hardest grado to drive

[cantsleep]

i know all grados sound pretty superb even without an amp
but i just want to know, if there is any, which grado/alessandro is the hardest to drive (or i should say really NEEDS an amp to shine)

[breadcrumbs]

I imagine they're all pretty much the same, according to this impedance graph from headphone.com:

http://graphs.headphone.com/graphCom...are+Headphones

It doesn't show the Alessandros, but I don't think they'll be boosted wildly by an amp either. Your best bet is to find a pair of high-end Grados that you like the sound of, and then get a decent amp to synergise with it like a Gilmore Lite or other frequently recommended amps with Grados (Blueberry Emotion, PPX3 Slam come to mind, but I haven't tried any of them).

[kramer5150]

Theyre all pretty much the same IMHO. Although the older SR325 is rumored to be VERY bright, so I imagine amping it with a bright amp could yield some nasty results.

[Lisa]

Only from quick impressions so I could be wrong but I found the HF-1 to improve the most from a simple MINT amp vs a decent headphone out of a PDCP of the three I own currently; MS-1, RS-1 and HF-1.

[recstar24]

HP-1000's - tough beasts to drive from a current perspective. When not amped properly, they sound lifeless, dull, boring and absolutely atrocious. I compare it to making love to a corpse. When amped properly the drivers sing and she becomes more alive, dynamic, punchy, beautiful midrange without that irritating upper midrange glare that is endemic to the current grados. The current grados sound great out of portable players and while they do improve with amplification, the HP-1000's downright require beefy amplifcation.

[GoRedwings19]

The hp-series are the hardest to drive. By that I mean even though they have low impedance like the current Grado's they have low efficiency.

Whereas something like the Rs-1 is low impedance but has a higher efficiency than the hp-series.

The senn hd-series are high impedance and have low efficiency.

Like if you use an amp and compare the rs-1 and hp-series then at a given volume the Rs-1's sound louder than the hp-series phones. Doesn;t mean it's better or worse as that's more down to preferences and taste's. But on the same track, same equipment etc. The Rs-1's have more volume than the hp-series.

[Jahn]

as said above, the HP1000 series is very inefficient, especially the HP-1, so you need a solid state beast like Pinkie to push it, or a tube hybrid like the Melos to give it enough juice.

[F107plus5]

Well,....we could turn the question around and ask which Grado or Alessandro is the "Easiest" to drive.

And since I have only listened to one of these sets of cans; I would have to rely on the old standby SPL spec.

What we have are those specs published by Grado: Easy!! All listed as an SPL of 98db thru 32 ohms for the current production phones. And Alessandros' published listing of 100db thru 32 ohms for the MS-1 and MS-2 with MS-PRO at 98db also 32 ohms.

So all things being equal(they never really are)the MS-1 and MS-2 should be significantly easier to drive than the remainder of the current Grado and Alessandro production line. YMMV

[VR6ofpain]

Originally Posted by recstar24

I compare it to making love to a corpse.

The scary thing is people have done this. As they always say, sometimes truth is stranger than fiction.