"Trevor Morton"

I thought the LM386 was an audio amp (not to DC), but had a try anyway
with a 5Hz squarewave. Distortion was pretty bad. Also, regardless of
frequency, I only get 1V swing out with 6V in. It is supposed to have
a built-in gain of 20. This I don't understand.


** Try again - you got it fouled up somehow.

With a 4 volt supply, square wave drive and 33 ohm load ( no coupling cap),
the output is a clean. 2.6 volt p-p square wave at *any* frequency up to
20kHz.

With a 12 volt supply, same set up as above, the output swing is 10 volt
p-p.

Same p-p swings apply to a sine wave input as well.


BTW

Make sure your input signal does not have a DC offset.



........ Phil