Cases

At the request of Sound Projects BV - Bemmel, the Netherlands, we restarted research and development for a number of products from its range, after their Lead Engineer had left the company. The company experienced a period of R&D inactivity that lasted more than a year. We have redesigned a number of products, including the X-act version 2. After a discovery period of approximately two months, this floor monitor still appeared to contain a number of design and technical flaws.

A number of PCB design errors had been removed and corrected. The firmware of the DSP (Analog Devices ADAU1701) was improved, after this the entire production methodology was determined and included in a production manual drawn up by us. The next step was the actual production of the floor monitor, where we also supervised the production process.

That same year, the products were sold and exported to various countries in Western-Europe and Asia.

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For Hong Kong-based Audio Designs Ltd. we designed a fully discrete True Class-A RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America) Equalization Curve pre-amplifier for Vintage Moving Coil / Moving Magnet turntable cartridges, without the use of Integrated Circuits. After an R&D period of several months, we designed the electronic circuitry, the printed circuit board and the special internal power supply, that also consists exclusively of discrete components.

In addition to achive the best possible and precise reproduction, we also developed a unique RIAA curve calibration method for this device. It guarantees an RIAA curve deviation of less than 0.15 dB (20Hz to 20kHz). So whatever cartridge or interconnections are used, after the calibration procedure the sound reproduction is always well within RIAA specifications.

After extensive testing of the system for specifications and sound quality (studio listening sessions) with a panel of 'trained ears', the final circuit board and housing were developed. The product is now sold through Audio Designs Ltd. in Hong Kong – China. The complete system is manufactured in various OEM factories in Shenzhen-China for a number of OEM brands, under license from Audio Designs Ltd.

The product is sold in China its internal market, as well abroad in several Asian countries under numerous brands.

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In collaboration with SMP audio, we started developing an Audio Processor Board (DSP) that would replace an existing speaker design PCB, as part of a complete engineering overhaul.

The existing design still contained too many engineering errors and therefore it made sense to create a completely new design from scratch. The basic schematic design was improved, after which the new PCB was developed.

The existing firmware for the Analog Devices DSP was also completely redesigned and extensively tested. This improved both the technical specs of the circuit considerably, as also the filter algorithms working more efficient and effective.

The entire project took about two months of R&D.

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