Sony TA-N80ES Mk1 Power Amplifiers

Sony TA-N80ES Mk1 Power Amplifiers

Today were taking a minute to look at two of my personal Sony TA-N80ES Power Amplifiers!

The TA-N80ES is part of Sonys exclusive ES series touting their TOTL Hi-Fi models!

Manufactured from 1990 to 1994 the TA-N80ES is essentially a beefed up TA-N77ES without the additional meters (the TA-N77ES had failure prone and inaccurate meters.) Being released in three version Marks I,II and III, the latter Mk II and III used potted toroidal transformers that had less current capacity than the MK1, the MK1 has a MASSIVE transformer compared to the other versions. Additional changes occurred in the population of the capacitor bank configuration.

The TA-N80ES is nominally rated at 200Watt a channel with a THD+N of 0.004%. Employing Sony’s Super Legato Linear pure complimentary output stage which is effectively described as a compliment of ultra-fast output devices and low emitter resistance with original 2SA1492/2SC3856 (emitter-ringer outputs.) Along with constant current drivers that were replaced with modern, low noise Fairchild TO-126 devices and new Toshiba TO-3PL devices and performance Wakefield thermal compound applied.

 Variable and fixed inputs can be used which then activate the front panel gain adjustments… a nice feature for line level devices.   Two inputs can be used, a balanced and un-balanced RCA which I recommend as the most direct signal path, the balanced circuit would then use a inverting/type Op-Amp for signal phasing. The TA-N-80ES can be configured in a bridge/monolithic stage or stereo output. 

Protection phases were built around µPC1237HA chipset with additional 24V relays at the output and an initial inrush limiter. One these two models due to exposure to high heat the electrolytic were replaced with low impedance, high temp (105C) Nichicon PW capacitors with a new TO-220 device.

The D505 bridge rectifier (tied to half wave) had a new 10MFD and 1000MFD 63V low impedance high temp (105C) Nichicon PW’s installed along with a new Schottky Ultra-Fast rectifier at D507.

Per recommendations published; the differential JFET coupling capacitors were increased from 22FMD to 100MFD BiPolar capacitors with a 1MFD WIMA polypropylene bypass capacitor installed for better sub-sonic response distortion response. 

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