Are there any regular amplifiers with good headphone out? I assume they all have some sort of amplification in them for the headphones but have any of you found any that were as good as a headphone amp.

In the recent NAD C352 thread, several people commented that the heaphone output was quite good.

I'm also interested in this question, for regular amps and possibly mini hi-fi's which have usable headphone outputs.

I am using the headphone out from my NAD C162 preamp, which sounds
quite good. I assume it is very similar, if not identical, to the headphone circuit
in the NAD integrated amps. I have to say that I am comparing this to my Zhalou 2.5C, a homemade vacuum tube headphone amp and to an XM4

I don't know about quality headphone amps that may be found in preamps and amplifers, but I just picked up a Marantz CD5001 CD player, which has a dedicated, high quality headphone amp built-in, and the sound is glorious! It's a high-res 24 bit player, so if you're only into CD's as a source, this player is worth checking out. And there are no interconnects... the signal path is very direct right to the headphone jack!

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I *think* the NAD integrated amps share the output of the main power amplifier. I know that some of the pre-amps have their own dedicated headphone amp.

I own an NAD C350 and it is definitely serviceable. I also have a McIntosh MA6900 on order. When I wrote to McIntosh, the head tech over there said that the heaphone circuit DOES NOT share the output of the main power amp. He said that there was a small "OP Amp" that was "compatible with most headphones" but "not as good as most of the better outboard headphone amps".

McIntosh also had no specs of any kind for the headphone amp/jack...that ought to tell you something about how much thought they put into it.

Hi bootleg.

Did you use your AKG701s with your NAD?

BTW, for the OP, here is the other thread on NAD amps for headphone use :
http://www.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=241394

I drive my Sennheiser HD-650s with a Rotel RC-1070 preamp, which retailed for about $500 when I bought it a few years back. I prefer the Rotel to the $1,000 HeadRoom and Meier Audio headphone amps I tried. The HeadRoom was too laid back and the Meier Audio was too grainy.

Years ago, I drove HD-580s with an NAD C320BEE integrated. I vividly remember how live my opera recordings sounded on that setup.

I prefer the headphone output of my old Marantz PM-14 to my Earmax Pro.

anyone have experience with using transformers to run headphones off of binding posts?

The Portal Panache is an excellent integrated amp and headphone amp. The headphone output is directly run off the speaker outputs.

It's a preamp, not an amp, but I'm using a Parasound P/LD-2000 which the owner's manual describes as having a "high-current, low-noise headphone circuit." Using a ratty old pair of 540s, the sound is very, very good. Added benefit -- I don't have to turn on my class A solid-state amp to listen to 'phones, since that amp basically doubles as a space heater!

using HD-650's with a PE congress 30w into 8ohm power amp, it also has a complex preamp capable of RIAA equalisation and many effects (bass treble boost, tape hiss clean up, scratch clean up and equalisation of different input levels). The headphones are just driven of the speaker output but with some resistors in the signal path (330ohm). This is obviously a non ideal solution as headphones have variable impedance but still sounds better than all opamp based amplifiers I have built with these specific phones. (although it sounds awfull with SR-60's , which sound good with all the opamp based amps). The amp has a number of flaws when used with headphones though, the noise from supply and some higher frequancy noise is prevalant and as the amplifier is capacitivly coupled there is a drop off in very low bass and low bass is muddy. The power supply is a stupid design aswell, instead of building a decent regulated power supply it uses a bridge rectifier with MASSIVE capacitance using 4 capacitors the size of small coke bottles rated at 22000uf. This means when I turn it off it stays running for 3 minutes :| which is very annoying.

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The ASL UHC-Signature does a great job of turning a speaker amp into a headphone amp. It has no appreciable sonic signature of its own, and the output is basically the signature of the speaker taps.

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I do own such a ASL-UHC, too.
AFAIK it's discontinued.
It's quite good, but naturally dependant on the quality of the speaker amp.
One caveat though: It doesn't work with any speaker amp since it does combine grounds.
Actually none of my current speaker amps is suitable for the ASL transformer.
One is a balanced speaker amp and doesn't provide ground to begin with and the other is a Audiodigit T2020 based on a Tripath chip. The latter is bridged and combining ground would fry it.
Read the manual first respectively ask the manufacturer before you try you utilize a transformer for headphones.