Nelson Pass on learning his craft, then starting Threshold, Pass Labs, First Watt  

Amazing interview of a man who I most respect in the audio world. He is also a great guy if you are a tech. I had to work on an older Threshold amp that no one else could fix and he sent me a schematic for the amp. I found the issue and it actually was simple, well to me anyway. The amp had high offset voltage in one channel and it was little more then a bad differential pair in the front end. I made sure to replace the failed components in the bad channel but also did the same to the other channel to maintain a perfect channel to channel balance. Once done the amp sounded totally amazing. I have worked on both Threshold and Pass Labs amps and all were nice to service and sounded wonderful.

i can listen to nelson for one year straight and not be bored. thanks for this interviews.

True story: Before I purchased my Pass amp, I called Pass Labs to find the date of manufacture and verify the warranty. The conversation went: "Oh, I wouldn't worry about it. If something goes wrong, simply bring it up here and if you're a nice guy, we'll take care of it." You could hear the smile on his face. I replied, "Wow! You must be The Man there!" "I am." "Wait...it this Nelson Pass???" "It is." I'm rarely star struck, but t's not everyday that you're able to talk directly to one of the true giants of audio, an icon in every sense. The fact that he personally answers the phones at his company made me a customer for life.

Great video, Steve! Nelson is a man whose forgotten more than I'll ever learn about this stuff.

These are great interviews. Thank you 🙏

Audio’s Steve Wozniak! Lovely interviews! Thank you Nelson and Steve!

Fascinating interview of a totally down to earth person who's efforts and creations enriched the lives of us audiophile equipment junkies. I am the proud owner of a NS10 preamp, purchased used in 1980, that I think will have to be pried from my cold, dead hands, as well as a used pair of ESS AMT1 speakers, which, I had no idea of his involvement in until now. His background of learning about repair work to see what works, and what doesn't, seems to be a very sound part of what he's accomplished over the years.

I only hope the younger guys that don't know much about Nelson come to realize & appreciate what a incredible designer as well as a man he truly is, he is nothing short of a American treasure.

I love my ADCOM GFA 545 MK2, Nelson pass is a guru.

Pass Labs (and First Watt) are Class A in more ways than one! Thanks again Steve - this is a great series, even for us die hard Pass fans. Looking forward to the next installment! : )

I watched this video all the way through. Steve, thank you so much for making conversations like this public. There is so much knowledge and so many stories in the audio world, and Nelson is no exception. Listening to Nelson and you go back and forth is extremely enlightening and interesting. I got into HiFi not just for the music and the equipment, but for the community. The conversations. The absolute wealth of knowledge amongst everyone. Every time you upload a video, I get excited because of the interactions and wisdom shared through you. I’m 21 and have gained an immense amount of knowledge over the past 9 years because of people like you. I just moved to North East NJ about 2 weeks ago and would love to meet you sometime. Thanks again, Steve.

Thank you what a nice interview WoW ! I am 52 years old, I can connect the history dots more because of you guys.

Great Admirer of Nelson Pass , he has given so much to the community that it won't be an exaggeration to compare him with Linus Torvalds.

That was a great interview 👍. I’ll be looking forward to the next ones with Mr Pass !!

I remember my Threshold A400. It's one of the best amps I have had. Talk about controlling the speakers. Jesus. Great video, thanks Steve.

What a great people. Congratulations from Portugal. Kudos, Kudos, Kudos.

Loved every minute of this! Thank you.

Thanks for the interview Steve (and Nelson ) Very interesting to listen to him talk about his past . I think Nelson has a resemblance to George Carlin. Looking forward to the remaining interviews .

The worst sting of seller's regret I experienced hit me when I sold an X350. I've admired Nelson for decades; now, I feel something even deeper. I could listen to him talk all day, but thanks for cutting him off, because I have things to do.

I love Pass Labs and First Watt gear. So elegant and revealing with low noise. I have an XP-20 and an SIT-3. It is hard to stop listening to that combo. Also, yes, Nelson does answer emails!

The world would be a much darker place without people like Nelson Pass.

Such a treat to hear Nelson speak about his philosophies and his history in HiFi. Thanks so very much, Steve!

Wow I love the Nelson Pass interviews. Good stuff!

Nelson's great man.

My hero, too! I love this.

Nelson is one of my heroes! I wish he would do a couple designs for car amps again. The stuff he designed for Soundstream was phenomenal. We need another batch of that to save car audio!

Fascinating to hear an audio legend talking about his experiences. Great interview series. Thank you Steve.

Such a great interview, thank you Steve so much, you are both great guys.

So interesting listening to the 1960’s & 70’s gurus..any chance of interviewing carver or bob hovland..

THIS WAS BRILLIANT!

Fascinating interview thanks Nelson and Steve

Thank you both.

Waiting to hear him recount his excellent work for Adcom. My old GFA-535 was a revelation when it came to pure bang for the buck back in the day. I know Nelson is (very sensibly business-wise) more into fairly "high-end" designs nowadays, but I'm very grateful that he did some more affordable "entry-level" stuff, because that overachieving little amp helped me develop the "budget audiophile" mindset that's guided me ever since.

Nelson Pass is my own personal God. I worship this man and all he does. Thank you Steve for this great interview.

Papa Nelson is also one of my (2) heroes too Steve, along with John Curl. my absolute respects, always loved his designs

Such an awesome video, cant believe i hadnt seen this one yet. I relate a lot to this, went to school for electronics because once i heard a vintage stereo i wanted to know why it sounded a certain way. Started repairing and now working for an audio company and designing my own amps to hopefully sell my own designs one day. Getting to meet Nelson Pass is on my bucket list.

That's really interesting. I built a Pass Amp Camp from DIY Audio and drive it with a Dynakit tube PAS preamp, something just right about the combination. Sounds good. Thanks for the video!

These Nelson stories are so very touching to me . I met with my dear friend in the 70ties ! He is a fabulous personality and so entertaining as well !I fell in love with the Oscar Heil driver at both Rene Besne and Nelsons private houses ! My houses are filled up with Amt Loudspeakers from my friends at ADAM audio in Berlin! Personally I Prefer Class A Oil cooled Tube amps from Columbus Ohio with Nagra and Kondo preamps! Dr Solheim Marbella,

Great treat and looking forward to the next Saturday... Thank you!

Nelson is my hero too. So interesting to hear his memories. Thanks Steve. Your the man.

I had conversations with Nelson when there was only snail mail; He always answered my letters and offered amazing advice.

Mr Nelson Pass!!!!!!!!!!!

Hi Steve, this interview with Nelson is a real breath of fresh air. He is the same age as I am and we have traveled along many of the same roads in life. He has so much to say and has the most engaging personality, you can listen to his stories forever and still continue to learn! Thank you for sharing this with us! Lary

Thanks Steve. Love hearing Nelson talk.

Dynaco and AR!!! Good to hear those names where I began my interest in audio

Love listening to the great Nelson Pass. Thanks, Steve and Nelson!

Steve, fantastic. I loved each and every minute and can't wait for the next segment! Well done.

Yup, Dynaco ST-35 soldered up in my dorm room at 3AM. Great Interview! Thanks!

Wow! I want more of this! Nelson wanted to speak more and I wanted to hear him more.

Steve, these interviews are solid gold. Thank you and be sure to pass on to Mr.Pass how much we enjoy learning a little about the master behind the magic.

Really enjoyed listening to a true master....

Fantastic interview. I loved to hear about the relationship he had with Peter. I dig some audio history.

Steve, Thank you! This has to be one of my best episodes to watch ( and I'm sure ,any others who follow Nelsons work). Nelson has got to be one e of the most generous folks in the diy audio community. Not to mention Wayne ( Nelsons assistant wizard) designs and generosity as well with some of his designs (have all the parts to put together Waynes whammy class a headphone amp/preamp). Lost count of how many of Nelsons amps I'm wanting to build or collecting parts for. Have 2 monoblock amp camp class a 1.6 I need to build as well. Collecting parts for aleph j and thought about doing the f5, f6 and m2 in the future. Definatley looking forward to more interviews with nelson! I book should be wrote on all the works he has done for other companies (adcom, ess, and some others ). Funny he mentions car amps. Now I know why some of his designs ended up in some. A lot can be learned from nelson regarding circuit design, layout, serviceability etc. I'm no expert but just looking inside some of his designs it's elegant with the minimum amount required to get best sound and measurements. Again, looking forward to more interviews with this legendary designer! Perhaps a tour of pass labs? His listening room seeing the big Tannins? I have heard stories about how many amplifier Nelson has ( heard like 70 plus lol) and he said parts to make a hundred more😀 a video could be almost dedicated to that alone lol. Perhaps a tour of some of them😀 Thanks again Steve! And thanks nelson!

Great! Thank you Steve!

"Yeah ya know,the plywood one got a tweeter". Perhaps this is the man behind the audio gear of my youth..... and then some....years..lol !!!!

I have no idea who Nelson is, but I thoroughly enjoyed this interview and now im looking at his products. Pretty cool that he's only up the road a bit from me.

Extraordinary

Excellent video, I have loosely followed Nelson Pass on and off as I can, starting with an article in Audio Amateur co-authored by Astronaut Norm Thagard (intriguing to me because I worked ground support equipment on the Space Shuttle program for 20 years). I have appreciated the fact that Mr. Pass has shared so much on the DIY Audio forum. He is definitely one of the audio legends...

Great interview! Can't wait for more from Mr. Pass.

Love these types of interviews! I could have watched more!!

I had the privilege to work with Joe S. and he was one of the nicest and honest people I have ever met, was a great mentor and always helpful. He will be missed.

It’s quite an addictive, interesting hobby following (and building!) Nelson on diyaudio... hope he keeps us busy... thanks Steve and Nelson

informative interview! Thinking about the Heils at ESS, now that technology is used in the inexpensive Daytons

Very cool interview! 👍 It's always interesting to hear the history of how some of these products came into being. And how people got started.

Hey Steve... great interview with Nelson.. Thanks for doing this.. Would love to see more of these types of videos..

I had no idea that he was with ESS before Threshold! I loved ESS speakers with the AMT

Oh, Oh, Oh, Steve, you ended the episode just when it was getting very goooood! :) Thx papa, plz come back soon!

This is a treat. :)

Great interview, very interesting! Merci bien...

Fascinating to listen in.

Looking forward to more of Nelson's interviews.

This was a very intriguing show.

That was fun and engaging😁

what a pleasure this man is - i imagine the architect of the Great Pyramid had to tour the building site, daily, for the whole 20 years, and same way Nelson Pass builds a whole amp, or two, or ten, to prove it can be done

Fascinating interview. Thanks to you both for doing this.

Such a great series of interviews! And man oh man I would love to hear about some of that test gear behind him. That dummy load, all of his gear and why he uses it. A complete tour of his bench and the lab area. And also what he thinks is most important for that type of work. Would love a long strung out video series of that stuff!

Awesome. I knew Joe, and of course Dan, but not Nelson. Always wanted too. Great stuff!

Brilliant!

My "Audiophile" and Audio design hero. A living legend. I built one of DYI circuits. (B1 Buffer amp) Plan to build another soon.

I still love my Threshold FET one and S/300

My hero too !! Nelson helped me do the Aleph mini amplifiers ! Till this day Still run them and sell PCB's for this..

You keep this up Steve and I might actually subscribe to your channel. Very interesting interview with the guy who designed my amp. Thanks!

Wow , Ive worked in the industry for 25 years , never heard such a pure explanation on how this all works , Thanks ... I worked at The Good Guys ! in Marin county , for my whole career . I was able to see many types of speakers Keff , Klipsch , Parasound , Adcom , Polk I used to bring my son to work with me once in a while . My son used to sit in front of a 70 inch Mitsubishi ,playing video games on a Adcom amp and Veritas speakers ... He thought I used to watch TV and play video games for my job ,it was great times ! Nothing exists quite like it anymore ...

Finally picked up a Fet 10 preamp. it is exquisite, matches nicely with my adcom GFA-555 mrk1

"It's entertainment, not dialysis" Love it. So, how many reviewers could work as double blind testers for Nelson?

Wow, what an interview... brilliant, and what an intresting Hifi story.. makes it all worthwhile. greetings from Sweden

Interesting that you mention Bob Carver. I went to Carverfest and built Bob's tube amp kit and then I helped Bob to get one of the amps working.

Steve (and Nelson) - the best ever. So many things...I had to look up the Bailey line www.keith-snook.info/wireless-world-magazine/Wireless-World-1972/The%20Transmission-line%20loudspeaker%20Enclosure.pdf. And the discussion on objectivity and subjectivity in design and listening...priceless. Nelson begins to explain the value of subjectivity in audio in a very coherent way...I wonder if he's ever taken that on as a "thing" to contribute to the conversation. I could listen to you two talk for hours.

I did some contract work at ESS i would tell coworkers. . These are a bunch of long hairs and seem distracted don't bug em. I also remember management being seemingly extreme bipolar nice friendly one day a holes the next. Could never afford the gear . Thx for the interview brought back memories i had forgot

Excellent

The man himself!

I can’t imagine somebody not loving Papa Nelson.

Just bought a S 300 amp. My final amp purchase.

Joe was the first customer of mine to buy my 3D modeled plans for the Jensen Corner horn. He ended up buying about five sets.

Nice video, loved the stories. Too bad I never really met Hi Fidelity until an electrical engineer, friend took me on a tour of recording history and played a reel to reel master tape at the 15 inch per second speed they played at. The tape was a demo from the early 60's of what stereo could achieve. Needless to say, I was awoken at the age of 56 eight years ago to Hi Fidelity and realized everything prior was just a poor alternative. Thanks for your efforts!

Another awesome Nelson interview. 7 petty dislikes already?

Nelson looks like a sneaky wizard. lol

I’d love to see his listening room

My friend called Advent in the mid seventies to ask a question about his new Advent 300 receiver and wound up speaking with Henry Kloss. I didn't think that kind of thing happened anymore.

I'd like to hear what he thinks about cables.