DIY Desktop Headphone Amplifier For Cheap

Since early this month, I am back to work with this 'new normal' situation. In my opinion it is still not a normal condition which I should extra taking care all my stuff to be cleaned before entering my office or my house. I also immediately take a shower after going back from work, then I usually clean my house since no helper occupied during this Covid-19 situation. I am quite busy at work to be honest and also with extra cleaning job at home.

The point is, right now I had so little time playing with my audio stuff.

Few days ago I grab my audio gear again and play my favorite music. If you know my review here about the Beyerdynamic DT880 headphones, you know this headphones is not for my taste. The high frequency to sharp and somehow less engaging to the music. I do some mixed and match amplifier with this headphones and I got a suitable amplifier for it. It is not more than a Cmoy amplifier with regulated power supply. It is cheap to built one and I guess I should recommend you to do the same if you want your Beyerdynamic headphones sounds better.

The most interesting in this amplifier built is all components are in the used condition. They are taken from my old project. But some of them are brand new, such as Rubycon ZL capacitors, Noble potentiometer, Neutrik headphones jack, cheap plastic case, and the op-amp IC NE5532 from Texas Instruments.

The spirit in this build is a good and cheap desktop Cmoy headphone amplifier with no extra cost to spend.

For the power supply, I am using 2 transformer, each secondary is 15 volt AC. The DC voltage after the rectifier and capacitor is around 17 volt DC. The voltage regulator using in this project is 7815 for positive and 7915 for negative. The total voltage is 30 volt, same as per opamps datasheet for optimum output to drive high impedance headphones like Beyerdynamic DT880.

If you look closely the photo bellow, each diode is bypass with 10nF capacitor. This capacitor function is to filtering the switching noise from the diode. I put as much passive filter components I had in this project like this 100nF capacitor for bypassing the power capacitor after the regulators IC 7815 and 7915.

I finish the power supply section by connecting the wiring from the transformer to the power supply board.

After this step, I measure the voltage output and then I can go to the next step is the amplifier board.

The board is universal double layer, and it is cut tiny enough to fit inside the plastic enclosure.

I put all the amplifier components in this tiny board. The simple design of Cmoy amplifier doesn't require too much board space.

The Elna Silmic 220uF is for voltage ripple rejection and the input capacitor is using Wima 100nF.

I put the signal input with direct cable instead of female plug. This cable termination is 3.5 mm stereo jack for line input to the source. With this approach, I can keep this Cmoy amplifier build as simple as I can.

Technically this amplifier is already finish. I am going to test this amplifier for a while before I put and glued them together inside the case.

The power output and the sound quality from this Cmoy headphone amplifier using 30 volt power supply is huge difference compares with the portable one using a single 9 volt battery.

And this is the photo after all glued together. It is a finished headphones amplifier that become my recommendation for cheap but good sound DIY headphone amplifier.

Disclaimer: Any statement and photos in this article are not allowed to copy or publish without written permission from the writer. Any injury or loss from following tips in this article is not under writer responsibility.