How many sockets are too much (electronically ?)

[pqt_bach]

Hello everyone,

I'm building an overdrive with about 60 parts... I want to socket them all so that it'll be like a better., more refined "bread board" - thing is, will this change the circuit electronically so that the "real life" results will differ from the socketed board?


Cheers

[oskar]

It will probably be allright electronically.
Just make sure that the power and ground cords don't form loops and keep audio-path
as short as possible. The biggest problem would be not that it wouldn't work at all, but
that it could end up not amazing as you intended. Even though your first idea was
correct... but I think you'll be allright. 

[pqt_bach]

Actually, it works and it does so well - but the thing I'm asking is whether the SOUND itself will differ from an unsocketed version?

I can't calculate the impact of sockets on "tone" but since a soldered resistors in NOT a socketed resistor, phsically, so I guess that electonically there should be a differance

[Pushtone]

That really is what a bread board is for. It is a bunch of sockets.

I've built lots of circuits on the BB and they sound the same when transfered to the PCB.
So there is no reason to believe a socketed PCB would sound different from a soldered PCB.

Corrosion would be the only difference between a socketed connection and a soldered one.
I don't think a loose or corroded connection would effect tone. I think it would effect the level, as in a drop in volume, or no sound at all.

[markm]

Corrosion would be the only difference between a socketed connection and a soldered one.
I don't think a loose or corroded connection would effect tone. I think it would effect the level, as in a drop in volume, or no sound at all.

Agreed.

[slacker]

You can supposedly get differences between a circuit on breadboard and a PCB. I think this is due capacitance between the breadboard tracks or something like that, never experienced it personally.
Like everyone else has said you're much more likely to have problems with dodgy connections than anything else.

[pqt_bach]

That really is what a bread board is for. It is a bunch of sockets.

I've built lots of circuits on the BB and they sound the same when transfered to the PCB.
So there is no reason to believe a socketed PCB would sound different from a soldered PCB.

Corrosion would be the only difference between a socketed connection and a soldered one.
I don't think a loose or corroded connection would effect tone. I think it would effect the level, as in a drop in volume, or no sound at all.

Thank you all for the answers

The thing is, it's more than 50 components. I use the bread board alot and I want to do this still

cheers

[R.G.]

In electronics, there are only a few things. There are resistors, capacitors, inductors, switches (i.e. open and closed contacts), semiconductors and free-electron devices (tubes). That's about it.

Everything else is made up from some combination of the above. If you want to think about how something affects sound, you think about how to make a model of the real thing out of those components.

A socket connection has the properties of a switch with some contact resistance and the capacitance of its parts to everything else in the universe. It has the inductance of the physical form of its conductors, and it has the semiconductance of any corrosion or dirt in the contact.

New, clean contacts have a resistance of only a few milliohms, and generally vanishingly small inductance and capcitance compared to normal audio practice. Well-used contacts loosen up and have a higher resistance because the spring pressure of the contacts is less. Old dirty contacts may have high resistance and rectification effects from the metal corrosion, as well as intermittent switching from any vibration.

What is the effect of a lot of sockets? Substantially none if they're new and clean. The more sockets, more time, and more use (insertions) the worse it gets. There is no single predictable tone effect, as that depends on where the bad contact(s) is in the circuit and what that change does to the tone.

Lots of sockets is a good idea for quick testing of new ideas. It's a bad idea for long term. And this reasoning is why I said that breadboards are as necessary as underwear - and also need changed.

[markm]

Lots of sockets is a good idea for quick testing of new ideas. It's a bad idea for long term. And this reasoning is why I said that breadboards are as necessary as underwear - and also need changed.

Now that's funny!

[pqt_bach]

Thank you very much everybody

[zachary vex]

I've never noticed any problems using sockets.  I don't believe I have had a single socket failure in the field, and I use a lot of them in the sequenced products and the lo-fi loop junky.

[R.G.]

Back in the bad old days of prototyping logic in 7400 family logic chips, we would put together prototypes in panels of logic. A panel was a hinged frame holding four 24" by 18" boards, each of which was brick wall coated in 16 pin DIP sockets. One prototype machine might use two modules each containing 16 panels and a power supply. With enough connection points to see the actual failure rate, as well as high internal temperatures to age the contacts, we regularly saw socket failures.

[soulsonic]

I use sockets for transistors and ICs in prototypes so I can swap things, but I never use transistor sockets and I only rarely use IC sockets in "production" builds.

[ulysses]

ic sockets are recommended to newbies whose soldering skills are not crash hot.

i like to socket parts i think may be problematic so i can easily swap them out. once i have a circuit sorted i solder them in permanently.

i dont like breadboards..

cheers
ulysses