The Stax thread - Page 70  

No, not in a stick it in your pocket with an ipod kind of way, more like an easily transportable amp. The only true portable is the 001.

so it is portable! i could just get a bag for it. KOOL so what batteries does it take?

12V Car battery

If you wanted to run it off batteries you would need to make your own battery pack with the appropriate cable. It has no place for batteries on the amp, it just has a 12VDC socket where you plug in the power transformer box. You should be able to power it off any 12V battery as long as the battery supplied enough current.

So, I got my Gammas today and I have to say that so far I love them to bits. Not at all what I was expecting. Yes they are a little bright but damn! I love these things.

They don't have the effortless deep bass of the 404 or the bloom of the 003 but they have an intimacy and immediacy I really like. The bass was a lot better than I imagined, and the impact of stick on drum is pretty amazing in texture and believability. With a well recorded piece they are utterly mesmerizing. These are definitely attention grabbers and even with the old MOSFET Hafler 220 feeding them from a modest source they sound superb.

After giving them a good warm up and charge they don't sound thin, shrill or particularly bass-shy unless the rcording is poor. Sadly the headband and housings are in crappy condition so I may need to perform surgery and FrankenStax them.

Overall though, for $100 I'm thrilled.

Congratulations How old are these Gammas? They must be ancient!

Over 20 years old and apparently use the same drivers as the SR-x Mk3. I can see why some love the sound, it's like an Ety ER4S with tons of added goodness. They are really fast sounding but not artificially so. The tonality and texture are awesome. I think the Gammas and me will become firm friends. I wish I had a normal bias output on my amp, unfortunately it only has pro sockets so I have to use the transformer.

I'm gonna see if I can get a broken set to fix mine up with as the strap is very brittle and flaking badly plus the pads are hardened. These drivers deserve better

just a thought... that phat (kinda) portable amp could run any full sized stax earspeakers with that pro thing..

I see it now, omegaII in someones portable rig

Here ya go..

http://www.adorama.com/BOMM12ATM.html

That should do the job.

I sold a Stax portable amp a couple of years back to a guy who stuck a portable plug onto a Lambda and was quite happy with the results. He claimed the portable amp was very good. It sounds good with fresh batteries and even better with a good external power supply. I don't know if it has the oomph to run the less efficient Stax such as Sigmas or Omegas.

maaaaaan!!! thats pricey for a BATTERY!!!!

hello head-fi & stax fans in specific

seeing someone else just got a hit of the gamma luvin, i feel doubly inclined to post this. i posted this in the diy forum too, but seeing as how nobody reads that...

today, prompted by the fact that my gammas were getting no luvvin because the o2's steal their thunder i played them.

please note that i have the "stax dynamic alpha" pads on my gammas, as after the proper gamma pad supply dried up this was the replacement.

i was reminded of the SINGLE reason i hated them. they bump&crush my ears like the akg k-240's with pleather pads. thinking back to an OLD w-5000 thread, i thought to "over stuff" the pads with tissue paper. so i did. one page per headphone, on the back of the pad, just rolled into a long snake. stuff it into the obvious gap, and get some breathing room. the mod is reversible, and easy to do. it took about 2 minutes to do this.

wow, 2 hours later and i am just in headphone nirvana. amazing. no ear pain, and the sound is awesome as you may have guessed. i see my o2's getting lots less play time.

I got my SR-3 today. Woe betide that I dont have a normal bias amp. So I cant use it.

Its dead comfy though, and its in SPOTLESS condition.

I have been blissing out with the Gammas. I'm having the same eargasmic sensations I first got with my old Wharfedale Isodynamics in '76, playing the same Supertramp album! I haven't had this feeling since that day I first gave them a test drive and none of my other phones since have ever managed that feeling despite their technical superiority and obvious fun factor. It's odd getting that feeling again after 30 years.

So many headphones, so few eargasms. I guess the Gammas must have a similar sound signature to the old Isodynamics to elicit that same response, though my memory of them is foggy at best given how long ago I owned them. Still, it's nice to get that feeling back again. I need to find a better amp or maybe find a pro version. Plus I'm dying to hear what the SR-X Mk3's sound like.

Nikongod: any idea where I might find some pads that will fit the Gammas as these pads have hardened badly in places. I looked but haven't found anything.