Since I plan to buy some custom acrylic parts to make a rack for it so it doesnt touch my asgard 3 (both are warm so probably not good) was wondering if I need to think of a way to cool it…
I wouldn’t worry about extetnal fans for an amp unless you actually hit points where the thermals shut it down. And at that point, I’d probably just rec a beefier amp tbh. While it could help with mitigation, you’d be introducing noise into your listening environment and if they’re nearfield anyway then I have to imagine that you won’t be pushing enough wattage to hit limits either (unless the Swans are mad inefficient, which I don’t believe that they are.
Regardless. I’d wait and see.
Stick some RGB on it and we have “when gamer embarks on his first audiophile quest”
Honestly strapping budget fans to a mini desktop audiophile stand for a nearfield setting - is about as useless as a marzipan dildo. Importance of noise reduction > active cooling
Ironically I did look that up, since acrylic would be kinda cool that way lol.
Wont do it though since I cant think of a good way to deal with the extra cables that comes with LED strips.
Yeah the noise would be annoying…if heat is a problem I guess passive cooling via a copper heatsink or something like that would work better.
You could use two plates of acrylic on each level (aesthetics) and between plates place the LED in flat bottom rope like diffuser grid pattern so it bends freely and gives a look where it is floating up and down and it squares the plates off if you didn’t want to add some form of edging for stylistic purposes - it’s essentially how you make floating shelves. Buy those angled standoffs and just drill holes through the core if you have the wide ones or thread/glue/clip the jumper cables on the inside angle and it shouldn’t be visible. Power cable will just go down with the amp or DAC cables if you cable manage and you can use a smart relay so all comes on/off in sync.
I was pissed at the price of the topping cooling pads as I needed like 2 x 2.2m of it for my makeshift home office desk. So ended up making my own but using copper was going to end up too expensive - actually worked out cheaper using carbon fiber and sort of fit the build better as I was inlaying it into a metal border which one day I will finally fit into the oak desktop - but for now sits under & on top of the monitor shelf. I did actually consider using marble slabs or porcelain tiles as you can do that super cheap but was concerned by weight as already overdoing it so carbon fiber won out from that perspective also. I did spot a metal serving tray when I was being dragged around Ikea the other day that would work well as a ready made solution for smaller footprint amps and was super cheap.
To be honest I also raised the feet on the amps in some cases to get better airflow and that really would have been sufficient by itself / I over engineered a load of functionally unnecessary work for myself for the sake of prudential completeness, my Topping pissyness and desk build masturbatory aesthetic competition with colleagues.
I only have space for a single plate though. Plan is to have it placed like:
Top
Swan speakers (stacked)
speaker stand
douk a5 amp on acrylic plate
acrylic plate
asgard 3 amp on desk
Bottom
That speaker stand is not that tall so I am very closed to using upp all the height from the speaker stand top to bottom.
How much is the amp weight of the Douk / you may be able to get away with a thicker sheet and then routing the LED in if you have the tools - as know you probs have the skill level.
Speaker stands I take it are on the desk not on the acrylic rack… Your using the stand as a upper marker for your rack height…
Could you consider a monitor stand to raise it all up slightly? As that height looks like it may be tight for good air flow clearance on two amps stacked with just acrylic between if they run hot
I would need to raise the other speaker stand up as well then and that place is more cramped (in width) so I would need 2 different monitor stands one that fits this wider pic and the other more narrow one.
Just run a long skinny one across for accessories and keep the monitor arm attached to the desk (will cost nothing if you use some laminated board and legs…) (I’m assuming you use a monitor arm and not stand…)
I’ll try find a pic of a makeshift one I did awhile ago - bought metal legs for it usually used to hold up sofas off aliexpress that are 10cmish (IIRC) so your monitor would be able to extend over it at the height you showed, even when you include the board.
measurements are in mm again so would need so many of them and the fins would be downpointing which would mean I would need a bottom dispersion sheet also
Carbon fiber can be made to have different thermal properties - I purchased one treated/constructed (not sure how it’s done) that has improved heat conductivity
Edit: The knob on the switch feels GREAT, actually feels more premium than the JDS Atom knob… The buttons (for mute and switching) is a bit more convenient and easier to use than the switches on the JDS ol switch.
@Rikudou_Goku , sorry I couldn’t pull out anything better but I found this old pic which sort of shows what I meant (sadly not in Spain and London office & home desks are too integrated and not good DIY examples). In the pic you can see the left vertical monitor mounted on an arm to the desk but hanging over the skinny shelf so you just gain loads of space (which I have successfully endeavoured to fill up as revised the shelf into more of a pro audio server style angled 3u rack with a top that doubles as a monitor shelf) as well as hiding the cables. The shelf runs across most of the length of the desk rather than having to make two separate racks. So then the central monitor hangs over the shelf also from an arm mounted to the desk and I have some touch/drawing screens mounted under the shelf so it sits angled from the desk up to the shelf level. Something I couldn’t do without the shelf and when using the monitor stand.
If you decided to use laminated boards instead of solid wood the cost to construct would be cheaper/comparable to the acrylic rack.
