| Headphone Amps (full-size) Discussion of desktop headphone amps. |
02-03-2010, 06:59 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by neilvg
For some reason or another, after seeing Spritzers posts/pics, I feel both impressed, happy, and sad.
Neil
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That just about sums up my feelings too. Mostly though I am impressed at the fantastic cosmetic changes and astounded at the technical transformation that Birgir has wrought. A BHSE it may not be but I bet it would show the standard Stax amps a clean pair of heals.
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02-03-2010, 09:47 PM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland
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It's indeed no BHSE but it should be more then comparable with the Woo WES (if a bit different) and show the other "high end" amps just how inferior they really are. In the end one must pick what kind of sound you are after, the BHSE/T2 offer us stark reality though it is never forced like with so many "neutral" components. What you have is just a very linear amp with enough power to swing voltage into any impedance presented by the transducers. With the ES-X (and the Woo WES) you are dealing with the limitations of vintage tube design. A plate resistor will never be as effective as a constant current source in dealing with the wild impedance swings of the transducers but the amps make up for it by being able to swing a lot of volts, far above what we truly need.
As for the Stax amps, they are built on a shoestring budget and all of them are DC coupled so there is a difference in presentation. The 007t is an easy target but the 717 would be tougher to beat if not just for the fact that is is less than 1/6th the size of the ES-1. That said this is after all a Stax amp on steroids so a similar take on the SRM-007t might sound pretty nice... 
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02-04-2010, 04:51 AM
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My amp is sitting off to the side for now, I'm using the HEV90. I find that after I keep it on for a while it sounds pretty OK.  One day I'll have to figure out how to salvage the ES Monster.
Neil
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02-04-2010, 07:03 AM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland
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You could put in something like Kerry's Blue Hawaii PSU and move on to AC filaments. That takes care of the PSU but the amp section is harder to fix. You could keep the PCB but it requires a bit of modding to get it right but given the huge size of the chassis, you might just as well rebuild the amp, point-to-point. Personally I'd scrap all the parts on the amp PCB, sell the AN silver caps and just start from the beginning. It's not as bad as it sounds, about 300$ for very good parts. I'd also replace the 4 50W resistors (the golden ones) with the ones I used which are Mills non inductive.
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02-10-2010, 04:53 AM
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Thing is I have no idea how to do this, and unless someone wants to help me (for a fee), I don't know who to go to.
Neil
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02-10-2010, 12:59 PM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland
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That is indeed the problem but have you talked to Wayne from Bolder Cables? The schematics are all available and it shouldn't be too hard for him to turn the amp back into something useful.
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02-10-2010, 03:33 PM
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Head-Fi'er
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Join Date: Mar 2003
Location: SoCal
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Neil, definitely give Wayne a call or email him. He's a bit busy right now, but he does great work, is responsive, and stands behind his work. He has my ES-1's right now working through the schematics to get them corrected and working per Dr. Gilmore's recommendation.
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02-10-2010, 05:18 PM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: May 2003
Location: So Cal
Posts: 3,029
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Quote:
Originally Posted by shokunin
Neil, definitely give Wayne a call or email him. He's a bit busy right now, but he does great work, is responsive, and stands behind his work. He has my ES-1's right now working through the schematics to get them corrected and working per Dr. Gilmore's recommendation.
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Hey, I thought your ES-1 wasn't having any issues yet. You just sent it in before problems arise?
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02-10-2010, 05:35 PM
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Join Date: Mar 2003
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Hey Jon,
While they worked, I'm having Wayne correct and upgrade the amp as it should have been in the first place. Heck one of my power supplies was only half working as Mikhail only wired one regulator, while there are two in there, only one was used. Yeah, go figure...
I rather get them fixed before they blew up and before they burn out ANOTHER set of NOS Mullards or Treasure EL34's, 5751's etc.
Glenn
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02-10-2010, 06:35 PM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland
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Even if the amps work they will chew up tubes so at least sorting out the filament supply is a good idea. A real bias supply is also a good idea (the stock amps are far off spec) and adding the C- supply plus the extra adjustment to the first stage is well worth it and quite cheap in terms of parts used.
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02-11-2010, 08:17 AM
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Kudos to spritzer's epic effort and Mr. Gilmore's insight!
Man I can't believe so many head-fiers got riped off by such shady practice. Just a couple of years ago I thought Single Power is the best headphone amp vendor in the world!  This is really sad.
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02-21-2010, 11:06 AM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland
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I updated the third post of this thread today with the final installment of this saga. 
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02-21-2010, 11:14 AM
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Brazil
Posts: 513
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Glad I've opted to get an Aristaeus instead...
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02-21-2010, 11:18 AM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: Reykjavik, Iceland
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Wise choice indeed. It does sound pretty good now with an all tube signal path (ECC99 with transformer output in my APL3910) but stock it was very much a let down.
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02-21-2010, 12:20 PM
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Headphoneus Supremus
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Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: Fukuoka, Japan (was Australia)
Posts: 4,345
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That looks awesome. Great work. It's nice to see this come to a happy ending of sorts.
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Headphones: Sennheiser HD-800, Symphones Magnums, Grado HF-2 (all balanced), Stax Lambda Nova Signature
Amps: Audio-gd Phoenix, Audiovalve RKV Mark II, Stax T1S, eXStatA (to be built)
Source: MacBook Pro or Onkyo DV-SP502 → Audio-gd Reference 3+1
Speaker rig: Parasound Zamp or Audiovalve RKV → Paradigm Titans
"The trouble with most people is not what they don't know, but what they know for certain that isn't true." -- Mark Twain
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