How do I know which kind of capacitor to use?

guitarfreak2105

New member
I am ordering parts for my Tyrian Distortion right now and am looking at the parts list and cannot for the life of me tell whether to order a film cap or a ceramic cap. I can tell when it is an electrolytic cap because they are clearly marked on the board and polarized.

On the Tyrian it looks like all film caps to me but on some build pictures I found there are both film and ceramic.

Any advice is appreciated!
 
There are a couple of threads in here outlining this question. However the brief rundown is that values in the pF range are usually ceramics (I prefer MLCC) values in the nF range are usually film. Some builds call for MLCC uF but the build docs will state that & electrolytics are clearly marked also.
Hope that helps
 
There are a couple of threads in here outlining this question. However the brief rundown is that values in the pF range are usually ceramics (I prefer MLCC) values in the nF range are usually film. Some builds call for MLCC uF but the build docs will state that & electrolytics are clearly marked also.
Hope that helps
Extremely helpful, thank you.
 
On the Tyrian it looks like all film caps to me but on some build pictures I found there are both film and ceramic.
Tyrian was my first build, and I know what you mean seeing other builds with varying parts got me confused as well. But from what I've gathered after a few builds is that it's usually ok to sub something value for value, exceptions for sure.

But for example, you may see the same build, but one uses a few 100nf green mylar caps mixed in, instead of all box film caps. Sometimes that's because it's cheaper or maybe they already had some on hand with similar values, etc. You or me probably wouldn't hear a difference. That being said I try to stick to the build docs and do check out those threads as there are general guidelines.
 
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