Headphone Amplification

Hi, I'm looking for a portable headphone amp with good imaging, high detail and a very fair reproduction of the source. My budget is roundabout $400. I was considering one of the offerings from Ray Samuel until I read the opinions here. Instead do you have any particular recommendations? I've heard good things about Graham Slee's voyager, would that be a good choice? This is all baring in the that I'm limited to closed phones because I'll be monitoring input sources - perhaps oneday I'll invest in the etymotic H4s's. Cheers

I got a chance to listen to the Singlepower Platinum Extreme at CanJam. I liked it compared to other tubed amplifiers because it didn't have that tubey warm colored sound. I wanted to pick one up used, but I have been reading that Mikhail is MIA and there may be problems with getting it fixed if I ever needed to. Can someone suggest some comparable amps with a similar sound? Just a FYI, I listened to the WooAudio3, Cary Exciter, and the Cary 300SEI. I thought all three of these amps sounded to warm and tubey for my taste.

Thanks to HC, I've pieced together a bedroom system consisting of: - McCormack Micro Headphone Drive (MHD) - Rotel RCD971 - Etymotic ER-4s I've tired of IEMs (ie sticking things in my ear) and these old ER-4s have been sitting in my desk drawer for years - sometimes I tried to sell it, but out of laziness it just sat there tucked away. Then I acquired the RCD971 (because I was in a weird GD phase and HDCD seemed pertinent). Then I acquired the MHD, which is the key here. I remember not too long ago when I was a piss-poor student and I lusted after McCormack gear, and the MHD popped up here on HC, and I couldn't resist. It was not planned this way, but this o…

AFAIR, there is a diode after each 9v battery, and two sets of caps between V+ and ground and V- and ground each. There is a series resistor inside each 9V rechargeable lithium battery, as I recall, but I can't figure out why they won't work with the SR-71. Any ideas why?

So, I just ordered a FirstWatt F1 for my K1000s, and I'm getting that feeling that you get when you get new toys WHEEE

knowing u guys are interested in the schematic for this amp so i went around begging people in other forum for this, finally got it is this the correct schematic for that amp?

At the multi thousand dollars price bracket, there is no bad amplifiers. - Mike Famous last words. Should pose an entertaining read. http://www.headfonia.com/true-beauty-wooaudio-wa5-headphone-amplifier/

Anyone here has one of these singlepower solid state amps around? I know they were made in a balanced configuration? I remember at some point there were a few units around

Can someone explain this to me using, you know, science/logic? Thanks. Oil damped tubes I am not trying this, btw.

Audio-gd Compass Impressions, not a review! Gear: Laptop, Foobar and MonkeyMedia, ASIO4all, AD900, HD650, Audio-gd Powe Cable. Hey all Head-Case. First off, nice to see so many of the excellent posters I respected at the other headphone forum here. I wondered where you all had gone, I mean once in a while I'll see a blue moon post, but not enough! I had a wonderful opportunity to be among the first 18 testers to own the newest headphone solution from Audio-gd. For, I feel this is by far the best option for me as a beginner into headphone amps and dedicated DACs. Audio-gd is a small company out of Beijing China, lead by their lead designer, Mr. He Qinghua,…

I never thought I'd get a tube amp but it looks like I am. I know nothing on the subject but really need a crash course. Is there a good resource out there that I can read?

Hi, I am presently looking at an amp to run my HD600's. I am also looking if possible to consolidate and use a good portable to cover those and my IEM's. Looking closely at the pico as it "might" fit both bills, but i know the lean is toward a decent home rig...in which case i am looking at DV336SE or one of the LD units as they are available here locally pretty easily. Anyone have feedback on using pico to drive 600's? Or else talk me away from it and into a dedicated home amp! Thanks!

Sorry, cannot wade through the lovefest thread. - How big is it - Custom paint? - Where do I get it from and product details in a single webpage if poss. Thanks

First of all. Hello everyone. I'm new to this forum and this is my first post. I've read many thread about the differences between the Woo Audio 3 and the Little Dot MKIV SE . I'm pretty new to the world of high fidelity audio equipment. About 3 years ago I bought a pair of Sennheiser 202's and later that year I upgraded to HD555's. I greatly enjoyed the 555's and started researching the next step up the chain. About a year ago I finally saved up enough money to purchase the HD650's and a Little Dot MKIV SE . I love my amp, but recently I've been itching to upgrade to something better and that's why I come to you. I'm currently using a Little Dot MKIV SE with the …

Hi, new here, looks interesting. I use HD600s with my orignal, stock Musical Fidelity X-Cans I am not a big user of headphones at home, mainly LP (LP12) and CD (Ikemi), I never use my PC for music. What should I try and how much (ish) should I expect to pay to noticeably get a better sound than the X-Cans. Has anyone here ever had their X-cans upgraded? thanks KT666 London

... I don't have the amp! Lol!! First of all, hi to all As I reported in the Title, I've already a vintage rs-1 recabled apuresound V3 and a Bluenote Stibber as cd-player. But I don't have the amp, I would like to recive some suggestions. I'm thinking of some valve amp in the price range of 1000euro/1500dollars, no more . I'm thinking also about the earmax SE, what do you think about? I've already possessed a rudistor nx-01 and nx-33ev08! For now thanks a lot! Marco

silvercore - Head-Fi: Covering Headphones, Earphones and Portable Audio Looks pretty beastly but it's probably too expensive to really be interesting for me.

Does anyone know of a decent integrated speaker amp that also has a nicely built headphone out? I think the Cary integrated amps may be an example of this, but I was wondering if there were any other choices. Around $1.5k max is a probable budget though I'm trying to stay under $1k used. Thanks for the help guys!

Hey all, sorry to add yet another HD800 amp thread but I'm really on the fence on what amp I should try next for my rig. My current setup is: Northstar M192 MK1 -> Gilmore Lite + DPS -> HD800 I'm currently interested in either getting a used Wooaudio 6 with the power supply upgrade and sophia tube or grabbing a 3 channel B22 kit from glass jar audio. Let's set a budget of around 800 for other suggestions. Any suggestions or opinions would be appreciated. Thanks

I felt really bad hijacking humanflyz thread so I've created this seperately. I've done plenty of searching at the other place. Earl one of your posts from Headfi. Just doing some searching for uber Grado amps. I'm convinced the 6BL7GT/A is the way (if this will provide tons of current for the Grados) I want to go, unless there is a more high current tube that can be stuck in the MPX3 without driving the costs to Supra levels. Out of everything I'm looking for in a tube amp bass slam, and bass control is probably the most important thing for me. I'd like tight controlled bass with excellent attack and decay. And uh...don't mess with the Grado midrange too m…

I figured something this rare deserved a thread of its own. Let me introduce the Stax SRA-7S, integrated amp for earspeakers. This was introduced in 1966 for the SR-1 and remained in production into the 70's. With Stax we never really know when they stopped making something but given it's all tube design, it was dead by the mid 70's. This one was missing just one knob but amazingly they are still in current production. A full set has already been sourced... Those RCA's really need to go but pretty clean over all. Pretty much unmolested but somebody decided to remove the fuse holder. Not a good sign... Amp and phono stage on separ…

I just saw this on Lloyd's website, and he has a newsletter describing the various technical changes that went into the new model: http://hollowstate.netfirms.com/Branches5.pdf

Can someone explain to me what constitutes a discrete op amp? Secondly, does this discrete op amp actually offer better performance than a typical op amp? KG, Nate .... anyone?

As the subject states, my GS-X has arrived. I received the amp yesterday and quickly set it up in my system once I got home from work. As some of you are already aware, the amp looks really, really nice, both inside and out. It is bit smaller than I had expected, especially after getting used to the size of a Gilmore Reference that I used to own. I'll post some pics soon when I get around to taking out my camera. No listening impressions yet since I'm having issues with my ears/hearing right now due to horrible allergy and sinus condition that I've been suffering.

So I was reevaluating my two-channel system and while things were moved about I decided to remove some of the accumulated dust. I was using one of those swiffers on the ES-1 and I guess it is too forceful an instrument as the green glass covering the readout from the digital volume fell into the chassis. So I am going to open it up and remove the glass and re-affix it to the chassis. I realize I need to turn it over and separate the bottom from the top. There appears to be only 4 screws (2 front and 2 back), of the approximately 1 billion screws in the chassis, that actually hold the top and bottom together. This seems way to easy, am I missing something here? The pie…