Headphone Amplification

Yo...whadya all think of the headamp AE-1???

I have no engineering or design background, so these may be stupid questions, but that's never stopped me before. Can you tell what an amp will sound like from the amp's design? Often times, somebody says that "Amp X is poorly designed" -- does that correlate to sound? Kevin Gilmore, whose opinion and judgment I value and trust probably more than any other designer in this field, may be able to answer this question best. Sometimes you see him saying that something is a poor design, or a very simplistic design, etc. Can you assume that such an amp will not sound as good as a well-designed one? I have a feeling the answer is no, but if it is yes, what are the best-…

Since I saw a pic of the board, I was wondering if it is worth it to "clone" as a DIY project the amp. I found two very useful pics of the inside. Based on it, I tried to fill in the parts: Is it a AC coupled amp ? The two closest cap from the potentiometer are input caps and i'm wondering if the two electrolytic caps close to the 1W resistors are output caps. Also, I don't know the name of the componant below the left 1W resistor. There are two of them. I think the output stage is push-pull, it probably looks like this: here is what I got so far. What do you think ? PS: I don't know if it is the right section and if it is allowed on this forum, mods fell fre…

I haven't really kept up with the headphone amp market much as of late. I started taking a look around to see what tube amps are currently available and there really doesn't seem to be all that many. The Woo Audio stuff has always looked interesting to me as they seem to be very well built and priced pretty well. Does anyone have any thoughts or impressions on the WA2 or the WA6SE?

Has anyone has experience of them?

Anyone here have any info about this tube? I read somewhere that this is a higher quality 6AS7G but upon inpection, I see that it has 5998 plates. This is where I'm confused: Is this tube supposed to sound like a 6AS7G or a 5998? BTW, I got my Chatham 2399s when I got my Extreme used and I like it....spacious and detailed but the 7236 trumps it in speed and punch.

So, I'll start. What's the deal with the 4 pin connection, and slew rates being improved? Is it by virtue simply of the 4-wire connection, or is it a byproduct of having the two transformers as well? Does it have the same virtues of a balanced setup as far as greater separation and less crosstalk? Please feel free to wax on to a non technical type, I'm here to learn. Do I need to consider a ZDT rather than a ZD if I have no plans to run speakers off the amp?

Okay, maybe not, but can anyone who's familiar with the Extreme topography suggest a reasonably affordable tube combination for a fast, neutral presentation? Stock or with ECC adapter? Any help would be greatly appreciated. The Extreme Plat may not end up working with the HD800s, but I want to give it a shot as it works well with my other phones.

Folks, anyone know where I can audience some headphone amplifier on these cities (in order of priority). If there are headphones, it would be even better. Also what kind of brand ?? Thank you all....... I know I've ordered my headamp+DAC from Justin so I may not buy anything at all but I wanted to expose myself to as much as possible thus have more experience. OTOH, God know I might ended up with something too :palm:

Just an update. Now I've had the Woo WA6SE long enough to form an opinion or two. Remember the restaurant scene in Pulp Fiction where Vincent asks about the shake? "It's a rectifier tube? It's not in the signal path? [buddy nods] and it's $150?" [buddy says yeah] "And you don't put bourbon in it or nothin?" A few minutes later, Vincent takes a sip... "Damn! I don't know if it's worth $150." "But that's a pretty fucking good rectifier tube!" There you have it. For me, the Sophia Princess 274B turned out to be more than pretty freakin good, it's more in freakin must-have territory. I'm not the first to say this, but if you have a Woo 6SE, you p…

So I recently purchased a Yamaha RX-V365 A/V Receiver for use with my new 5.1 system. The receiver has 3 HDMI inputs and one HDMI output. I had intended to hook my Blu-ray player and my satelite receiver into the A/V receiver via the HDMI inputs. As it turns out this receiver will not send audio to the speaker outputs via the HDMI inputs. This seems pretty lame to me, as the whole idea with HDMI is to have one cable carrying evrything. It also seems that this is fairly common. My receivers manual says to use the digit output of my Blu-ray into the digital input of the receiver. That works fine for 2 channel playback, but the manual says that it's only compatible…

... 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

Folks, nubie here.......Been browsing the whole 20 over pages of portable amps in search of desktop amps for my future desktop rig. Have ordered HF-2 and looking to pair it with desktop amps. I listened mainly to pop (air supply, kylie, air supply, any stock, aitken, waterman arrangement), jazz (shakatak), adult contemporary(george benson, gloria estefan, everything but the girl, etc), smooth jazz (acoustic alchemy, peter white, jim brickman, etc), easy listening, slow rock (toto, journey), rock (poison). My collection is some 30% 320kbps, 25% lossless WMA and the rest 192 to 128 kbps (slowly will upgrade to lossless WMA by re-ripping my CD collection). I plan to list…

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.

First, let me point out that I don't know much about amps and electronics. I've been wondering about how Single Power amps use tube adapters. I have an ES-1 and several types of adapters which allow the use of a variety of tubes. The default configuration is 2x 6SN7 per channel in the two gain stages, for a total of four 6SN7, and then 2x EL34 power tubes per channel, for a total of four EL34 tubes in the amp. Four 3D21A adapters allow the use of 3D21A tubes in place of the EL34. Two 2C51 adapters and two 5687 adapters allow the use of the respective tubes in the 6SN7 positions. Two "ECC-1" adapters also allow the use of 12AU7, 12AX7 and 5751 in the 6SN7 positions. …

Well, the Curse of the CanJam has claimed another victim. After being banned from the meet, Mikhail seems to have jinxed the SinglePower amps in attendance. First Neil's, now my SDS-XLR is dead. I really hope that Andy's amps are not next. Have you checked the amps? I set it up yesterday for the first time since CanJam and had a very strange incident where the left channel did not seem to be working on the K1K and then I switched in my K701 with Black Dragon and the left channel was still out. I swapped the driver tubes and still no left channel. Even though the left channel had been out on two cans, I decided to double check and swapped left and right and th…

Was expecting to find a Head-Case melodrama thread about this amp here, but it's not the case. The inane banter and debates on the Head-Fi Phoenix thread about CAST, DAC, etc, makes me skim alot and not read much there. This amp's two box layout is rather interesting to me. Without really knowing too much about the actual circuit, the build quality looks pretty impressive to me. Seems to be an ideal layout for me as well, as I don't like full wdith stereo components. Digital volume control and inputs galore are a plus. One issue I have is the internal conversion to CAST, and how it's converting single ended to balanced. More info and pics here: [url…

Here's an interesting new pro headphone amplifier, hand made in Serbia: BoZo Electronics - Sparrow It has very good specs !!! For the amplifier gurus here, a question: how does it compare with the beta22? Pics:

Jack is now offering custom made aluminum feet with silicone rubber inserts for your WA6. I paid $25, shipping included.. I think they look awesome

I see during several of the FET-A reviews the Gilmore Lite/GS-1 were understandably brought up as natural competitors, but as reviewers didn't have the HeadAmps on hand at the time, I wondered in the last few months if anyone has had a chance to A/B (especially with Senns)?

Taking a hard look at the Qinpu Q2 from Head Direct. Exposing my noobness but WFC's so... Will this power Absolute Zero Speakers satisfactorily? Anyone have experience with this? Anything else I should consider in that price range $79 ($99 Shipped)?

...and Nate suggested a Starving Student. Wanted to get y'all's opinions on these two Millett's for sale on HF. Whiplash Millett SS for $130 Or Millett Hybrid for $150 the $150 looks like a good deal, but I don't know anything about the builder. Thoughts?

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

Justin's Pico Slim gets leaked, and so Ray announces a direct competitor that's "in the works"... News - Ray Samuels Audio