James Audio - Electronics as art
Hifi power conditioners without compromise
James Audio Ltd was founded in North Staffordshire by Alan Clarke, an executive design engineer with 23 years of design experience in a large multi-national electronics company. He has worked on many projects, including high-speed digital telecoms equipment, commercial and military satellite communications and industrial motor drives. Specialist areas include RF/microwave design, control interface and EMC, including military 'tempest'.
This privileged position allows access to an elite team, drawn from the design and manufacturing field, plus a world-wide network of contacts extending to the world-class experts and specialists required to innovate in this field.
The team working on the power conditioner project are motivated by challenge, passion and the desire to build a class-leading product. They are neither constrained nor forced to compromise by project timescales, budgets, cost-targets or limited resources. They have access to a large, fully-equipped design and test facility.
The power conditioner project was inspired in 2002. An audiophile colleague asked for advice about the many and various devices offered to address the negative impact of mains-borne noise on audio equipment. A period of investigation, measurement and experimentation led to a realisation of the magnitude of the problem and the gains which could be achieved. We became inspired to create a conditioner which addressed the entire raft of problems, from the lower frequency mains distortion products to the ability of mains wiring to act as an antenna up to microwave frequencies. It also became clear that there were many pitfalls to be avoided whilst achieving this.
Enthusiasm snow-balled. Many disciplines were involved, experts were consulted, hardware went through many iterations. The difficulties proved harder than expected, becoming ‘worthy challenges’ and their conquest a matter of pride. There were hundreds of hours of experimentation. We required parts which could not be bought, so custom parts were commissioned. For example, it took the managing director of a German capacitor company four attempts of hand building parts to achieve the required characteristics.
This wasn’t work, it was fun… and you can find a lot of time for fun!
After some final tweaks to the Mk.5 conditioner, we were happy and believed it was ready for the wider world. Evaluation units were circulated amongst respected experts in the field of HiFi. The feedback was all good, some very good. As anticipated, the inner-city areas where the noise problems are greatest yielded the superlatives ‘Phenomenal!’, ‘Incredible!’
With some happy Mk.5 owners in the field, there came interest from the most serious of HiFi enthusiasts, the ones who re-wire their houses to give the audio system a dedicated mains supply. Here there was much praise but not without a lingering reservation – something was ‘lacking’. Further calculations, experiments and testing resulted in the Mk.6. At 18kg this is 3kg heavier than the Mk.5 and packs a lot more punch. Verdict? “Impressive!”
We believe that perseverance has won through. We believe that engineering in its purest form achieves the status of art.
