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Little Dot MKVII with AKG K701's Balanced? - Page 2

post #16 of 29
12/27/09 at 1:32pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joelby View Post
The stock cable has 4 wires right back to the plug. It's set to go balanced with a retermination.
Are you certain? I was told it is a 3 wire cable?
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post #17 of 29
12/27/09 at 2:04pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by tim3320070 View Post
Are you certain? I was told it is a 3 wire cable?
Sure as ****! Just did a full recable on them, my man.
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post #18 of 29
12/27/09 at 2:16pm
To clear things up:
The K701 definitely has a 4 wire cable.
The K702 has a detachable cable with a 3 pin xlr, so it wouldn't work for balanced.
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post #19 of 29
12/27/09 at 5:52pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joelby View Post
To clear things up:
The K701 definitely has a 4 wire cable.
The K702 has a detachable cable with a 3 pin xlr, so it wouldn't work for balanced.
Awesome, I knew there was a reason I didn't purchase the 702's.

Joel,
A couple more questions when you get time.

1) Can you attempt to explain the changes in sound with the 701's single ended vs balanced?

2) Once the cable has been reterminated with the neutrik XLR plug is there an adapter available that could allow the headphones to be used single ended?

Thanks,
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post #20 of 29
12/27/09 at 6:15pm
I'll have to spend more time with them before I make a comparison. I've got too many headphones now, and the K701s have seen mostly gaming time lately. They're awesome for gaming, btw. The nice thing about the MKVII is you can go back and forth between single ended and balanced.

I've made a single ended adapter for myself. You can probably buy them as well. If you want to make one, you'll need a female 4-pin xlr plug, a single ended plug and a small length of cable.
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post #21 of 29
12/27/09 at 11:45pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joelby View Post
To clear things up:
The K701 definitely has a 4 wire cable.
The K702 has a detachable cable with a 3 pin xlr, so it wouldn't work for balanced.
Thanks for the info!
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post #22 of 29
12/28/09 at 1:34am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bowedtoothdoc View Post
Awesome, I knew there was a reason I didn't purchase the 702's.

Joel,
A couple more questions when you get time.

1) Can you attempt to explain the changes in sound with the 701's single ended vs balanced?

2) Once the cable has been reterminated with the neutrik XLR plug is there an adapter available that could allow the headphones to be used single ended?

Thanks,
When you cut the TRS plug of the cable leave a foot of cable on it,then attach a male 4 pin to the phone side and a female 4 pin to the foot you cut of.
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post #23 of 29
12/28/09 at 2:53am
Quote:
Originally Posted by Joelby View Post
To clear things up:
The K701 definitely has a 4 wire cable.
The K702 has a detachable cable with a 3 pin xlr, so it wouldn't work for balanced.
I had modded my K702 to go balanced. The process is a pain the the ass though, so don't bother.
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post #24 of 29
12/28/09 at 8:44pm
Here's the wire color scheme for the K701:

Pin 1 = L+ = yellow
Pin 2 = L- = white
Pin 3 = R+ = orange
Pin 4 = R- = black

Confirmed by testing stock cable with multimeter and using this picture to distinguish the (-) leads:

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post #25 of 29
1/13/10 at 7:53am
Thread Starter 
Joelby,
Thanks for the help. I have ordered the new MKVII+ from David @ Little Dot and will soon be ordering the XLR adapters from markertek. Apparently they were forced into changing the design of the MKVII unit because of a opamp shortage. Hopefully this change will be an improvement, but I don't think anyone knows for sure?

You can see the thread that I started here:
Little Dot MKVII+ Available Now!
http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f5/lit...le-now-465713/
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post #26 of 29
1/23/10 at 2:20pm
Thread Starter 
Joelby,
Just wanted to report back that this morning I was able to successfully reterminate my AKG's. I also got the female adapter for single ended and am listening in single ended right now. I appreciate your help and will report back after my MKVII+ arrives and I am able to listen in fully balanced mode.
Thanks Again!!
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post #27 of 29
1/23/10 at 7:06pm
It's basically this but with different wire colors- it is very easy but you need a multimeter and soldering iron (cheap enough at Radio Shack).

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f6/bal...gs1000-431493/
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post #28 of 29
1/24/10 at 9:01am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by tim3320070 View Post
It's basically this but with different wire colors- it is very easy but you need a multimeter and soldering iron (cheap enough at Radio Shack).

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f6/bal...gs1000-431493/
Close, but the nice thing about the mkVII and the mkVII+ is that they balanced output is a single 4 pin connection as opposed to two 3 pin connectors.
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post #29 of 29
2/10/11 at 2:50pm

I have an AKG 702 that has been reterminated to balanced by a fellow head-fier, as well as a Little Dot DAC_I and MKVII+, all running in balanced mode. I find that for the most part, the amp drives the 702's pretty well, although when I listen to orchestral classical music which generally has a larger dynamic range than other music, I have to turn the volume knob up to around 60, 65 or even 70 to clearly hear softer passages on some albums. I had hoped (probably unreasonably) that balanced configuration might change the sound signature of the 702's and reduce the treble energy slightly and perhaps increase bass impact; however, I have found that not to be the case. Rather, in my experience, running balanced just makes headphones louder at the same volume pot positions as SE (as one would expect).

 

At any rate, as others have mentioned, the Little Dot setup is a solid, budget balanced rig that gets good sound out of the balanced 702's (although this is not really true with balanced K501's, which I also have. The volume knob has to be turned way up on certain classical albums in order to get even decent amplification).

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