[sdiy] Capacitor types - which when?

[René Schmitz]

Hi all,

Dave Magnuson wrote:
> So, generally speaking, are mica caps good for use in the audio path?   An
> example would be decoupling between stages, etc?  I know some people get
> very fussy about the "sound" of various types of caps, with ceramics being
> a "bad" choice for the audio path.

Ceramics have high dielectric figures (so the cap can be made small), 
but at the cost of also being very nonlinear. That is why they should be 
avoided in the audio path. But sometimes they are whats responsible for 
the "sound" of a particular circuit. (Hehe, next we'll discuss wether 
mica, styrene, ceramic or mylar are better for the *-filter...)

Mica does suffer from high dielectric absorption. So that would rule out 
anything that has to do with storing charge. S&H, VCO...

For the audio path, I don't see any reason why mica couldn't be used.

Cheers,
  René

-- 
uzs159 at uni-bonn.de
http://www.uni-bonn.de/~uzs159