in this amp, no option unchosen.
My brother made a good point. "Meter illumination....why can't you add a switch to adjust that so you don't have to take the amp apart to change it?" Well.......I said, at this point why don't we just call it a White Oak PL400B? A new faceplate that you'd have to have FIVE knobs?? 1.Power, 2.Meter Attenuation, 3.Brightness Control, 4.Left Channel Gain, 5.Right Channel Gain. I mean if we follow that logic, lets just do it ALL?? I'm sure someone out there would go to the trouble?
I think this will be fine. No alteration of the face. That's as humble as a PL400 needs to be. Below are my pictures of the Final-FINAL build. After this; the amp will take a trip to my father. BUT, because of COVID....he's not willing to allow anyone over until round#2 of vaccines happen and he gets it. So I haven't physically seen him since I can't recall, and he's sticking to that. Soooooo a couple weeks into March is the soonest I can get this amp to him. In the mean-time......I'll enjoy if FOR him. I shall update this posting once the trip has been made. See below for Meter Switch and Light Board final Installation........
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
Below in the stack I tested my father's amp with the new board and switch installed. The highs the amp is on can now match the meter swings of the lows the 700B's are on thanks to the switch. Great for Bi-amp set-ups. And YES. I do love the show.
Also added, youtube links of the dim feature and switch addition tests. See below:
PL400 Rev C Light Board Dim Feature - YouTube
PL400 Optional Meter Attenuation Switch - YouTube
PL400 Meter Attenuation Switch Test - YouTube
Also added, youtube links of the dim feature and switch addition tests. See below:
PL400 Rev C Light Board Dim Feature - YouTube
PL400 Optional Meter Attenuation Switch - YouTube
PL400 Meter Attenuation Switch Test - YouTube
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2011
- Messages
- 74,244
- Location
- Gillette, Wyo.
- Tagline
- Halfbiass...Electron Herder and Backass Woof
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
Guys; thank you. Honestly.
I literally couldn't have done it without you. George, your pics were excellent, Lee your advice to my q's=perfect, and Joe. Bless Joe for answering my seemingly unending emails. Someone like me with OCD tendencies who REALLY wants to do a correct and thorough job, who has NEVER attempted a WO conversion before, WILL ask a lot of q's and he was a perfect professional individual to me through it all. We even got to test out the meter switch pigtails on my build. Very clean, and well done thanks to all of you.
March is near to us.....very soon I will be able to take this out to my father and get his feedback once I'm allowed to visit.
I literally couldn't have done it without you. George, your pics were excellent, Lee your advice to my q's=perfect, and Joe. Bless Joe for answering my seemingly unending emails. Someone like me with OCD tendencies who REALLY wants to do a correct and thorough job, who has NEVER attempted a WO conversion before, WILL ask a lot of q's and he was a perfect professional individual to me through it all. We even got to test out the meter switch pigtails on my build. Very clean, and well done thanks to all of you.
March is near to us.....very soon I will be able to take this out to my father and get his feedback once I'm allowed to visit.
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
So I finally made it out to my fathers house. Haven’t seen him in six months. I replaced all the bulbs in his Carver M500t’s while I was there, and after dinner we went downstairs to test the WOPL400.
First we listened to the existing PL400 with New WO bulk caps, everything else original. Then we swapped it out to the WOPL. INSTANT DIFFERENCE! My brother and I could tell. No contest. And my father could too. HOWEVER.......
We have a problem. We could not truly do the test. The stereo set-up he has now is NOT like it was three years ago the last timeI was down there. The once nice dual racks, (same as mine) that I set up for him have been ravaged, pilfered and taken down to one rack. He has stereo equipment of all types sitting stacked on top of each other (up to 4 things) with the actual glass shelves intended for the gear empty, cords everywhere, an equalizer that doesn’t even power up right coloring the sound that wasnt there before, the carver preamp is gone and in its place a Rotel RC-1580. The meter lights dimmed when the music got cranked. (Doesn’t happen at MY house) when tested. He surely has some power issues going on here. He’s using a 75-ft extension cord from halfway across the basement to a power strip. The pre-amp made the music sound like you had your hands cupped around your mouth. Or as to say the sound of the mid range being inside a tunnel. Apparently it’s the Pre. And IMHO all the OTHER issues. I also forgot my OPPO BDP-205, my test discs and my iphone connector (in worst case scenerio for test music). HE couln’t find the disc that contained the test song he wanted either, and when I tried to use what CD I had on hand in my car, it wouldn’t play on his Rotel CD Carousel. (Which needs to go to). What a bugger of a night.
We ALL agreed the Preamp needs to be replaced period. And FIRST. Before we can acuratly rate this amp. The RIGHT source material with the RIGHT source and I need to get all that muck he undid, REDID. lol. I need to double check his wiring. Apparently the last three years he’s been down-sizing amps and speakers and adding equalizers and other gear and it’s not even the same system I left him with. So yeah.........
We are right back to where we started. The amp is NOT the weakest link again. It’s all back to the pre-amp. He has cycled through the Rotel RC-1550 ( which I use in my system and sounds fine, but HE sold); The Carver 3,000 series preamp that blew up on him, and the Rotel RC-1580 that replaced it, which sounds terrible. (Online reviews back this up according to him). Remember he used to have the Audio Research SP-3 but sold it because of the high cost of replacing the tubes. He has not been pleased since. Now he’s looking again at the AR-LS2. Specifically because it has ONE tube to have to replace, and gets great reviews. But due to it’s expense, it’s on hold. Being only newly retired and on a fixed income, the time and $$ hasn’t been there to correct this. And untill he fixes the break in this chain, the review of this amp should as well. We cannot due it justice.
In MY system of 700B’s, the WOPL400 was bi-amped on the high end and it sounded INCREDIBLE! My fathers system sounded not even close. He needs some time to fix the other issues. BUT..... he DID notice the difference, and for now.............that’s where we have to leave it.
First we listened to the existing PL400 with New WO bulk caps, everything else original. Then we swapped it out to the WOPL. INSTANT DIFFERENCE! My brother and I could tell. No contest. And my father could too. HOWEVER.......
We have a problem. We could not truly do the test. The stereo set-up he has now is NOT like it was three years ago the last timeI was down there. The once nice dual racks, (same as mine) that I set up for him have been ravaged, pilfered and taken down to one rack. He has stereo equipment of all types sitting stacked on top of each other (up to 4 things) with the actual glass shelves intended for the gear empty, cords everywhere, an equalizer that doesn’t even power up right coloring the sound that wasnt there before, the carver preamp is gone and in its place a Rotel RC-1580. The meter lights dimmed when the music got cranked. (Doesn’t happen at MY house) when tested. He surely has some power issues going on here. He’s using a 75-ft extension cord from halfway across the basement to a power strip. The pre-amp made the music sound like you had your hands cupped around your mouth. Or as to say the sound of the mid range being inside a tunnel. Apparently it’s the Pre. And IMHO all the OTHER issues. I also forgot my OPPO BDP-205, my test discs and my iphone connector (in worst case scenerio for test music). HE couln’t find the disc that contained the test song he wanted either, and when I tried to use what CD I had on hand in my car, it wouldn’t play on his Rotel CD Carousel. (Which needs to go to). What a bugger of a night.
We ALL agreed the Preamp needs to be replaced period. And FIRST. Before we can acuratly rate this amp. The RIGHT source material with the RIGHT source and I need to get all that muck he undid, REDID. lol. I need to double check his wiring. Apparently the last three years he’s been down-sizing amps and speakers and adding equalizers and other gear and it’s not even the same system I left him with. So yeah.........
We are right back to where we started. The amp is NOT the weakest link again. It’s all back to the pre-amp. He has cycled through the Rotel RC-1550 ( which I use in my system and sounds fine, but HE sold); The Carver 3,000 series preamp that blew up on him, and the Rotel RC-1580 that replaced it, which sounds terrible. (Online reviews back this up according to him). Remember he used to have the Audio Research SP-3 but sold it because of the high cost of replacing the tubes. He has not been pleased since. Now he’s looking again at the AR-LS2. Specifically because it has ONE tube to have to replace, and gets great reviews. But due to it’s expense, it’s on hold. Being only newly retired and on a fixed income, the time and $$ hasn’t been there to correct this. And untill he fixes the break in this chain, the review of this amp should as well. We cannot due it justice.
In MY system of 700B’s, the WOPL400 was bi-amped on the high end and it sounded INCREDIBLE! My fathers system sounded not even close. He needs some time to fix the other issues. BUT..... he DID notice the difference, and for now.............that’s where we have to leave it.
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2011
- Messages
- 74,244
- Location
- Gillette, Wyo.
- Tagline
- Halfbiass...Electron Herder and Backass Woof
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
I honestly try. Him working for nearly 55 years tryin to raise 4 kids, keep a marriage, a big house and sending kids to private schools wasn't easy. 70hr work weeks were the average and I'd say he doesn't remember at least 30yrs worth of it. "Just a blur" as he calls it. The man needs time to enjoy life for HIMSELF for a change. Time to return the favor.............
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
So THIS week I went back to my fathers to celebrate Christmas. Now that the folks have had their shots; they've allowed the family and all the little kids to come back around with no fear of croaking. So the holiday was pushed off to this Saturday. THIS time I came well-armed.
I had my pre-amp, The OPPO BDP-105, my test discs, a portable soldering iron, crimpers, cutters, drill, nuts and bolts, 12AWG wire and ANY thing I could see myself all the sudden needing and not having. Brought the whole house with me. No more bad test incidents. First thing I did was look at what this sad look of a rack was plugged into. (Image Below) What did we have? TWO Giant Refrigerators and a dehumidifier plugged into a 15A dual Gang wall outlet at the other end of the basement with one of those multi-outlet converters. The extension cord for the audio rack was on that thing as well. Hell, just touching ONE of the fridges cords was hot. I can't imagine him trying to run a power hungry system thru that? Lest it be a Grizwald Christmas and fire hazard. Yikes. No wonder the meters dimmed at every bass passage? I tore that SHIZZ down lightning fast and sent that cord to an isolated outlet on its own breaker for the time-being. He really needs a dedicated drop there.
Next, I got rid of that equalizer, and then his preamp. We went from running a straight single PL400, to using the latching xover on the back of the speakers to bi-amp them, and put the WOPL400 on the lows and the Factory PL400 on the highs (that has Joes bulk caps in them. That's it). I tore out all that mess of patch cords going nowhere; ran new speaker wire runs, brought a handful of dual-gang gold-plated Phoenix bananna jacks so I could use 12AWG to the binding posts, and put the OPPO in-line at the bottom. Whew! Time to TEST!
He put in a song he likes to use for testing in the OPPO and walked over to the chair in the center of the room, sat down and turned it up, and the end result?........ and I quote................"TWO THUMBS UP DAVEY BOY"!!
Finally! He has now Admitted that a White Oak Audio Phase Linear Amplifier is WORTH the convergence!! As I fell to my knees and threw up my arms. Thank GOD the 7-yr saga is Over! And he would actually agree that it wont be ME flittin the bill for the next one. (The high end amp). We still have to address the Preamp. My Rotel was better, but it's still a weak spot admittedly. I am aiming for an Acurus RL-11 upon Lee's recommendation. Just waiting for a chance to acquire one. I'd like to save him the $1,800 on the Audio Research LS-2 he thinks he needs. I think if we can resolve that, then he'll be ready to bite the bullet and WO his other 400 in the rack.
Sorry I didn't take a pic of my handy-work AFTER I fixed all that up, but trust me when I say I wouldn't be 235 posts IN deep just to lie to you all.
Joe - AMAZING. The mans ears HEARD and that's all that needed to be said. DONE!!
I had my pre-amp, The OPPO BDP-105, my test discs, a portable soldering iron, crimpers, cutters, drill, nuts and bolts, 12AWG wire and ANY thing I could see myself all the sudden needing and not having. Brought the whole house with me. No more bad test incidents. First thing I did was look at what this sad look of a rack was plugged into. (Image Below) What did we have? TWO Giant Refrigerators and a dehumidifier plugged into a 15A dual Gang wall outlet at the other end of the basement with one of those multi-outlet converters. The extension cord for the audio rack was on that thing as well. Hell, just touching ONE of the fridges cords was hot. I can't imagine him trying to run a power hungry system thru that? Lest it be a Grizwald Christmas and fire hazard. Yikes. No wonder the meters dimmed at every bass passage? I tore that SHIZZ down lightning fast and sent that cord to an isolated outlet on its own breaker for the time-being. He really needs a dedicated drop there.
Next, I got rid of that equalizer, and then his preamp. We went from running a straight single PL400, to using the latching xover on the back of the speakers to bi-amp them, and put the WOPL400 on the lows and the Factory PL400 on the highs (that has Joes bulk caps in them. That's it). I tore out all that mess of patch cords going nowhere; ran new speaker wire runs, brought a handful of dual-gang gold-plated Phoenix bananna jacks so I could use 12AWG to the binding posts, and put the OPPO in-line at the bottom. Whew! Time to TEST!
He put in a song he likes to use for testing in the OPPO and walked over to the chair in the center of the room, sat down and turned it up, and the end result?........ and I quote................"TWO THUMBS UP DAVEY BOY"!!
Finally! He has now Admitted that a White Oak Audio Phase Linear Amplifier is WORTH the convergence!! As I fell to my knees and threw up my arms. Thank GOD the 7-yr saga is Over! And he would actually agree that it wont be ME flittin the bill for the next one. (The high end amp). We still have to address the Preamp. My Rotel was better, but it's still a weak spot admittedly. I am aiming for an Acurus RL-11 upon Lee's recommendation. Just waiting for a chance to acquire one. I'd like to save him the $1,800 on the Audio Research LS-2 he thinks he needs. I think if we can resolve that, then he'll be ready to bite the bullet and WO his other 400 in the rack.
Sorry I didn't take a pic of my handy-work AFTER I fixed all that up, but trust me when I say I wouldn't be 235 posts IN deep just to lie to you all.
Joe - AMAZING. The mans ears HEARD and that's all that needed to be said. DONE!!
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
- Joined
- May 26, 2013
- Messages
- 713
- Location
- St. Louis, MO.
- Tagline
- Born and Raised In The 700 Watt Club.
My father called me today out of the Blue. I thought he wanted to know when he was getting his pre. But in fact he was calling me to tell me how AMAZING and INCREDIBLE the white oak Phase Linear 400 sounded. I said “didn’t we test it and you said it was great”? And he said “Yeah but it was xmas and your mother was barking at me to get upstairs so I didn’t really have time to ‘Listen’ to it. The grandkids were runnin around screamin etc”. Well, he was downstairs this week cleaning up and just turned the system on for background sound when he noticed “hey, this bass response sounds incredible! Oh my God”. So it was brought to my attention that he was considering White Oaking the other 8-fin PL400. I won’t pay the bill for this one but I’ll lend my hand in the build again. Which is amazing because in the beginning he wouldn’t even consider doing a conversion whatsoever.
It seems no matter Who you are: one thing holds true. Once you hear a WOPL, you never go anywhere else. His mid and high end on his bi-amped system he says sounds harsh. Well that’s for two reasons. The pre-amp and the original guts of the other PL400. Once we get this second one converted, and the Acurus Pre-amp in....He says that’s all he’ll need. The equipment will outlive him. And 20 yrs is all he’s expecting. No doubt they’ll go for 40.
Hats off to Joe and White Oak Audio. Superior Preformance changing the minds of even the MOST indescisive doubters.
It seems no matter Who you are: one thing holds true. Once you hear a WOPL, you never go anywhere else. His mid and high end on his bi-amped system he says sounds harsh. Well that’s for two reasons. The pre-amp and the original guts of the other PL400. Once we get this second one converted, and the Acurus Pre-amp in....He says that’s all he’ll need. The equipment will outlive him. And 20 yrs is all he’s expecting. No doubt they’ll go for 40.
Hats off to Joe and White Oak Audio. Superior Preformance changing the minds of even the MOST indescisive doubters.
