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HT Omega "Claro Halo" Headphone Only soundcard - Page 7

post #91 of 359
12/27/08 at 11:11pm

Claro+ vs Halo

I'm doing research before buying one of these cards (Claro Plus+ or
Halo), but stuck on dilemma that I would like, is it possible, to have
answer for.
Based on all information that I found I don't see any
other advantages that Halo has against Claro Plus+ except from:

1) Dedicated headphone amp based on TPA6120 for high impedance phones.
I'm planning to use D2000 (25 Om), so will I have any advantages here?
I know that in many headphone schematics use AD8620 as preamp before
TPA6120 but is it more necessary for high impedance headphones (50 Om
and more)?
2) Sockets for opamps
I would be satisfied with AD8620BR opamps on front channels (so basically not interested in changing them later).

Am I missing something else or for my situation I would be perfectly fine with Claro Plus+

Really appreciate for any suggestions.
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post #92 of 359
1/20/09 at 11:10pm
Sorry for the thread necro, but I thought starting a new thread would be silly.

Does anyone have further thoughts, experiences with this sound card over the last couple weeks? I'm all about using the PC as a source, and am getting really to pull the trigger on the halo card in the next two weeks for use with my HD650s.

I know it's been stated that they work great with high impedance 'phones, but has anyone had a chance to try them out with some 300+ imp 'phones, and are they happy with it?
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post #93 of 359
1/20/09 at 11:22pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Daetlus View Post
Sorry for the thread necro, but I thought starting a new thread would be silly.

Does anyone have further thoughts, experiences with this sound card over the last couple weeks? I'm all about using the PC as a source, and am getting really to pull the trigger on the halo card in the next two weeks for use with my HD650s.

I know it's been stated that they work great with high impedance 'phones, but has anyone had a chance to try them out with some 300+ imp 'phones, and are they happy with it?
Hi,
Just my 2 cents. You may already know this, but those phones really suck up amps. They realy sound good if you can throw a good amp at them. I'm sure they will be useable with the HT card, but if you really want to hear them properly you should get a Head amp that can throw some power at them.
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post #94 of 359
1/20/09 at 11:39pm
Well I understood that from others, but I'm actually still awaiting delivery of my phones. Previous to this the only phones I used on a regular basis were a pair of Shure E3s They were driven 'fairly' well by pretty much anything.

Honestly, I've tried to stay away from 'high-fi' for as long as possible. I know how badly I'd get scooped up in the chasing your tail that sound quality could become. As I'm a college student and a person currently going through a divorce, my wallet doesn't get much of that adrenaline rush that comes with free falling before it smashes with a ghastly death into the red.

I honestly won't have too much money to put into this. Perhaps I should make a new thread.
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post #95 of 359
1/21/09 at 12:28am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Daetlus View Post
Well I understood that from others, but I'm actually still awaiting delivery of my phones. Previous to this the only phones I used on a regular basis were a pair of Shure E3s They were driven 'fairly' well by pretty much anything.

Honestly, I've tried to stay away from 'high-fi' for as long as possible. I know how badly I'd get scooped up in the chasing your tail that sound quality could become. As I'm a college student and a person currently going through a divorce, my wallet doesn't get much of that adrenaline rush that comes with free falling before it smashes with a ghastly death into the red.

I honestly won't have too much money to put into this. Perhaps I should make a new thread.
Well, you can run them off the card and upgrade to an amp in the Future. Of course everytime you listen to them, you'll wonder, you'll always wonder!

If you get an amp, they really seem to like Darkvoice Tubed amps. I have mine running off a DV 337SE, and they just kill!!
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post #96 of 359
1/21/09 at 5:22am
How does this compare to the ASUS Xonar Essence STX?
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post #97 of 359
1/21/09 at 2:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vandal View Post
How does this compare to the ASUS Xonar Essence STX?
Buuuuuump...

And how about these two vs the X-Fi Fatality for gaming?
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post #98 of 359
3/5/09 at 7:54pm
Just thought I would snatch the stake out of the Vampires heart and ask about Opamp rolling and how it is going with you guys. I just received this card. I'm waiting on some more Opamps and some Connectors to make a BNC connection and a COAX connection slot plate.

Basically interested in the OPA rolling folks have done. I have the LM4562, LT 1364, LT 1469 and OPA 2132 coming. I don't necessarily want to get into Brown Dogs and what not. This is just to do something for fun. I'm not going to listen to the Phone output except to Play with OPSa. I ust need the Digital IO of the Card.

But thought it might be fun to roll the OPAs a little since I'm only using Free OPAs.

HaloXT, what did you settle on?

.
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post #99 of 359
3/5/09 at 7:59pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by CompressionalFlagellation View Post
Buuuuuump...

And how about these two vs the X-Fi Fatality for gaming?
The X-fi is superior to both of them for gaming. None of these two have hardware accleration, nor the creative Xram.

There is no difference in sound quality between this card and the Asus.

One is PCI, the other is PCIE.

However, the Asus seems to be designed for 32ohm headphones and up, the Halo has a jumper that can make the card work better for headphones under 32ohms.
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post #100 of 359
3/5/09 at 8:08pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Goit View Post
The X-fi is superior to both of them for gaming. None of these two have hardware accleration, nor the creative Xram.

There is no difference in sound quality between this card and the Asus.

One is PCI, the other is PCIE.

However, the Asus seems to be designed for 32ohm headphones and up, the Halo has a jumper that can make the card work better for headphones under 32ohms.
There IS a difference in SQ between the STX and the Claro Halo. Have you even tried them both?
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post #101 of 359
3/5/09 at 8:16pm
I'm using the lm4562's, but I would suggest trying out the LME49860, majkel says it is superior to the lm4562's, in fact it is his favorite opamp (that means a lot given all the opamps he has tried) and it is dual-channel and pretty cheap, like $5 a pop.

Why did you get the halo? If only for the digital output that's a little extreme no? I'm quite impressed with the detail of the halo compared to the compass dac/amp though, imaging is the only real difference, but I think LME49860 may really fix it if I understand majkel's opinion of it and lm4562's correctly.

If you choose to get it, let me know how it works I am interested in getting some since I can now tell none of the 3 hdam's from audio-gd were designed for perfect neutrality and presentation.

Shahrose, which did you prefer for music enjoyment? I am quite fond of the halo sq.
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post #102 of 359
3/5/09 at 8:31pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by haloxt View Post
I'm using the lm4562's, but I would suggest trying out the LME49860, majkel says it is superior to the lm4562's, in fact it is his favorite opamp (that means a lot given all the opamps he has tried) and it is dual-channel and pretty cheap, like $5 a pop.

Why did you get the halo? If only for the digital output that's a little extreme no? I'm quite impressed with the detail of the halo compared to the compass dac/amp though, imaging is the only real difference, but I think LME49860 may really fix it if I understand majkel's opinion of it and lm4562's correctly.

If you choose to get it, let me know how it works I am interested in getting some since I can now tell none of the 3 hdam's from audio-gd were designed for perfect neutrality and presentation.

Shahrose, which did you prefer for music enjoyment? I am quite fond of the halo sq.
I haven't tried the Halo, but I do have the Claro Plus+ which, save for the amp, has nearly identical analog outputs as far as I know (actually the Claro+ has better opamps, ie. AD8620BR). The Essence STX has better SQ, plain and simple. I would rate the Claro Plus+ second out of all the cards I've listened to.
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post #103 of 359
3/5/09 at 8:39pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by haloxt View Post
I'm using the lm4562's, but I would suggest trying out the LME49860, majkel says it is superior to the lm4562's, in fact it is his favorite opamp (that means a lot given all the opamps he has tried) and it is dual-channel and pretty cheap, like $5 a pop.

Why did you get the halo? If only for the digital output that's a little extreme no? I'm quite impressed with the detail of the halo compared to the compass dac/amp though, imaging is the only real difference, but I think LME49860 may really fix it if I understand majkel's opinion of it and lm4562's correctly.

If you choose to get it, let me know how it works I am interested in getting some since I can now tell none of the 3 hdam's from audio-gd were designed for perfect neutrality and presentation.

Shahrose, which did you prefer for music enjoyment? I am quite fond of the halo sq.
Its a long story, but a lot of the Higher end Audio cards won't loop in and out a lot of signals. The Juli@ wouldn't loop analog to SPDIF out, and it would not Loop SPDIF in to SPDIF out. The real High dollar cards won't do this either like the RME cards around $1000. So I had to go back to a Consumner card.

I also needed COAX and OPTICAL IN and OUT. I needed the Headers for COAX to be easily soldered to, so that i can convert them to a BNC connector for the REF 1 I am getting.

That's how I landed on the Halo. I also like HT Omega's Support which is the best I've ever seen.

I just ordered 5 of those LME49860's. You don't pay for these do you? National will send you 5 of them overnight for free. LT is not overnight, but it's pretty fast, they only give you two at a time. TI will do more, but is like 3 days. ALL FREE SAMPLES. I got a drawer full of these things. I don't think you should take advantage of them, but they'll give them to you if you KNOW how to answer a few questions

.
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post #104 of 359
3/5/09 at 8:59pm
Well let me just warn you right now, optical in into the halo is not affected by computer volume control. I tried setting the windows volume to 0, soundcard volume to 0, and foobar volume to 0 and it went to 100% and hurt my ears pretty bad. When I emailed to ask why it doesn't work they told me because of legal issues with c-media, their chipset manufacturer.

Not likely you will ever use optical in into the compass from a cd-player, but just warning ya .
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post #105 of 359
3/5/09 at 9:17pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by haloxt View Post
Well let me just warn you right now, optical in into the halo is not affected by computer volume control. I tried setting the windows volume to 0, soundcard volume to 0, and foobar volume to 0 and it went to 100% and hurt my ears pretty bad. When I emailed to ask why it doesn't work they told me because of legal issues with c-media, their chipset manufacturer.

Not likely you will ever use optical in into the compass from a cd-player, but just warning ya .
No issues there, that is how I would prefer it to work. I'm sending out to Active Digital Studio Monitors vis SPDIF that have their own Volume Control and there will be no DA conversions

But thanx for the info.

.
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