Watts Abundant is owned and operated by Don Imlay. I do this on a part time basis for two reasons. First, I like the Phase Linear product line. Second, Watts Abundant provides a little money to buy big boy toys etc. Since this is not my primary income, I never have to sacrifice quality versus the bottom line. On the other hand, if the bottom line is going to suffer, I don’t do it. That’s why I don’t work on every receiver that comes along.

I’ve been interested in electronics since I was a kid. I had all of the electronics experimenters kits. My brother and I also had an extensive H.O. racecar track. I learned a lot about motors, DC and power supplies from this experience. A few years ago I designed an H.O. car power supply which used an amplifier class B output circuit with current limit. I used a welding foot controller to vary the output. When you let off the pedal, the power supply would put out an adjustable negative DC voltage to act as a brake. Although it worked well, it’s easier to use hand controls rather than your foot for H.O. racing.

In 1976 I graduated high school and went to tech school hoping to get a job in pro sound. Graduated in March 1978.

From 1978-1983 I worked at various companies in the field of power conversion. This included transformer design and manufacturing, military inverters and DC motor drives.

In the spring of 1983 I got a job with a pro sound company doing repairs and installations. The company was a Phase Linear dealer. I learned a lot about Phase Linear amps real fast. The company fell on hard times and they had to let me go. In hindsight, this was the best thing that could have happened to me. It’s hard to make a decent living doing repairs full time.

In December I 1983 hooked up with an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) manufacturer. I went to the interview thinking brown trucks. I started doing audio repairs on the side. Twenty plus years later I’m still bringing home the bacon with UPS’s.

From 1984 to about 1995 I was doing part time work with a local mail order hi-fi company. They purchased the entire remaining Dynaco inventory and reintroduced a few models. I was the primary technical person. I tested hundreds of driver boards for Dynaco amps. I did the warranty repairs as needed but very few failed. They later purchased a large inventory of Hafler parts. The early Hafler amps were reintroduced. I did a lot more driver board testing. They also got into tubes and sold amps and preamps. I did a lot of development work, built test sets, and did production testing. At the peak I had 3 tech friends working there also.

In 1991 I became a father. Audio work conflicted with being a daddy and eventually I had to get out of it for a while. As kids get older they don’t need or want parental presence as much. So now there’s a little time to get back into audio.