Circuit knowledge

Here is the 22 watt stereo audio power amplifier circuit diagram based on TDA1554 and integrated circuit from NXP semiconductors (formerly PHILIPS semiconductors). It is very simple and useful circuit for amplify the stereo signals .The circuit dissipates roughly 28 watts of heat, so a good heatsink is necessary. The chip should run cool enough to touch with the proper heatsink installed .the circuit operates at 12 Volts at about 5 Amps at full volume. Lower volumes use less current, and therefore produce less heat. R1 is also a 5% resistor.Circuit diagram:

The AN7147 Dual 5.3-watt Audio Power Amplifier from Panasonic is listed as a ‘replacement type’ so hopefully will be around for some time to come. Together with some extra components, it can represent a simple surround-sound system requiring no opamps or a negative voltage supply. As shown by the circuit diagram the basic stereo amplifier is changed into a surround-sound system by a trick called ‘adding feedback from the opposite channel’. When surround sound is required, the negative feedback signals supplied by C13-R3 and C12-R4 are fed to the inputs of the ‘other’ amplifier. The resulting phase difference causes the surround effect. If surround sound is not required, the effect can be disabled by pressing push-button S1.


This causes the bistable built around IC2.A and IC2.B to toggle and drive transistors T1 and T2 such that the above mentioned negative feedback signals are effectively shunted to ground. A high-efficiency LED and a 3.3-kΩ series resistor (R14) should be used to make sure the maximum output current of the CMOS 4001 device is not exceeded. The amplifier should not be loaded with impedances smaller than 3Ω. The AN7147 will typically supply up to 4.3 watts into 4 Ω. The SIL-12 case needs to be cooled wit a small heatsink of about 6 K/W or better. The quiescent current is modest at just 19 mA.

If you need to use a headset with your PC, then you will know how frustrating it is continuously swapping over speaker and microphone cables. This is even worse if the PC is parked in a dark corner and the hard-to-read writing on the sound card sockets is covered in dust. This simple switch box eliminates all these problems. It sits on top of the desk and connects to the PC with stereo one-to-one cables. On the rear of the box are sockets for the PC speaker and microphone connections and the existing speakers. On the front of the box are the sockets for the headset microphone and headphones, an input for an external microphone and two switches. One switch is used to direct the sound card output from the PC to either the existing speakers or the headphones.

Circuit diagram:

The second switch connects either the headset microphone or the external microphone to the input socket of the PC sound card. The switches used were 3 position 4 pole rotary switches with the last pole unused and adjusted for 2-position operation. All sockets were stereo 3.5mm types. This multiple switching arrangement is very flexible and is especially handy if you want to use an external microphone while monitoring with headphones. The ground wire as well as the left and right wires are all switched to prevent noise that could otherwise be induced into the microphone input through joining separate earths. For the same reason, a plastic case is used so that the earths of the sockets are not shorted together as would happen with a metal case. You will require two additional short stereo extension cables to connect the box to the PC.

This circuit was designed for use in a hifi showroom, where a choice of speakers could be connected to a stereo amplifier for comparative purposes. It could be used for other similar applications where just one of an array of devices needs to be selected at any one time. A bank of mechanically interlocked DPDT pushbutton switches is the simplest way to perform this kind of selection but these switches aren’t readily available nowadays and are quite expensive. This simple circuit performs exactly the same job. It can be configured with any number of outputs between two and nine, simply by adding pushbutton switches and relay driver circuits to the currently unused outputs of IC2 (O5-O9).

Gate IC1a is connected as a relax-ation oscillator which runs at about 20kHz. Pulses from the oscillator are fed to IC1b, where they are gated with a control signal from IC1c. The result is inverted by IC1d and fed into the clock input (CP0) of IC2. Initially, we assume that the reset switch (S1) has been pressed, which forces a logic high at the O0 output (pin 3) of IC2 and logic lows at all other outputs (O1-O9). As the relay driver transistors (Q1-Q4) are switched by these outputs, none of the relays will be energised after a reset and none of the load devices (speakers, etc) will be selected. Now consider what happens if you press one of the selector switches (S2-S5, etc). For example, pressing S5 connects the O4 output (pin 10) of IC2 to the input (pin 9) of IC1c, pulling it low.

Circuit diagram:

This causes the output (pin 10) to go high, which in turn pulls the input of IC1b (pin 5) high and allows clock pulses to pass through to decade counter IC2. The 4017B counts up until a high level appears at its O4 output. This high signal is fed via S5 to pin 9 of NAND gate IC1c, which causes its output (pin 10) to go low. This low signal also appears on pin 5 of IC1b, which is then inhibited from passing further clock pulses on its other input (pin 6) through to its output (pin 4), thus halting the counter. So, the counter runs just long enough to make the output connected to the switch that is pressed go high. This sequence repeats regardless of which selector switch you press, so the circuit functions as an electronic interlock system.

Each relay driver circuit is a 2N7000 FET switch with its gate driven from one output of IC2 via a 100W resistor. The relay coil is connected from the drain to the +12V supply rail, with a reverse diode spike suppressor across each coil. If you want visual indication of the selected output, an optional indicator LED and series resistor can be connected across each relay coil, as shown. For selecting pairs of stereo speakers, we’d suggest the use of relays like the Jaycar SY-4052. These operate from 12V and have DPDT contacts rated for 5A. Note that although four selector switches are shown in the circuit, only two relay drivers are shown because of limited space. For a 4-way selector, identical relay drivers would be driven from the O2 and O3 outputs of IC2.

I remember when i was a kid, i was just starting with electronics, and i was very curious about this kind of systems. They were present in every contest show on tv. It’s cool that someone developed and published a project like this. The system is controlled by an ATmega88, and the voting pads interconnect trough RS-485. After the voting is done, a Java application that runs on the PC generates bar graphs.