A Perfect Little 12v MAME Amp

[FrizzleFried]

I picked up a tiny little 12v AMP from ebay for the purpose of driving a pair of car speakers in my upcoming Capcom fighter cabinet. I won the auction a couple weeks ago and it was taking a bit of time to get here so I broke down and went with a Logitec solution for the fighter cabinet (CPSII running through the 2.1 system sounds kickass BTW)...

I figured that I'd use this amp, if it had enough power, to drive my Yamaha house speakers that I am using with my cocktail jukebox giving me the ability to finally rid myself of the large house amp tucked under the cabinet.

Well, when it arrived, immediately my hopes were dashed. The damn thing is tiny...about the size I figured... but not only was it tiny... it was light... ultra light. I mean, less than a pound kind of light. ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---... most "decent" amps have a bit of a weight to them. I figured this thing would have some serious issues pushing my 8 ohm Yamaha house speakers.

So I find a 12v transformer and hook the bad boy up. BOY WAS I SURPRISED! This little bugger can put out some pretty decent sounds at a pretty decent level! Surely not audiophile kind of quality and surely not "insane" kind of levels, but easily enough to power the juke... and it's 12vdc so I can wire it to a 12vdc line on the PS...and it's compact so I can get rid of that huge ass Yamaha amp under the cocktail so I can finally lower the damn thing all the way! W00T!

I paid less than $30 shipped for this thing...

http://myworld.ebay.com/export-genie/

Note that they also sell a version with AM/FM... I got the AMP ONLY model.

[2600]

I believe I have this one although not necessarily from this seller

T-AMP

Nice amp.  Class D or T and is why they don't need to be heavy.  This one gets some good reviews with the HiFi guys.  I think they both are about the same power rating.

Yours must be a bit newer though as I didn't see it when I picked mine up a few months ago and don't know much about yours.  Pretty good amps though.

[Nacimroc]

Just bought one! Saved me the hassle of looking for one! Ideal for what I need!

Thanks

[orion]

Just for the sake of product review, allow me my 2 cents. This company Lepai, makes some powerful little amps. They seem to only ship directly from Hong Kong or Taiwan for some reason, so it took a while for mine to arrive. I was also surprised as to how flimsy they are... they look as cheap as they actually are, but they do pack a punch for such a little amp. They are also easy to get into to hack, as I needed to relocate the volume pot on a jukebox project that I'm just wrapping up (which this was perfect for) They are about as simple an amp as you can get, which like. I was considering getting the T amp version as I heard it was audiophile quality, but I wound up getting one with Bose componets as it was the only version that would drive both 4 ohm and 2ohm speakers.  For the size and price you pay these things really deliver.


http://cgi.ebay.com.sg/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260433724099

[Ummon]

I think the PC speakers I have get pretty loud with good audio, and they powered sub the pushes the whole thing is maybe the weight of a 500-page hard cover book. In your case, it's just finding something similar in component that's DC. That stuff's out there, like you found.

[somunny]

I believe I have this one although not necessarily from this seller

T-AMP

Nice amp.  Class D or T and is why they don't need to be heavy.  This one gets some good reviews with the HiFi guys.  I think they both are about the same power rating.

Yours must be a bit newer though as I didn't see it when I picked mine up a few months ago and don't know much about yours.  Pretty good amps though.

I used the T-Amp in a project I built in 2006.  Good unit.

[sham69]

apologies for jumping in on this.
I have a cab with some speakers that were already in them, I decided not to use them and got some cheap ones.
If I wanted to hook up the existing speakers could I use one of these amps?
I am terrible at wiring etc, would there be much hacking involved?
How would I power the speakers?
Sorry for the noob questions.
Thanks
Sham

[MaximRecoil]

This is my preference for such an application (though it is more expensive than the amp you bought); the "AMP-100" from David Navone's site:



It is 20W x 2 @ 4 ohms; relatively small (1.5" x 3" x 4"); has gold-plated RCA jacks; is a traditional toroidal transformer based amp, rather than an "amp-on-a-chip"; and was designed by David Navone who is a legend in the car audio circle. 

Another nice thing about this amp is that it has speaker-level inputs in addition to the RCA jacks, so it could be used in any arcade cabinet with ease; just use the existing speaker wires for input, and wire the amp's output to the existing speakers (or get some better speakers).

[mlalena]

Just in case some people think car audio is the only option, there are now lots of opportunities for home audio parts:

Ex: This $35 2x4W @ 4 ohm amp runs off 120AC: http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=248-460
4Watts is low, but you can get 4x40 for < $70.

Parts Express is good for home (& shielded) speakers also.

[Finchbyrd]

Noob questions coming at ya! Which of these:http://cgi.ebay.com.sg/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260433724099, http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=248-462,http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=310-2048 will power these http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=9202631&type=product&id=1218057726500 without issue? I'm very behind on stereo stuff.

[orion]

Noob questions coming at ya! Which of these:http://cgi.ebay.com.sg/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=260433724099, http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=248-462,http://www.parts-express.com/pe/showdetl.cfm?Partnumber=310-2048 will power these http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=9202631&type=product&id=1218057726500 without issue? I'm very behind on stereo stuff.

Yes, they should work fine. Like I said I own the Pink Lepai one and it is pretty good. That one doesn't come with a power supply so, just make sure if you go that route you have a 12V 5A power supply such as this one http://cgi.ebay.com.sg/12V-DC-5Amp-12V-5A-Suppy-LCD-Monitor-Power-Adaptor_W0QQitemZ250488888311QQcmdZViewItemQQptZLH_DefaultDomain_216?hash=item3a524d1bf7&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14

Actually it can take 6v-18v and 5a-6a

[Nacimroc]

Just to warn people, I got one of these original ones the poster stated!  After 7 days he finally emailed me and said it will be 10 more days before its even posted, so in or around 1 month before (if) I get it!

[shatteredzman]

I bought a little amp like this from ebay. These are usually called motorcycle amps but in reality they are usually just crappy amps. They often claim to be able to push several hundred watts but a good rule of thumb I use is to divide the advertised wattage by 10 or 15 to get a good estimate of the amps max power in RMS watts.
I bought this amp for $10.

I used some crappy walmart sony speakers I bought years ago with this amp they are 15 watts RMS.
http://reviews.walmart.com/1336/4694343/reviews.htm
This amp uses a barrel connector but it did not come with a cable. I was able to find one that fit fairly easily and I wired it directly to the computers power supply without a problem at all.
It works great but the distortion is horrific at higher volumes or with the bass turned up. However I can turn the volume up with a decent amount of bass to the point where it is more then loud enough when standing in front of the arcade cabinet. This setup is definitely not desirable for a jukebox setting but the amp/speaker combo worked out great for my cabinet.

[MaximRecoil]

I bought a little amp like this from ebay. These are usually called motorcycle amps but in reality they are usually just crappy amps. They often claim to be able to push several hundred watts but a good rule of thumb I use is to divide the advertised wattage by 10 or 15 to get a good estimate of the amps max power in RMS watts.
I bought this amp for $10.

Yeah, those ridiculously high ratings are "peak" ratings at something like 10% THD and 14.4VDC input; which is meaningless. No one wants to listen to music at 10% THD. Anything above 1% THD is noticeable to the human ear.

Many manufacturers use RMS ratings at .1% THD and 13.8VDC input; and amplifiers rated in such a manner are generally considered to be "underrated", because (assuming an unregulated amplifier, which is the most typical) if you give them closer to 14.4VDC (the maximum voltage of a car electrical system before the battery boils over) and drive them to 1% THD, the amp will be putting out way more power than it is rated for.

An easy way to determine the actual maximum power of an amp is to look at its fuse size (or its recommended fuse size if it doesn't have a built-in fuse). Watts = volts * amps. So if you have a 5 amp fuse, then the amp can not put out more than about 60 watts total before blowing the fuse (5 * 12).

[mlalena]

Another thing to watch for is ILS (If Lightening Strikes) amplifiers.
Basically, it will push that many watts when it is hit by lightning.
I've actually seen car stereo amps with ILS logs on them.
http://www.caraudiobook.com/car_audio_amplifiers/car_audio_amplifiers.htm

[Sky Zero]

This is my preference for such an application (though it is more expensive than the amp you bought); the "AMP-100" from David Navone's site:



It is 20W x 2 @ 4 ohms; relatively small (1.5" x 3" x 4"); has gold-plated RCA jacks; is a traditional toroidal transformer based amp, rather than an "amp-on-a-chip"; and was designed by David Navone who is a legend in the car audio circle. 

Another nice thing about this amp is that it has speaker-level inputs in addition to the RCA jacks, so it could be used in any arcade cabinet with ease; just use the existing speaker wires for input, and wire the amp's output to the existing speakers (or get some better speakers).

I just got this amp in the mail today (haven't had  chance to look at it yet, still at work) and wondering wondering if anyone could give any pointers on hooking this up to my PC power supply or arcade cabinet power supply (running a Super Neo Candy 29)? I'm going to try and get it hooked up tomorrow before work. I'm a total noob at this sort of thing so any help would be greatly appreciated!

[bkenobi]

Did it come with a harness of any kind?  That unit has a 4 pin header that you use to power the thing (from the looks of it anyway).  If you don't have the harness, you will either need to make one, or open the unit up and wire around the connector.

[syph007]

Thanks FrizzleFried, just ordered one.  Was needing one and you saved me the hassle of looking.