Hi all,
Any idea when there will be new QA-403 available in stock ?
Last update was from March, with the notice of chip sortage.
Just wonder if there is any indication when there will be new chips available.
Kind regards,
William (from The Netherlands)
Hi @WilliamL I wish I had more visibility into the process but at this point things appear to keep degrading. We just got a mail yesterday that the bulk of the TI SN6505B parts delivery was moving from September 2022 to Jan and March 2023.
Here’s the usual plot of the % of TI DCDC converters in stock at Digikey. What this says is that of all the DCDC converters “normally stocked” at Digikey, just 23% are actually in stock. Everything else is subject to awful lead times. This plot (I think) is helpful because it will give a clue when the situation starts to reverse course. And until we see things reverse, the general situation won’t be improving.
Intel just came out and said they expect the situation to persist until 2024. The guidance here isn’t great.
@matt This is all very sad news of course.
But we’re engineers, right? I see a few options how the problem can be addressed.
First, let me introduce myself. I’m an audio engineer, founder of a small audio manufacturer company Zlatoust (see https://zlatoust.cz) from Czech Republic. Currently, we’re prototyping our first device.
I believe this device is built for the engineers to use in the laboratories, or other places with a bit of basic equipment like laboratory power supplies. So first thing which comes to mind is to implement a version where all the non-5V power supply is external. The manual could include all the instructions on how to wire the device properly to external power supply including all requirements for such power supply, or an external power supply could be bundled in the package (for example see Mean well PD2515, it has two +/-15V lines and ripple of 50 mVp-p).
Second idea is to switch to a different DC converting solution. If the goal is to get an isolated and clean supply rails, there is a way to use non-isolated converter but power it from power bank. PB’s are affordable these days and they do work well. Possible option is an LT3580/LT8580 family, with a separate port only for power.
I understand this is something you don’t want to spend your time on, but it will make the product available. To me having analyser which requires extra equipment or effort to use is still better than not having it at all. I have a feeling there are loads of people on the market seeking for affordable and easy to use audio analysers, and failing to find ones. I’m the one of them. Ready to be an early adopter of a modified device.
BTW, you and guys like Jan Didden with his Linear Audio magazine, and Autoranger are doing very important job of democratising the audio industry by lowering the entrance barrier. This is invaluable and really important. Unfortunately, the pandemic is making it harder for you, but the challenge it brings can be converted to an engineering problem and essentially making it easier to solve 
A.
Hi @sibiryakov, technically you are correct and most eval boards for ADC and DAC and opamps require you to provide your own supplies. I just think it’d really hurt the usability of the offering. Then there would be issues with supply sequencing, latch-up protection that would need to be added, reverse voltage protection, etc.
Have you tried to purchase a QA403 from someone in the EU that might not need one any more?
I agree 100% on making the audio testing equipment more accessible!
Agree about the complexity to solve. Not sure about the usability, anyone should have a power supply in the lab. These are affordable these days more than ever.
I would love to purchase 403. Please suggest a way how to find one.
Best regards, A.
