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Sound Blaster amplifiers

EDIT: These days, please harvest amplifier chips from active computer speakers instead. They are plentiful and contain only what you need in a nice package.

For a project of mine, I needed a stereo amplifier. I had some old Sound Blaster ISA cards (and later got more, which are also now listed here), with different amplifiers:

card name model number year amplifier IC Power output
Sound Blaster 16 CT2290 1994 TEA2025B 2 x 2.4 W
Sound Blaster 16 Value CT2779 1994 TEA2025B 2 x 2.4 W
Sound Blaster 16 CT2940 1995 TDA1517P 2 x 6 W
Sound Blaster CT4170 1997 TDA1517P 2 x 6 W
Sound Blaster Vibra 16 CT4180 1997 TDA1517P 2 x 6 W

I liked TDA1517P, because it had so few additional components.

The amplifier part (left) of Sound Blaster 16 CT2940, cut off with a diamond cutting wheel. Jump wires were soldered to route input from Line In, and wires were added for 12 V power input (shared ground with signal). Two pins of the TDA1517P amplifier were shorted to enable the chip. A voltage regulator was also removed, as it was not used by the amplifier.

Seems to work fine!