QUADRATIC
Quadratic Audio MC-1 Moving Coil Transformer
Audio Technique 01 September 2023 Full Review
This time I tested a Quadratic Audio MC-1 Moving Coil Transformer. To be honest, this is my first time to approach this brand of products, but I have also heard the name of Jam Somasundram, the designer of this Transformer. He is the past engineering director of Cary Audio. After joining Pass Labs in 2013, Jam Somasundram spent a year conceiving the HPA-1 A headphone amplifier, which relied on a custom toroidal power transformer with a Faraday cage to reduce the low sound of the signal amplification. After being launched on the market the following year, it was widely praised by audiophile and won numerous awards.
Two sets of gain settings
CineMag has been established in North Hollywood, California, USA since 1979.
Its early products included Cinema Magnetics. Hence their names, Cinema and
Magnetics are combined into CineMag, which has always been a transformer
manufacturer for professional recording equipment. Quadratic Audio collaborated
with CineMag to produce a unique transformer that incorporates a number of
proprietary technologies. The design uses Faraday cage to help reduce noise
and a unique semiconductor device fabrication. The design has extremely high
frequency interference and hum elimination. The bandwidth is wide, the soundsurround
ambiance is rich and the music is detailed. The two transformers are
mounted on custom printed circuit boards and each channel has its own ground
plane to minimize interference between the two channels. The factory gain
setting of the MC-1 Moving Coil Transformer is 28dB. Users can choose a lower
setting of 22dB by simply adjusting it through the wire jumpers on the circuit
board.
Faraday cage
The internal transformer of the C-1 Transformer has its own Faraday cage, which is a
cage used to block electromagnetic fields (so it is also called a Faraday cage). The
reason why the Faraday cage operates is because the external electromagnetic field
causes the conductive material of the cage to The charge distribution within the cage
thus offsets the field effect inside the cage. This phenomenon is commonly used to
protect sensitive electronic equipment, such as RF receivers,from external radio
frequency interference (RFI) during testing or calibration of precision equipment.Even if
a large current passes through the cage, the current passing through the objects inside
is very small. When facing electromagnetic waves, it can effectively prevent a large
amount of Electromagnetic Interference (the official parameter is greater than -30dB
isolation) to achieve the best noise suppression effect. In addition, there is also a
GROUND LIFT setting on the circuit board (also adjusted through jumpers), allowing
users to float the ground to eliminate acoustic interference generated in the ground loop.
The subsequent amplification provides a clean signal.
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