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CanJam at RMAF Denver CO October 2,3,4 - Page 7

post #91 of 209
10/5/09 at 7:40pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sherwood View Post
Very true. The scary part is that there are other designs in the works, some of which WERE meant for the o2s
I know, I already spoke with Bill about the bigger power supply and increased voltage swing possible, among other upgrades possible.
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post #92 of 209
10/5/09 at 7:43pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by AmanGeorge View Post
I'll add what little credibility I have in support of yours - I had the exact same experience testing the HE-5 in my rig, even at low enough volume levels that the HE-5 wasn't yet sounding distorted.
When I audition them, Fang commented about the synergy with his little hybrid amp. I didn't get time to try them with a solid state amp so the vote is still out how much power they really need. Fang commented about possibly have a package when they are officially released of the headphones and the amp.
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post #93 of 209
10/5/09 at 8:15pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by HeadphoneAddict View Post
I know, I already spoke with Bill about the bigger power supply and increased voltage swing possible, among other upgrades possible.
Increasing the chances of killing myself for minimal increase in cost = hell yeah I'm in.

And yeah, $700 would make the HE5 exactly the same pricerange as the $650 LCD2... interesting.
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post #94 of 209
10/5/09 at 8:22pm
Hey everyone, sorry I didn't get to meet as many of you as I'd have liked. I was in the CanJam room early Friday and late Sunday. Jude was kind enough to let me stash my bags in his room during the day on Friday, since I came right from the airport.
Even though I only missed about an hour each day, I was racing to hear everything in the show, and didn't get nearly enough time to listen to headphones. I did get a chance to hear Aman's (Jacob's) amp, which looked as good as it sounded. The Moth was a treat to see and hear as well.

Since I have a Woo 6SE, I spent a bit of time at the Woo table. The Woo5 was fabulous with the 800s. A step up from the 6SE, I noticed to my chagrin. The balanced 650s from the WA22 sounded better than I've ever heard them.
Woo Audio had some prototype DACs there, using Wolfson8741s. One was a music server with wireless, a touchscreen panel and USB input on the front. No firm date or price yet, although they hinted at early next year with a very rough estimate in the $1K range.

I spent most of the rest of the weekend visiting the rest of RMAF and attending the talks. Although the $200-300k rigs were very impressive, only a few setups really left an impression on me. I'm glad it was dark in the Rethm room, because the Hummel concerto with Wynton Marsalis left me teary-eyed. I've never heard it sound so involving. I could have stayed there for hours, but for some reason felt the need to visit every room. I don't regret it, but next year I expect I'll trade breadth for depth.

On Sunday afternoon, I finally got to the JH13 table. Just as I walked up, I saw them pulling a name out of a box. What? They had a drawing? I didn't know! Please tell me they weren't for a pair of JH13s...

Well of course they were.

So they called up the winner, David somebody. He was at home. The JH girl told him "Congrats! You won a pair of Jerry Harvey JH13 IEMS!".
He says...





"Cool! Uhhh... What are they?"
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post #95 of 209
10/5/09 at 8:36pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by jopagi View Post
So they called up the winner, David somebody. He was at home. The JH girl told him "Congrats! You won a pair of Jerry Harvey JH13 IEMS!".
He says...





"Cool! Uhhh... What are they?"
Ahhhh!!! I will find him and offer to trade him for my Klipsch X10 which are clearly superior because they are smaller.
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post #96 of 209
10/5/09 at 8:36pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by jopagi View Post

"Cool! Uhhh... What are they?"
Wow.... I would be pissed if I was JH! And of course, if I were anyone else in the room who was actually dying to win that drawing...

Quote:
Originally Posted by jopagi View Post
Although the $200-300k rigs were very impressive, only a few setups really left an impression on me. I'm glad it was dark in the Rethm room, because the Hummel concerto with Wynton Marsalis left me teary-eyed. I've never heard it sound so involving. I could have stayed there for hours, but for some reason felt the need to visit every room.
Cheers sir, thanks for the kind words - they've just been passed along.
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post #97 of 209
10/5/09 at 9:02pm
I know it's less new and sexy, but one other standout at the show for me was Larry's LA7000. I had heard a stock D2000, owned a stock D5000, heard a Markl-modded D5000, and a stock D7000 earlier in the day, and this pair blew them away. I actually didn't really like the Markl-modded D5000 I had heard very much - it sounded really uninvolving to my ears relative to the stock version. But the LA7000 was a clear improvement on the stock version - much, much more balanced and incredibly musical - definitely is competitive in the top tier of dynamics, to my ear.
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post #98 of 209
10/5/09 at 9:28pm
Thread Starter 
I just got home from a GREAT 4 days at RMAF what a great time, many thanks to the vendors that attended the headfi room and special thanks to the headfi members that attended you guys made this a very special event for me.

Both planar headphones were outstanding to me although I thought they sounded different to me and will likely appeal to different people depending of what their sonic preferences are. I need to hear both out of the same set up to really make a value call on these. I was just too busy to try them both on the same set up.

Many people from the two channel speaker community were impressed by our side of the world from manufactures to reviewers and just plain old speaker enthusiasts. My guess would be that we will be seeing more products from the traditional speaker centric companies aimed at the headphone market. I think we'll also see more attention from the audio press both online and paper based after this show as they appeared to get it.

Just a few audio thoughts now, The Woo table was awesome as ever I spent some time with the Woo 5 and the Audeze 2 headphones and it drove them wonderfully speed, tone and decay were strong suits. I did some listening to the WES and the WA22, the WES were driving the Stax O2s and the WA22 were driving the HD800s. In my short time with both I'd be hard pressed to say which I would choose as both were outstanding. Maybe I lean towards the WA22 driving the HD800s solely because I like dynamics punch slightly more. Both combos could be considered absolutely state of the art rigs with noting that I could point to as a short coming.

I spent some time at the Head Direct table listening to the HiFIman 801 and was as impressed at RMAF as I was with this Hi Res player as I as at CanJam LAX. This time I was able to place some of my FLAC files on a card to hear this player with music I knew well. This is at least as good as my netbook pico dac amp combo and potentially better. Fang set me up with his planar headphone the HE 5 and it was a treat with a rich full sound, that had a wide stage with each instrument firmly in a place in the stage. I tried them at this table with what I think was the EF1, I would love to hear them balanced or on an amp like the Woo 5.
Fe Fe had me try their new in ear monitor that I think is being targeted at the $200 range. To my ear they will likely outclass IEMs in that range as they sounded stellar but I was using them with the HIFiman 801.

Now I stepped away from portable rigs a few years ago as they became too much hassle for me strapping an amp to a DAP with a LOD but after a few months with my pico I am flirting with this again. I still did not want to go the LOD amp route but Ken from ALO and Matt from GR9 had me take a listen to their new RX amp and I was impressed enough to ask to borrow one for review. It as also a hit with many of the other MOTs as some came over to borrow one for the event. Keep an eye out for this one. Matt from GR9 also had this magic box that takes the digital stream from the ipod and feeds it to a dac. THe combo of the RX being fed from his box that takes the digital stream from the ipod and converts it with his internal dac in concert with the RX raises the bar for portable audio in a big way.

JH Audio was the hit of the event and like all things in life Jerry and company do things in a big way. His booth was amazing fitted with two couches and a balanced cdp (compliments of Electrocompaniet) and the Apache amp from RSA. This combo blew minds and as good as the JH13s are out of a DAP they scale mightily with top end sources and amps.

Jerry also came prepared to bring people to our HeadFi room with a street team of wonderful ladies that helped to convince old school audiophiles to give IEMs a chance. I don't know what the hit rate was but his Audiologist was a busy guy all weekend taking ear impressions for customs all day long.


There was a ton more but thats all for now except to thank Tyl for the beer and the rest of the crew that went out Sunday for pizza for their excellent company.

PS Jude, ASR, Sherwood and all you nikon toting crazies please post pics!!!
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post #99 of 209
10/5/09 at 9:28pm
I thought that was a D2000, larry?
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post #100 of 209
10/5/09 at 10:35pm
Hello Everyone,

I posted some photo's here:

CryoParts RMAF/CanJam 2009

Enjoy!

Peace,

Lee
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post #101 of 209
10/5/09 at 10:42pm
great pics. thanks.
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post #102 of 209
10/5/09 at 11:17pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by jopagi View Post

So they called up the winner, David somebody. He was at home. The JH girl told him "Congrats! You won a pair of Jerry Harvey JH13 IEMS!".
He says...


"Cool! Uhhh... What are they?"
LOL, this part cracks me up.

Quote:
Originally Posted by jp11801 View Post
JH Audio was the hit of the event and like all things in life Jerry and company do things in a big way. His booth was amazing fitted with two couches and a balanced cdp (compliments of Electrocompaniet) and the Apache amp from RSA. This combo blew minds and as good as the JH13s are out of a DAP they scale mightily with top end sources and amps.

Jerry also came prepared to bring people to our HeadFi room with a street team of wonderful ladies that helped to convince old school audiophiles to give IEMs a chance. I don't know what the hit rate was but his Audiologist was a busy guy all weekend taking ear impressions for customs all day long.
Thanks for the impression about the balanced JH13s
This only makes me more and more curious of how they scale with better sources/amps. Maybe I'll try to shoot Jerry an email asking about his balanced cable.
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post #103 of 209
10/6/09 at 12:17am
I was there for a couple hours on Friday and Sunday. I finally got a chance to hear a few of the headphones I had been hearing about for so long. Here are my impressions:

1. When I first tried the JH13, I was unimpressed. It sounded OK, but not brilliant. However, I did not have a proper seal. I checked the booth again later and tried out the 10X3. I thought it sounded pretty good. Then I took out my Etymotic ER-4Ps and played the same track again through the Etys. The difference was astonishing. The Etys weren't even in the same universe; the dynamics were just so much more constrained. I tried the JH13 again and this time got a proper seal. Within ten minutes, I was getting my impressions for my own pair of JH13s.

2. I agree that the Head-Direct HE5 sounded fantastic. The HM-801 also sounded brilliant. I'm glad I submitted my pre-order for the HM-801 a couple months ago. I'm really looking forward to the HM-801/JH13 combo.

3. I tried the K1000, and can see why they are sought after. They were very nice, and could easily be a headphone that you could be comfortable with for a long time.

4. The best rig that I heard there was Asr's Cary CD player/Blue Hawaii SE/Stax O2 Mk I. I put in the Vivaldi Four Seasons CD, and just melted into the music. That was probably the best musical experience I had at the show, including all of the $100,000+ speaker rigs.

Big thanks to Sherwood for looking after my ATs while I wandered around the speaker rooms on Friday. It was also nice to meet Jude and JP# at the show.
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post #104 of 209
10/6/09 at 12:42am
Quote:
Originally Posted by AmanGeorge View Post
I know it's less new and sexy, but one other standout at the show for me was Larry's LA7000. I had heard a stock D2000, owned a stock D5000, heard a Markl-modded D5000, and a stock D7000 earlier in the day, and this pair blew them away. I actually didn't really like the Markl-modded D5000 I had heard very much - it sounded really uninvolving to my ears relative to the stock version. But the LA7000 was a clear improvement on the stock version - much, much more balanced and incredibly musical - definitely is competitive in the top tier of dynamics, to my ear.
Those were my impression as well. I loved the LA7000 and was considering getting the D7000 but after trying it I realized it didn't compare. Even the balanced D7000 was a big improvement over the stock. I also didn't care for the D5000 and the LA5000 wasn't as nice as the LA7000.
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post #105 of 209
10/6/09 at 12:46am
Quote:
Originally Posted by AmanGeorge View Post
I know it's less new and sexy, but one other standout at the show for me was Larry's LA7000. I had heard a stock D2000, owned a stock D5000, heard a Markl-modded D5000, and a stock D7000 earlier in the day, and this pair blew them away. I actually didn't really like the Markl-modded D5000 I had heard very much - it sounded really uninvolving to my ears relative to the stock version. But the LA7000 was a clear improvement on the stock version - much, much more balanced and incredibly musical - definitely is competitive in the top tier of dynamics, to my ear.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Sherwood View Post
I thought that was a D2000, larry?
Yes, the D2000 are gone and these were my new LA7000. The LA7000 filled in the hole in the midrange, and gave better detail and treble. After the July meet I couldn't bear to send the LA7000 back after my review, and I sold the D2000 and a couple of other things to buy the LA7000.

Quote:
Originally Posted by jp11801 View Post
...

Just a few audio thoughts now, The Woo table was awesome as ever I spent some time with the Woo 5 and the Audeze 2 headphones and it drove them wonderfully speed, tone and decay were strong suits. I did some listening to the WES and the WA22, the WES were driving the Stax O2s and the WA22 were driving the HD800s. In my short time with both I'd be hard pressed to say which I would choose as both were outstanding. Maybe I lean towards the WA22 driving the HD800s solely because I like dynamics punch slightly more. Both combos could be considered absolutely state of the art rigs with noting that I could point to as a short coming.

...

Fe Fe had me try their new in ear monitor that I think is being targeted at the $200 range. To my ear they will likely outclass IEMs in that range as they sounded stellar but I was using them with the HIFiman 801.
JP, my O2 Mk1 on the WES were much better than the O2 Mk2, and they had better deep impact as well. And I agree the RE252 IEM are a standout in the $200 street price range. I think RE252 are much better than the RE2 and RE3 that I have here. Vs other dynamic earphones I even prefer them over my IE8 or C700, and would take them over an SE530 or Triple.fi 10 Pro. I just traded away my IE8 this weekend for another W3 at RMAF, after I recently lost my original W3, so I have not compared the RE252 to my Westone 3 yet. At this point, I think the W3 and UM3X are the ONLY universal IEM that I might like more than the RE252, but the RE252 may well beat everything else. They sound good from my iPhone and Nano as well, not just the HiFiMan 801 or amped iPods.
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