Head-Fi.org › Forums › Equipment Forums › Portable Headphone Amps › Review: Portable amp roundup! 56 portable amps reviewed and compared - FINAL update 12-20-10 added RSA SR-71B
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

Review: Portable amp roundup! 56 portable amps reviewed and compared - FINAL update 12-20-10... - Page 161  

post #2401 of 3234
6/16/09 at 9:43am
Thread Starter 
For Classical and female vocals, I would go with the LT1. It is a little lusher in the midrange, which will be better for those musical styles.
post #2402 of 3234
6/16/09 at 12:17pm

Almost sorted out.

An enormous thanks to Skylab for the great work. Your advice/experience has been a lot of fun to read and learn from. Now my question is down to the final two: 3 Move vs. Mustang.

I take it the Mustang does not have a DAC so the 3 Move comes out ahead here. It's li-ion rechargeable batteries correct?

Thoughts on the 3 Move vs. Mustang ($100.00 price difference) with : AKG K701, Sennheiser HD 600, AKG 271K Studio, Audio Technica AD 700 and even Koss Porta Pro. Around the house it's the 701s & Audio Technicas mostly. Travelling it's the 271 Studios and Koss Porta Pros? All kinds of music-classical to rock. Folky rock & blues is a favorite.

Thanks for the help-I know this get's pretty murky. Yes, I do have a home amp (Glow tube) to more properly drive these phones.

Thanks again.
post #2403 of 3234
6/16/09 at 12:32pm
Thread Starter 
Hi c-record - thanks for the kind words. Unfortunately, I do not own any of the headphones you listed, and so cannot really help you there.

The 3Move uses a standard user-replaceable 9V battery. I do not believe it has any charging facility so if you wanted to use a rechargeable you would need to have an external charger.
post #2404 of 3234
6/16/09 at 2:27pm
With all the hype around the D10 I feel like my 3Move is out of the loop and old/behind the curve. Maybe I should not take such heft with reviews by enthusiasts especially those who don't have much to compare to. You and HeadphoneAddicts reviews are the best thanks for all your hard work!
post #2405 of 3234
6/16/09 at 2:36pm
Thread Starter 
Thank you!
post #2406 of 3234
6/18/09 at 12:57pm

Aaack!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Skylab View Post
Hi c-record - thanks f or the kind words. Unfortunately, I do not own any of the headphones you listed, and so cannot really help you there.

The 3Move uses a standard user-replaceable 9V batery. I do not believe it has any charging facility so if you wanted to use a rechargeable you would need to have an external charger.
You were just supposed to tell me which amp and then I would have gone on in satisfied bliss. Based on your review of the Mustang - midrange excellence etc., I may have to plan for the extra $100.00 over the Meier. I do like that RSA is US for support.
post #2407 of 3234
6/18/09 at 9:58pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by DoYouRight View Post
With all the hype around the D10 I feel like my 3Move is out of the loop and old/behind the curve. Maybe I should not take such heft with reviews by enthusiasts especially those who don't have much to compare to. You and HeadphoneAddicts reviews are the best thanks for all your hard work!
I hope you get the opportunity to listen to the D10, specially w/ a TopKit by HiFlight. The D10 is a fantastic unit which competes with many home units IMO.
post #2408 of 3234
6/19/09 at 12:56am
Move and Pico are both 3 what is your oppinion on the differences Skylab?
post #2409 of 3234
6/19/09 at 1:37am
Quote:
Originally Posted by DoYouRight View Post
Move and Pico are both 3 what is your oppinion on the differences Skylab?
I'll toss my hat in the ring - to me the biggest difference - 3MOVE is richer more forward sounding, while Pico is more spacious and open sounding but a little more distant and a little less rich sounding. For example the 3MOVE's mids work especially better for my Denon D2000 headphones, but the Pico seems to work better with many of my IEM to keep the mids from drilling into my head.

Second level of differences - - the Pico DAC is superior to the 3MOVE DAC, which is no slouch either.

Third level of difference - Pico is slightly smoother in the highs than 3MOVE.

Fourth level of difference - both with a lot of power, but 3MOVE seems to have more power for driving HD600 and 600 ohm K240M, but little difference with lower impedance phones.

Final level of differences - 3MOVE is slightly bass'ier than Pico, which does not lack in bass at all.
post #2410 of 3234
6/19/09 at 9:22am
Thread Starter 
I agree with all of that (thanks Larry!), although I didn't really think the Pico was "smoother" in the highs, exactly - I think it was slightly more extended in the highs than the 3Move, but just slightly.
post #2411 of 3234
6/19/09 at 11:11am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skylab View Post
TESTING METHODOLOGY:

For the review I used the following headphones:

•Sennheiser HD25-1 (primarily)
•2005 Beyerdynamic DT770/32 ohm
•2005 Beyerdynamic DT880/250 ohm
•In later reviews, Denon D5000, AT-ESW9, Ultrasone HFI-780


I listened to some with Shure E500’s, but that was not part of the “formal” test.

Music used for the review:

•Patricia Barber – “All or Nothing at All”, Nightclub
•Holly Cole, “Looking for the Heart of Saturday Night”, Temptation
•Crash Test Dummies, “In the Days of the Caveman”, God Shuffled His Feet
•Dave Matthews, “Oh”, Some Devil
•Jenny Lewis with the Watson Twins, “Handle With Care”, Rabbit Fur Coat.

Listening was done with the levels matched to within 1db using a RS SPL meter, so that the listening volume level was identical with each amp. Source was a RedWineAudio iMod iPod, connected with an RnB Audio interconnect.

No attempt is going to be made here to completely describe each amp – this has been done plenty of places on this site. Rather, I scored the amps based my listening in the areas of midrange, treble, and bass performance, transparency, neutrality, soundstaging, build quality, and other pertinent comments. I used an academic grading scale, but as in most academics, the lowest grade any of these amps got was a B-, since they were all pretty good.

At the end I will rank each of them, but to start they are listen in alphabetical order. Also, in case there is any question, I purchased all of these amps with my own hard-earned money, and they are the stock amplifiers – no mods of any kind were done. Where there was a bass boost function, it wasn’t used.
Hello Skylab, thank you for the review.

I'm curious why you didn't make use of the beatiful Victor JVC DX-1000? too much wood? I would really like to hear about this, well for moi, a fantasy headphone at the moment. I am quite stunned by what I read about from AudioCubes wrt the construction. BTW the reason I am so very smitten is that I just recently acquired the Victor HP-FX500 wood dome and housing IEM, and that has supplanted my entire IEM collection on every level. I can only imagine what the bigger boys are like... Im Qrious.
post #2412 of 3234
6/19/09 at 11:38am
Thread Starter 
The JVC DX1000, are, IMHO, not a logical pairing with a portable amp, and this is the main reason that I do not use them.

But thank you for reminding me that the "headphones used" part of the Testing section needs updating
post #2413 of 3234
6/19/09 at 5:59pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skylab View Post
The JVC DX1000, are, IMHO, not a logical pairing with a portable amp...
Screw logic!

...still enjoying this thread Rob.


post #2414 of 3234
6/19/09 at 6:00pm
Thread Starter 
Dane, that's awesome!
post #2415 of 3234
6/19/09 at 7:55pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Skylab View Post
Dane, that's awesome!
Thanks!

It sounds awesome.
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home
  Back to Forum: Portable Headphone Amps
This thread is locked  
Head-Fi.org › Forums › Equipment Forums › Portable Headphone Amps › Review: Portable amp roundup! 56 portable amps reviewed and compared - FINAL update 12-20-10 added RSA SR-71B