Cheap vs expensive ic's and trannys

[erynforrester]

Just wondering if there is a difference in quality/tone between and ic chip eg) 4558 that costs $8 and one that costs $1?
Same with trannies (not germanium etc) you can get 10 for $2 or one for $3 from different sellers  
Hope this post makes sense.
Thanks

[Marbles]

Good question.. I always used cheap 4558s and they sound great in my opinion, though I must say:

I just finished a Zvex Superduper yesterday. Initially I put in 'normal' BS170s. But I did had some Zetex ones (used in the original apparently, and about 30(!!) times more expensive). I socketed them, thinking there wouldnt be that much difference. I'm always a bit weary of certain ICs or Transistors being overpriced, but to me there was a very noticable difference. Did not expect that.

Would there be a big difference if I tried another pair of 'normal' BS170s? Maybe, but in this case, the Zetex ones sounded a lot better to me.

[erynforrester]

Thanks for the response.
I'm too scared to experiment in case I convince myself to like the expensive ones.
I'm really liking how cheap pedal building can be

[Beaker]

It's partly economy of scale. Take something like cheap and plentiful trannys like 2N3904 or 2N5088. You can buy one for £1 on ebay from one seller in the UK. Another seller offers ten for £2. A seller in China offers 100 for £2.

Pay your money, take your choice - there is NO DIFFERENCE in the parts - same manufacturer, same quality, same condition. Therefore same performance, same sound.

The same applies to common ICs.

Problems arise with rarer - therefore expensive - parts like IC's and FETS. If they are too cheap, the chances are that they are duff, or fakes.

Many of us have been stung with the latter!

[Beaker]

As a follow up, there SHOULD be no discernable difference between a Motorola chip and a Harris chip (for example) of the same type. Some professional builders may try to claim the particular ones thay use sound better, but that is almost certainly snake oil.

HOWEVER, different suffixes on chip numbers can and will make a difference in some circumstances. for example 7660 chips used in voltage doublers can produce a high pitched whine, while 7660S do not, as they are desighned to move the noise out of the range of human hearing.

2N2222 transistors are another example - they come in plastic T092 package and "metal can" versions. To my ears there is a difference, and I much prefer the metal can versions. I am sure that this is down to the construction method (plastic package vs metal can) rather than any difference in manufacturer or quality.

I hope this helps.

[rocket88]

Beaker is spot on. In some instances there can be an audible difference between types. Like beaker I hear a difference between metal can and plastic 2n2222, as well as bc108s, and the like. For me the same can be said for the metal can ICs vs their plastic case ones. Not sure if it's in how it's constructed or in how the metal case affects the parts.

One place I will say that the IC will make a difference in an effect is in fuzzes. For instance, the IC big muff needs the old cheap ICs to get the right raunchy sound. I think it's important to think of it that cheap doesn't mean sound bad.

My suggestion when buying ICs and transistors in bulk is price and rarity. If there's an IC that's normally found for let's say $5 for 10, but you see sellers in china selling them $5 for 100 avoid it. If it's way too cheap I wouldn't trust it. There's been a lot of talk about fake and counterfeit parts, mostly FETs and IC that are harder to find. But you'll see there are sellers that a lot of us have had issues with poor and fake parts from china.

[erynforrester]

Awesome
Thanks for the responses guys.
Roughly what I thought.
I like that you can in most cases build pedals for under say $30 aud without having to buy into orange drop this and sprague atom that like with amps

[Beaker]

There's no reason why you can't use orange drops etc., after all they look awesome, and I think most of us on here have tried at least one "mojo" build, just for fun if nothing else. Travis seems to be doing it on a regular basis, and seems to sell a lot of Tonebenders as a result. Look at one of his builds - you just know it sounds as awesome as it looks!

In reality the cost of parts is not that big a deal, say £5 tops for a simple fuzz, and £15 or £20 if you use all mojo parts. The difference comes when you try to sell it, £100 for standard parts, £200+ for the mojo parts version, so you can see why builders like DAM do it.

Do they sound better? almost certainly yes , but I would argue that that is more to do with the extra care and attention to build quality, trialing and fine tuning, and a lot more more attention paid to things like component tolerance matching, than to the the more expensive components sounding inherently better.

Zach is spot on about the cheapest parts sometimes sounding better though. Cheap noisy ceramic caps are essential in a Bug Muff - it's just part of the character that you don't want to lose.

[strassercaster]

i was wondering the same thing. i just ordered some burr brown op amps i plan on doing a comparison when they come in.i did use some tle2074 op amps instead of tl2074 and they were quieter and seemed to have a wider eq range for the zorg bass star. i think there are differences for some ics for sure. Transistors idk. i have subbed a lot of transistors. and the biggest difference is the the Hfe of the transistor . Same with caps other than ceramic caps being low fi and noisy.'I did some comparisons on caps and there are very subtle differences . Now that  i have several meters for measuring caps ,jfets,inductors, transistors and even ics i have noticed it makes less difference than the actual measurements of the component. dif brand or batches of transistors run at different hfe levels . a2n3904 and a 2n5088 with the same hfe sound the same pretty much

[Muadzin]

I wonder how many of these audible differences are due to tolerances and how different manufacturers have different tolerance standards.

I used to work at a semiconductor plant, the old Philips Semiconductors, currently NXP Semiconductors. If you have an old IC from the 90's it may have gone through my hands. It was and still is not a very nice place to work, with a lot of personel changes and temporary contracts. That's just got to negatively influence quality control.

[scimitar]

Not sure if I have just been lucky but as yet I have had no problems buying cheap, in fact just been testing some pt2399 chips I bought - £0.99 for 10 and they work fine. Also bought some cheap pics for the taplfo to build the twin peaks and that is working well. I absolutely understand if you build to sell it might be false economy but for me it is the only way I can justify my hobby (financially at least)

[strassercaster]

cool i get mine from tayda never got a bad one .I have bought at least 15 and tested them all in a working circuit non had the dreaded static . I just got jipped on aliexpress. I bought 50 2n5457 jfets for 14 bucks. Theyt had really low voltage readings seems like they are rejects . opened a dispute we shall see. First time i have been burned on ali express.I been burned on ebay several times for the ca3080 otc op amps. I finally found a good batch for cheap and was fully refunded on fakes

[Travis]

Hey strassercaster

If you have difficulty sourcing the CA3080 in the future, you can substitute it with an LM13700 which is two CA3080 in one package. They are cheaper than the CA3080 and readily available

[Muadzin]

strassercaster wrote

cool i get mine from tayda never got a bad one .I have bought at least 15 and tested them all in a working circuit non had the dreaded static . I just got jipped on aliexpress. I bought 50 2n5457 jfets for 14 bucks. Theyt had really low voltage readings seems like they are rejects . opened a dispute we shall see. First time i have been burned on ali express.I been burned on ebay several times for the ca3080 otc op amps. I finally found a good batch for cheap and was fully refunded on fakes

Well, there's your mistake. Do Not Buy Out of Production Transistors And IC's From Cheap Chinese Sellers. All obsolete electronics get sent to China to be recycled for useful parts, so the market there is absolutely glutted with 2nd hand parts that often get rebranded into fakes. There's so much of that stuff out there I wonder if the Chinese sellers even still know what is legit and what is fake. Just avoid them like the plague.

Buy your unobtainium IC's from trusted sellers like Smallbear and just forget about using through hole FET's and accept that you have to use SMD FET's from now on. If it sounds too good to be trough it usually always is too good to be true.

[Beaker]

"Buy your unobtainium IC's from trusted sellers like Smallbear and just forget about using through hole FET's and accept that you have to use SMD FET's from now on. If it sounds too good to be trough it usually always is too good to be true."

+1000.

[motterpaul]

"If you have difficulty sourcing the CA3080 in the future, you can substitute it with an LM13700 which is two CA3080 in one package. They are cheaper than the CA3080 and readily available"

This is one where I think I agree with the "go with the metal casing" rule. Frank posted an overdrive based on this IC - and the old version is a metal can. You can find them on eBay for about $6.00 apiece. But there is a new version DIP called the CA3080AEZ (or something like that) that got for well under a dollar.

I ordered the cheap ones and built the project - and while it worked perfectly and sounded adequate, it did not blow me away enough to mention it. It fit into that "just another overdrive" category.

I also have the LM13700 that I used for something else. Those do seem to be pretty decent chips, though.

[Travis]

If you paid well under a dollar a piece for CA3080 then you probably bought fake or out of spec parts. I wouldn't use that purchase to evaluate the plastic package CA3080 as a whole. You can see the plastic package CA3080 used successfully in many classic effects, like the Small Stone etc

[nicklouiz]

I was thinking of this the other day...
I've build a small clone about a year ago and always felt that something is missing from the effect I get from it...
Working as it should but never got that great/big chorus I see on youtube videos...
I've used some cheap MN3007 from a random seller from ebay (maybe chineese-can't recall)...
Maybe those IC were rejected or were out of specs or something...
Now I'm thinking to order another one from Das Musikding to try out...

BTW this is my first post although I watch the forum for quite a long time now ... I'm glad I've found you guys...

[Muadzin]

Musikding has MN3007's?

When did that happen? I thought they've been out of stock with them for years.

[nicklouiz]

Here you go:
http://www.musikding.de/MN3007_1
But their price is 1/3 lower than Banzai...
I dont know if this difference in price means something