PAM8610 tiny stereo audio amplifier board review and test

Rated 15 watts per channel, this class D amplifier board is very small relative to its power rating. Watch and see what I find with this little board.

[@adoniscmj3212]

This chip is really impressive if you ask me. I just watched a repair of a Realistic mini hifi amp from the 60's and it only put out 1 watt of power and this little chip kick's it's ass thoroughly. I have one of these chips myself and love the big sound for the size.

[@tubiasguitar]

Hello, very well explained your video, took many doubts, congratulations.

[@Kenshindegozaru]

Hi John. If Im using lithium Ion batteries does make sense to filter the voltage? Does this make any difference in the amplified signal?

[@royrijpma]

hey jhon.. about the hissssssss .. for some boards the gain of the chip is set to high ... it's a resistor change .. Search the data scheet for the value's

[@gavroon04]

Hi Roy. In datasheet I see 120k for ROSC and on my boards I have this value. Also datashet says that ROSC is 1/8*VCC. For VCC I have 12VDC. So 0,125*12 > 1,5?

[@Evo2Raid]

Thanks nice to see somewhere you can buy at a reasonable price will have a look see myself

[@dannyhoang3192]

I appreciate your review and suggestion, J!

[@ALEFILES]

How is the current consumption of this amp at full power? I want to use 4 Ohm loudspeakers and 12Vcc... My question is because I will build a power supply for this amp, with a transformer, bridge rectifier, and 7812 regulator...It will be enough for the amp or will need bypass power transistors for more current? Thanks a lot for the video!

[@tonnyanthony677]

I have this 8610amp it keeps quiet on strong bass on high volume but red light still on, when i disconnect the adapter and reconnect after some minutes it plays,, what would be the issue?

[@vikassm]

Anti clipping protection? Probably a low-impedance/high gain preamp (Like the built in audio out on a PC motherboard). Use a tone-Board, easy fix.

[@jaysuthar2723]

anyway to combine output of both the channels to get 30 watt output ?

[@davidhaggerty9850]

I believe what you're hearing is accounted for on the specs sheet. The process of amplification causes noise. It's just a natural byproduct of how the circuitry works, operating temperatures, how the signal is interpolated, etc. Digital audio introduces additional errors based on sample rate and subsequent quantization error (though this happens at a point outside of human hearing at sample rates of 44.1k and above based on nyquist theorem). Analog amplifiers are no exception, though the nature of the distortion (often called saturation) is generally more pleasant to the ear which is why tube amplifiers are still sought by many audio enthusiasts and the harmonics properties are even modeled and artificially reproduced in modern digital music production to add warmth and character to different audio material. Going back to this particular unit, it has a particularly high noise floor since the spec sheet said the signal to noise (SNR) ratio is 90 percent. There are a lot of different ways of measuring SNR data for different applications, but if I"m not mistaken this ratio indicates that at the tested value (perhaps peak load) there is an SNR ratio of 90 percent which means that 10 percent of the signal is noise introduced by the chip's operation. Where THD will increase as you exceed the clipping threshold introducing new harmonics that change the intended character of the sound, I believe SNR is more of a constant noise and therefore becomes more apparent under low audio outputs due to less harmonic content to mask its presence. I imagine this was an intentional trade off to create cheap parts with high amplitude potential at the expense of fidelity that is less perceptible at nominal levels. I also imagine that unless these amplifiers were advertised as RMS watts then they used Peak values because they look better on paper which means the chip probably would perform as advertised when measuring peak value at maximum load. Though this would create a massive amount of heat which is probably also what is responsible for a lot of the noise since heat disrupts copper's ability to conduct and therefore causes errors in the transmission of data. I'm not suggesting that this is a fantastic piece of high fidelity equipment, but if it's relatively cheap as you hinted at then I would imagine that it's working as advertised and the drawbacks are a byproduct of getting what you pay for. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signal-to-noise_ratio en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyquist%E2%80%93Shannon_sampling_theorem

[@Rendraco79]

VERY NICE , that is a lot of good info! thank you.

[@aadhilthanseer8823]

I am new to audio amplifier boards and I would like to know that will it support inputs directly from a 3.5mm audio jack??

[@danielbuleandra3981]

The rezistors solved the problem mostly with the horrible distortions when the music didn't play. thanks a lot! thumbs up!

[@KuntalGhosh]

you should made mail bag video of you unboxing the stuff you buy and show a quick review of things that dont need a separate video to show like the leds we need to know if they light up evenly and what is there brightness!!

[@suvradeepmuduli5977]

I want to know full details about pam8403 amplifier board.can you help me with that?

[@manassehabraham5589]

My board gives a buzzing sound sound even when there is no input and there is no power coming to the aux. So I brought another Pam board and I faced the same issue . Someone please help.

[@Tracks777]

Awesome video,Keep it up!

[@JesemanuelRamirez]

Hello, would you be so kind to point me in the direction of an online store that sells transistor amps that isn't ebay. Not built, just the transistors. I have a JVC amp that has a quieter channel and they tell me it might be the transistor (Im going to send it out to get it checked, just in case ). Just looking for info to help with the sourcing of parts.

[@JohnAudioTech]

Here in the US, I'd source transistors from DigiKey or Mouser. In other countries you have to find a reliable vendor or import them.

[@gkdresden]

At low volumes the pwm linearity can become audible, especially for lower pwm frequencies which could pass the output filter to a certain amout of magnitude. Sometimes also the output filter itself is the problem or it is even not present. Did you do a listening test with applied output filters? This could really make a difference relating low volume distortion.

[@gregvisioninfosoft]

When you say that if the board does not include large filtering capacitors and you externally wire these in... where in the circuit do you attach the external capacitors? can you tell me what time into your video a particular board is where you did this and point out what wires are going to the external capacitors? What should the capacitor values be? Thanks for this insight...

[@JohnAudioTech]

The capacitor is placed across the power supply leads. It should be close to the board as possible. 2,200uf would be a good minimum value.

[@correia707]

Hey John. I bought a PAM8610 with BT board, but it gets me alot!! of hiss noise. Do you know what can be?

[@dnagarjuna1610]

Nuno Correia how much voltage , amperage you have given to pam 8610board please tell me i tried with 12 volts 1amp but not worked

[@Ale-Tronic]

I use it on my bluetooth speaker, powered by 18650 batteries (3X2 design 12.6V) with high sensitivity drivers (2X 4Ohms), I can confirm that it has a very "grainy" sound at low volumes, but it don't bothers me, and it is so loud that I doubt it got only 3.9W per channel. A thing I found is that I bought this amp a while ago, and recently I bought 3 more of those and they all ended with the output shorted to one of the rails (bringing straight DC to the speaker), but the one I bought for first still working fine! I think they are so cheap that they became disposable amplifiers.

[@marekbax513513]

Hello John I like your videos, my Bowers and Wilkins Z2 are dead I found that they are using SSM3302 can you make video about this chip ? I'll like to make some DIY board with SSM3302 can you help me?

[@MrBrymstond]

Does this have a common mode network filter to get rid of the osculation?

[@JohnAudioTech]

No. These are filterless.

[@eumesmo-kd1tr]

nice and honest review tks

[@tribbinvw]

I have used a couple of these chips for various purposes and haven't experienced the low-volume distortion that I hear in your video. What I did experience however is that these tiny PAM8610 and the PAM8403 boards have problems with certain power supplies and power-, speaker- and input-leads and volume-knobs where my sure-hifi class-D boards are much more forgiving. My hunch has been that the on-board output inductor coil and capacitor quality where key factors.

[@rimmersbryggeri]

This was much better than the 3w one. The bass was more pronounced.

[@MichaelBeeny]

Might be interesting to look at the scope with a sine wave input and low audio output to see the distortion.

[@JohnAudioTech]

I tried but noise made it hard to see. Interesting the data sheet shows distortion goes above 1% at very low output but this sounds far worse.

[@MichaelBeeny]

Almost sounds like not enough current at low levels.

[@Aries2376]

Hey, I'm back again. I bought this amp online. I was really satisfied with the PAM8403. But I was still lacking some volume. Since this is 12v. Can I just use a boost converter to boost the voltage from 3.7v to 12v? Well, I already ordered it anyway. Maybe I'll just wait for it to arrive and just test it.

[@JohnAudioTech]

You would need 7 or 8 amps at 3.3v to get the 2 amps at 12v the amplifier needs.

[@coilsmoke2286]

Just get/find 12volt 2amp wall wart ...Are you limited to 3 volt batteries or something?

[@Aries2376]

Coil Smoke Yes. Although, I had a change of plans. I bought a 3S BMS for 12v that the amp needs. I was just wondering if I could charge the speaker using a 5.0V 2.1A. That's why I before, I opted to use 3.7v 18650 cells. But I guess that will be a bit difficult. I'll just build a special cable that boosts the 5V output on a powerbank to charge the 12V speaker. It might be charging slowly but atleast I can charge it with a powerbank.

[@sputnik4216]

Luv the Hack Shack Calculator at 11:30, super nice.

[@Lauriemine]

Hey John, have you or would you consider reviewing some TDA7293 amplifiers? The particular ones that cost $2-$4, to see how they perform. Another great video by the way!

[@JohnAudioTech]

My friend bought some from Banggood and neither of them are working properly. He has assembled some more involved kits, so I don't think he made a mistake.

[@HillsWorkbench]

Actually, it turns out I got them from ICStation! But it's strange that Banggood specs them at a lower voltage when you'd need to be near 100 (50+&-) to get 100W. When the first one didn't work right, I brought the other one up slowly with a variac and it does work at the reduced voltage. Both attempts are recent videos

[@ericsalidbar1693]

Ive used this board for my jbl loft40's and they have great sound i used then without a pot just straight lined in. The loft 40's are already filtered hi/lo pass and i didnt have a noise issue although when i tried them with regular un filtered speakers they didnt sound as great and the good sound wasnt really there like with the loft 40s.

[@dokterzorro]

I've implemented 2 of these in diy mobile crates with 4 ohm 5.25 inch car speakers and 12v gel batteries. In my setup, they exhibit near silent operation, no hiss or hum at all. Maybe it's still the power supply generating some noise? You did put a capacitor on the powerline but in my opinion it is too far from the board. Solder it directly to the powerpins on the board and put an extra 100nf bypass cap on it for good measure. Also, ferrite hf beads will help, they could be clip on type or even hf "pignose" chokes or salvaged ferrite cores from dead pc psu's. As long as they are as close as possible to the board. May I also suggest you put the heatsink on the BACK of the pcb instead of on top of the PAM chip? The chip's heatsink pad is soldered to the pcb and the pcb has a lot of plated through holes underneath it. SO, the heat is dissipated way better through the board instead of through the black insulation on top of the chip. Mine stay reasonably cool on 4ohm load and 25 watts rms power. To help cooling I've placed the pcb in the airstream of the bassport so the louder it plays, the more movement of air there is around the heatsink. Works brilliant, they can play loud for hours without issues.

[@ericsalidbar1693]

When I used them I had his or hmm from the same board depending on the 3.5mm Jack I used. I thought it was strange.

[@ericsalidbar1693]

Sorry I wasn't clear. If I used a 3.5mm female Jack I got hiss and hmm but when I used 3.5mm male Jack I got clear sound it didn't matter what device I used to play music from.

[@DreamhopMusic]

Love it

[@BogdanSerban]

How did you attach the heatsink to the chip?

[@JohnAudioTech]

Yes, thermal adhesive tape.

[@Xsbt]

good question and thanks for the answer

[@Sayan_here]

Hey can i run 2pcs of 2ohm 15w speakers? What voltage should i supply? 12v or 9v?

[@JohnAudioTech]

2 ohm is two low for this amp.

[@coilsmoke2286]

That is such an odd ball speaker...Are you sure about those specks? most 2 ohm speakers take/handle *WAY* more then 15 watts

[@kjetilkjellstadli4476]

The distortion you mentioned at low volume may be caused by the fact that the board does not have an output filter. I have had similar experience with a purchased class-D amp. When I connected a headphone there was a lot of noise and really distorted sound. But with speaker connected it was fine. So it can all depend on how well the speaker and cable works as a low pass filter. I would recommend to always use a filter on the output.

[@rich1051414]

If that's true, the music would sound terrible through a piezo or ribbon tweeter, as they don't have enough inductance to filter the noise...

[@niveshnivesh3800]

bro for this Ic amplifer we should ground all the ground connection to the Amplifier cabin or else the noise will came

[@leosvids1297]

Is there anything smaller than this 🤔

[@ArvinG]

Can I use 5w-10w 4ohm on this amp?

[@coilsmoke2286]

Stick with 10W-40

[@Ncky]

@@coilsmoke2286 lmao, 20w-50 is better

[@patrickd308]

My PAM8610 is running well without heatsink at all... Running preclipping at 4ohm. No problem at all...

[@JohnAudioTech]

It can work with music as average power is much less. The chip itself is capable of 4 ohms loads, it just needs the heat sinking, especially when playing music loud that has long sustained bass notes.

[@patrickd308]

You are correct. The datasheet clearly says 15w at 4ohms and the thd rise a lot! I prefer higher the TDA8932 as it's capable of 20w clean music...

[@Sayan_here]

Hey can i use 2ohm 15w drivers?

[@jitendrakumar-ni4ys]

Is it better than pam8403

[@leoanglo6176]

My pam8610 stop and play repeatedly. What do you think problem?

[@coilsmoke2286]

Something is tripping their self preservation circuit(s)?...Could be an oscillation, even one outside human hearing. You might see something on an oscilloscope

[@himanologanor4093]

Your power source is too weak, change it to a 30 watt 15 volt (at least 12 volts), the cables from that to the PAM module must be thick. Add a filter capacitor right on the module +&- . If it still does that probably a channel is burned (has 4 amps inside connected in bridge 2x2) and makes the chip hot to protection.

[@techpluslab8744]

I have same issue but don't know the cause;(

[@techpluslab8744]

@@himanologanor4093 I am testing my class d amp board and I found same issues,I will try to explain it as clearly as possible. 1)it plays well for 20 mins or so and after that it pauses every 2 seconds or so(like-play..thump..play... Thump...play..thump so on...) 2)if I unplug power supply and replug it,playtime depends on how long I unplugged the supply(max30 mins play time) and after that issue persists again. 3)as some people here suggested and I too thought it was a heat issue and pulled heatsink (it is not getting hot at all to touch).then I found that there is no thermal paste on it,it is just super glued.I thought that is the issue and pasted some thermal paste and put the heatsink on the chip(just pressed on to it ,not glued).the problem still exists!!! 4)I am running it on 24v supply and about 1 amp current.is this issue?power adapter isnt getting hot to touch.I thought power is the issue and connected it to car battery 12v 15amps and stepped up to 24v but still I am facing same issue. 5)I am running board with recommended ohm load speakers,4 ohm 50w.this happens even at low volume. The board is tpa3116d2.please help me identity the problem,please

[@himanologanor4093]

it`s $4 on ebay, doesn`t worth the trouble to lose your time on it www.ebay.com/itm/TPA3116-D2-DA-DC-12V-24V-100W-Mono-Channel-Digital-Power-Audio-Amplifier-Board/152990339062?epid=21009512837&hash=item239eef4ff6:g:t3QAAOSwLmda2Z2k

[@sanjaysam6220]

Pam8610 has a sw mark . Is it for connecting sub , if it is then how do I connect ?

[@napnap6554]

Maybe it mean (switch)

[@purvr4626]

I don't get distortion at low volumes. I have made a video about it

[@chrizevo]

Purv Rane mine have same issue like John's, low volume distorsion and noise

[@Aries2376]

I got a problem with this board. I've got 7 of these and I finally finished my 12 volt (3s 18650) speaker using this amp. But I've blown 4 of these amps on using the speaker. They seem to have a common problem, the speaker cone connected to the outputs will suddenly go "down". The amp chip will then get very hot. When I turn it off, the speaker cone will go up again to its normal position. I don't really know whats going on. I've already gotten the bluetooth module on a separate battery to avoid ground looping and other issues. Could you help me with this? I've also tried putting a heatsink but still the same result. Do I need to get a larger heatsink or something?

[@JohnAudioTech]

Are you connecting the speaker directly across the outputs or one side to ground? These are bridged outputs and must not be connected to ground nor should a shared lead be used as common between the channels. This will kill the amp pretty quick.

[@Aries2376]

@@JohnAudioTech The outputs are connected to a left and right 10w 4 ohm speakers each with separate leads and they do not share a common ground. But I am still killing these amps even though they already have a heatsink. I'm planning to use a different amp this time, this thing breaks so easily. Could you suggest a different amp as small and as powerful (preferably, a class d one) as this one? I only have limited space on the speaker enclosure.

[@adithyapillai4259]

Try adding a capacitor in Series to the Speaker. It might block off that dc that's passing into your cone (the Cone pop that's happening). Other than that can't really do anything about this board. I blew mine up by accidentally shorting +12v to R-in 😂

[@Aries2376]

@@adithyapillai4259 Thanks for the tip. I still have 2 of those lying around. Unfortunately, I abandoned the PAM8610 amp for my portable speaker. It gets quite hot and easily blows up at 4 ohm loads even with a heatsink and thermal paste. The cone doesn't just pop at the start up. It just go down permanently until I turn off the amp and the amp will get very very hot when the cone goes down. Anyways, I replaced it with a bit more powerful amp. The Yamaha YDA138 x2. It outputs 20w in bridged mode. I bought one that contains 2 chips. No problems with the amp so far. Only problem I've encountered is that I've accidentally blown the right speaker so I'm ordering a neodymium one.

[@adithyapillai4259]

Seems like you're doing something wrong with your amp there buddy. The behaviour you're talking about is where the chip is blown. I do have some blown out boards that behave the same like you've experienced. They draw like 2 amps and gives out that magic smoke. While doing so the speaker behaves the same as you described.

[@simplygame5530]

Is that 5.7w per channel?

[@JohnAudioTech]

yes

[@Evo2Raid]

The quality of the chips

[@blackopsdavid8601]

their boards are only a couple bucks! may get me one of them

[@ngoquanguc1807]

Try shortening the wire and put the amp in a metal cases. The quality will be much better.

[@iceberg789]

envistia mall guys may be biting their nails now, lol. but you may still want to try it with battery supply, to check if the hiss is still there. long live pam8403, lol.

[@JohnAudioTech]

Although I'm pretty sure it wouldn't make a difference, I tried a 12v battery and the distortion is still there. I had a 1000uf and .27uf supply bypass caps, so it is pretty well decoupled from the supply anyway. I even played music through the low pass LC filter I use for measuring power and the distortion is still there. I tried shorter speaker cable, different speaker, removed the preamp, ect. This board simply has issues.

[@SianaGearz]

Why would they? I found out about the store from this video, and if i was within their service region (i'm in Europe), i'd certainly consider buying from them rather than straight out of China, due to their reasonable pricing for presumably fast delivery. I think this video is to their benefit. And after all, people will buy crappy stuff and will not be disappointed if it's sold with integrity and honesty behind it, sometimes it's just what you happen to need. You don't expect a PAM to sound perfect, and you don't expect perfection for $2 either. For its intended use case of doing ultra cheap and somewhat loud audio, it's perfectly fine. Knut Ballhause from German µC forum suggests an LLC filter on the outputs, 2x47µH, 1µF, reports reduced noise.

[@sangeetaprajapati8321]

कहां पर मिलेगा

[@ImaginaPower]

There is nothing wrong with the chip nor the board!! I have the same and i do not get any of the distorsion nor the hiss!!

[@buya940]

My hiss was coming mostly from my input source which is a Bluetooth 12v device I put a 16v 2200uf cAp on directly on tha Bluetooth power terminals and a inductor clear it up well run 8 ohms 10/14 watt. 4ohms 20 watt. 3ohm never get hot With only a bolt superglued down for a heat sink. But still not a great sounding amplifier

[@DavidRobertLewis]

more on the wiring, I see a capacitor.

[@DiySpeaker-Vn]

các bạn có thể tham khảo sản phẩm tại: www.sendo.vn/mach-khuech-dai-am-thanh-hifi-class-d-pam8610-2x15w-7115019.html

[@VIJAYKUMAR-pr5dr]

Texas instruments TPA is best.

[@ngoquanguc1807]

The hiss is came from your wire. The signal wire from audio device to the amp. The higher quality of wire, the less hiss and noise.

[@coilsmoke2286]

Ahhhh...? *NO* !

[@goobisoft4873]

Amp sucks