Your experiences with gainclones (chip amps)?

[roncagg]

I recently bought a used DALaudio chip amp (based around the LM3886 chip) with cap and resistor upgrades and I'm surprised at how gutsy it is - nice densely textured sound and bass slam without sacrificing resolution. I find it has great synergy with my 88db Gallo 3.1 speakers, which are typically underserved by such low power (this chip puts out 38w into 8 ohms). For preamps I am alternating between my DIY Pass B1 active buffer and a Niteshade passive, so no additional gain. Sounds great! And at $300 I can't complain about the ROI (and that price dissuaded me from going DIY, which many have done successfully). I became interested in this technology after reading the 6moons review of Clones audio products (also the topic of a thread on this forum). So simple and effective...

What experiences have you all had with these chips?

 

[joeinid]

Thanks Ron. I've never heard one and I'm very curious. Sounds like you got a great deal.

 

[socfan12]

Ron, good to see you here again!

Ditto, very interesting, Ron. Do you have a pic of the unit? Where did you pick it up?

 

[roncagg]

Bought it from Paul Folbrecht, he has another I believe, used them to bi-amp his horns. The upgrades from stock (which itself is only $340 new, see at DALAUDIO Studio LM3886 R3 Chip Amp STD 2-Channel Gainclone Amplifier) are:
1.) Nichicon CAPS Nichicon Muse (Black Gold ) (6 per unit)
2.) Takman Rex GAIN Resistors
3.) Billet RCA's CM-R1 DH Labs Billet Connector
4.) 5 Way Gold Plate Speaker Terminals

Gain is 27db

Pics are of front, back and in the context of the system as a whole (it's a small fellow!)...