Zen Variations 3 — Nelson Pass / 2002

In Part 2 we developed a new active current source for the Zen amplifier. In this part, we create a power supply regulator suitable for the Zen amplifier projects. Previous versions of the Zen amplifiers had no power supply regulation at all, or used capacitor/inductor/capacitor "pi" filters to smooth the ripple on the DC supply lines. In keeping with our philosophy of simple-aspossible, we want to develop a supply regulation system which gives us good regulation, with low AC noise and a stable DC value. The need for a good regulator is obvious enough. As simple as they are, the… More...

Zen Variations 8 — Nelson Pass / 2005

Thanks to a nice person on the Pass Labs Forum ( www.diyaudio.com ), I became aware that high current power JFET transistors are again available. You can check them out at www.lovoltech.com which offers a small variety of high current N-channel vertical JFETs in TO-251 and TO-252 packages. They don’t hold a lot of voltage 20-24 volts) or dissipate lot of power (69 watts, derated at 1.8 watts/degree), but they do deliver up to 100 amps peak. Clearly designed as switches, they nevertheless offer a linear operating region and are attractive for audio amplifier design. Small signal JFETs are routinely… More...