Conrad-Johnson ACT2 Manual de usuario

Conrad-Johnson Owner’s Manual:

ACT2 Advanced Composite-Triode Preamplifier

conrad-johnson It just sounds right.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 1

Thank you for selecting the conrad-johnson ACT2 advanced

composite-triode line stage preamplifier as the control center for

your audio system. The ACT2 is conrad-johnson’s latest reference

preamplifier, replacing the legendary ART. The ACT2 is capable of

remarkably faithful recreation of the dynamics, textures, tonalities,

and ambience of live musical performances. We believe that you

will experience the excitement of discovery in hearing more from

your favorite recordings than ever before.

At conrad-johnson, we expect our products to be a source of

satisfaction and of pride to their owners for many years to come.

Accordingly, circuit designs, parts and materials for all conrad-

johnson products are selected with a view to maintaining optimal

performance over the years. Our reputation for producing among

the industry’s most reliable components is a natural consequence

of this engineering approach.

Although the ACT2 has been designed to operate in an intuitively

apparent way, you will find useful information on its installation and

operation in this manual. Please take a few minutes to read the

manual to better understand the features and capabilities of your

ACT2. Note that this unit is phase inverting. See the section

entitled “Getting The Most From Your ACT2" for details on correct

hookup in your system.

In closing, we’d like to welcome you to the family of conrad-

johnson owners. We want you to enjoy your conrad-johnson

product to the fullest. To this end, our staff stands ready to answer

any questions you may have about the function and application of

your ACT2, and to provide any needed service both during, and

after the warranty period. Our goal is to heighten your enjoyment of

recorded music.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 2

imited Warranty For Conrad-Johnson Components

Conrad-Johnson Design, Inc. will provide service under warranty to

the original owner on products sold new in the United States for the

lesser period of three years from the date of purchase by the

original purchaser, or five years from the date of shipment to the

authorized conrad-johnson dealer. During the warranty period,

conrad-johnson will repair defective units without charge for labor

or parts (with the exception of vacuum tubes and batteries).

Exclusions. The following are not covered under this warranty:

a) Units which have been damaged by misuse, abuse, or

accident.

b) Units which have been modified, altered, or improperly

repaired by anyone not specifically authorized by conrad-

johnson design, inc.

c) Units not purchased from an authorized conrad-johnson

dealer in the United States for use in the United States.

d) Normal wear

e) Incidental or consequential damages are not covered under

this warranty. Some states do not allow the exclusion of

incidental or consequential damages, so this exclusion may not

apply to you.

Obtaining Warranty Service: To obtain warranty service, the unit

must be shipped, along with evidence of purchase, in factory

packing to conrad-johnson design (or designated service center)

with freight and insurance prepaid by the owner. After repair, the

unit will be returned with freight and insurance prepaid by conrad-

johnson design to any destination in the United States.

All implied warranties, including merchantability and fitness for a

particular purpose are limited in duration to the duration of this

express warranty. Some states do not allow limitations on the

duration of implied warranties so the above limitations may not

apply to you.

This warranty gives you specific legal rights and you may also

have other rights which vary from state to state.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 3

Conrad-Johnson products purchased outside the United States are

covered by warranty terms of the importing distributor in the

country in which the product was originally purchased, which may

differ from the terms set out herein. Importing distributors are not

obligated to provide warranty service for products originally

purchased outside their country. Conrad-Johnson will provide

warranty service for products outside the United States, but in

these cases, the customer must pay all shipping, handling and

customs costs both to and from our Service Department.

Questions about this warranty should be addressed to:

Service Department

conrad-johnson design, inc.

2733 Merrilee Drive

Fairfax, VA 22031

The conrad-johnson service department can also be reached by e-

mail at [email protected], by phone at 703-698-8581,

or by fax at 703-560-5360.

Service

If your conrad-johnson audio component requires service, repack it

using the original box and packing material and ship to the Service

Department address above. Boxes and packing materials can be

obtained from our service department for a nominal charge, if you

no longer have yours. Include with the unit a note describing the

problem you are having in as much detail as possible. It is

especially important for our technician to know if the problem is

intermittent. If you want an estimate of cost for out of warranty

service, be sure to request it in this note. Be aware that requesting

an estimate will delay service to your unit, as we will have to

contactyou for approval before commencing service.

Registering The Warranty

Please return the enclosed card to the factory within 30 days of

purchase to register the warranty

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 4

nstallation

The first step in preparing your ACT2 preamplifier for use is to

install the vacuum-tubes. To do this, remove the top plate of the

tube guard by removing the four socket screws using the supplied

hex-head screwdriver. The ACT2 uses four type 6N30P tubes.

After checking the pin orientation, insert one tube in each tube

socket. Next, fit two of the included silicone rubber rings over each

tube, spaced at roughly 1/3 and 2/3 distances. These rings will

minimize the effects of air-borne microphonics on the tubes.

Finally, reinstall the tube guard.

The next step is to remove the transit screws. To minimize

microphonics, the critical audio circuits in the ACT2 are on a sub-

chassis that is mounted to the main chassis with flexible isolation

mounts. To prevent damage during shipping, this assembly is

secured by four screws through the bottom of the chassis. These

transit screws can be readily identified as the four silver screws on

white nylon washers. Before installing your ACT2, remove these

screws to release the suspension. Save the screws to re-use if it

becomes necessary to ship your ACT2.

Set Up

To maintain proper ventilation, mount the ACT2 horizontally on a

flat, hard surface, and take care that the ventilation holes in the

bottom are unobstructed. Allow at least two inches of clearance

above the unit and keep the cabinet or shelf open at the back.

All ACT2s sold in the United States are configured for operation on

a 60Hz ac power line producing between 108 and 126 volts. Export

versions of the ACT2 will have the correct operating voltage and

frequency clearly marked on the back panel of the unit, near the ac

power cord. In all cases, the actual line voltage should be within +

5/-10% of the nominal rated voltage.

Electromagnetic Interference (EMI)

Considerable care has been taken in the design of the ACT2 to

minimize its susceptibility to radio frequency interference and other

forms of EMI. Choice of materials, physical layout, grounding

practice, and power supply design have all been specified with a

view to reducing the impact of electromagnetic fields on the

performance of this unit. At the same time, however, our primary

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 5

goal is the accurate reproduction of recorded music in the normal

home environment, and we have elected not to compromise this

objective by the application of heavy-handed RFI filters, or by using

grounding practices that reduce RFI at the expense of degraded

audio performance. We find that the approach we have taken has

worked extremely well, resulting in only rare instances of EMI

problems which could be treated locally as needed, rather than

compromising the performance of our product in the 99.9% of

installations where EMI is not a problem.

Care in installation can often avoid EMI induced problems. The

following practices should generally be observed in any

application, and will be especially important where EMI may be a

problem.

Interconnect cables should be kept as short as possible (3 meters

or less), and shielded cable should be used (cable which has two

center conductors, and a separate external shield connected at

only one end).

Physical location and cable “dress” can be an important factor in

minimizing hum pickup. The installation should situate the

preamplifier well away from the power amplifier, and power (ac

mains) cords should be dressed to remain at least 4" (100mm)

away from input/output cables.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 6

onnection

SOURCES (AUX/PH, TUNER, CD, VIDEO, AUX2): These high

level inputs are electrically equivalent. The load they present to the

source varies with the volume control setting, but in no case will it

drop below 12 kOhms. Connect the corresponding source

components to these inputs.

EPL1: A set of line-level inputs and outputs provided for

connection of external signal processors (e.g. parametric equalizer,

tone controls). These can also be used for the connection of a tape

recorder. In this case, connect the EPL OUT to the recording input

of your tape recorder, and the EPL IN to the output of your tape

recorder. The EPL IN connection can also be used as an additional

line level input.

EPL2: This is an external processor loop designed to conveniently

accommodate the addition of a surround-sound processor (SSP) to

a high-quality two-channel system without compromising two-

channel performance. Connect the front left and front right channel

outputs from your SSP to the EPL2 input. You can also connect

the EPL2 OUT to an input on your SSP, allowing you to do matrix

processing on selected two channel sources. When EPL2 is

selected, the level controls are set to unity gain. Level and balance

control is then accomplished via your surround sound processor.

MAIN OUT: Two pairs of main outputs are provided. Connect to

the input of your amplifier (or crossover in a bi-amplified system).

We recommend the use of an amplifier with an input impedance of

20k ohms or higher. Since the ACT2 inverts phase, it may be

necessary to invert the speaker leads to maintain correct absolute

phase. See the section on “Getting the most out of your ACT2" for

an explanation.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 7

ontrols

<power>: Press the switch labeled power to switch the

preamplifier on. A time delay auto-muting circuit is incorporated

into the ACT2 to eliminate transients generated by the warm-up,

and cool down cycles of the vacuum-tubes. All outputs are

grounded via relays for approximately 90 seconds after the unit is

turned on in order to suppress warm-up transient noises. During

this auto-muting period, the mute indicator led will flash. All control

functions are disabled during the auto-muting cycle. The muting

relay also grounds the outputs immediately at turn-off or in the

event of any power line interruption. When the ACT2 is turned off

(by pressing the power switch again), the standby led will be

illuminated.

When first connected to ac mains, or after an interruption of power,

the ACT2 will turn on in a default mode (after auto-muting), with the

level set at 20, and the CD input selected. In subsequent sessions,

as long as the ac mains has not suffered a power outage, the unit

will turn on at the last used volume setting and input.

<mute>: Pressing the mute button will silence the preamplifier

main outputs, and set the level display to zero on both channels.

Pressing the mute button again will restore the previously selected

level setting.

<vol up>, <vol dn>: Level setting on the ACT2 is achieved by

using a programmed microprocessor to select combinations from

among an array of high-quality precision resistors. This

arrangement allows 100 steps of approximately .7 dB per step. The

steps are numbered 0 through 99, with 0 being silence, and 99

being maximum volume.

The level setting can be changed by pressing the vol up and vol dn

buttons on the front panel. Each time a button is pressed, the level

will move up or down one step. If a button is pressed and held, the

level control will cycle through the steps at an accelerating rate.

With each step, a slight “click” will be heard from the opening and

closing relays inside the ACT2. Balance can only be set using the

remote control.

<source>: Pressing the button labeled source will cause the unit

to step through the five source inputs (ph/aux, tuner, cd, video,

aux2). The selected input will be indicated by an illuminated led.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 8

<epl/thtr>: Pressing the epl/thtr button will cause the unit to step

from source through epl1 and epl2(theater). When source is

selected, the input selected by the source selector will be passed

directly to the volume control. When the EPL1 or EPL2(theater)

inputs are selected, the selected source will first pass through the

external processor loop before being routed to the volume control.

When EPL2(theater) is selected, the level will be set and locked to

unity gain.

Remote Control

All operations of the ACT2 can be controlled by the wireless

remote unit.

MUTE: Pressing the mute button will cause the main outputs to

mute and the level display to be zero. Pressing it again will restore

the last level setting. Pressing and holding the mute button for

more than three seconds will switch the ACT2 into standby mode

(all tube circuitry switched off). Pressing the mute button when the

unit is in standby mode will switch it back on.

SELECTORS (PH/AUX, TUNER, CD, VIDEO, AUX2): You can

directly access any of these inputs by pressing the associated

button on the remote.

EPLS (EPL1, EPL2): Pressing the EPL buttons inserts the

associated processor in the signal path. Pressing the button again

will re-establish a direct connection to the selected source.

Pressing the EPL2 button selects the EPL2 input, setting the level

to unity gain.

LEVEL (+, -): Duplicates the function of the front panel <volu up>,

<vol dn> controls.

BALANCE: Allows attenuation of either channel independently of

the other. Pressing the right balance button will reduce the left

channel level setting by one step. Pressing and holding the right

balance button will cause the left channel to cycle down through its

level settings at an accelerating rate. Pressing the left balance

button will attenuate the right channel in the same manner.

ACT2 Owner’s Manual 9

acuum Tube Replacement

The ACT2 circuit employs four vacuum tubes (V1 -V4), all

6N30Ps. The 6N30P offers low noise, low microphonics, and gain

well suited to use in a zero-feedback line-stage. The brands of

tubes we supply have been chosen by first selecting those brands

which are known to be most reliable, then by extensive auditioning

of these acceptable brands with the final choices being made

solely on the basis of sonic performance. We know of no vacuum

tubes available which will improve the sonic performance of your

ACT2. The tubes in your preamplifier have been tempered by a

controlled burn-in procedure that permits them to perform for a

greatly extended period without sonic degradation, and then

selected for minimum residual noise. Replacement tubes are

prepared and selected in the same way. Therefore, we highly

recommend that you purchase replacement tube sets from conrad-

johnson design.

We anticipate tube life to accommodate two to three years of

operation without degradation in normal use -if the preamplifier is

switched off when not in use. If the preamplifier is left on at all

times, tube life can be exhausted in a matter of a few months.

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