Official: New York Area Meet, Nov 20, White Plains, NY  

The Auction was incredible, One person donated a pair of HD650 with cardas cables balanced, RS-1 balanced with a very rare variant grado cable. Beyer donated a pair of DT860 and Fang donated a pair of HE6 prototype, and other very goes stuff. Wish I had more cash. Congrats to winners as they all got some stupid cheap prices for some very expensive gear!  

I didn't stay too long, but it was quite fun.  Was my first meet.  I didn't get to identify who's amp was whose in every case..........but I was really enthralled by the Apex Peak, which I thought was a great buy.  I also really enjoyed the Headroom balanced rig set up in the front, and there was a very very cool Stax rig in one corner.  It was extremely impressive.  I got to listen to the Omega 2 Mk i for a few minutes and it's the best I've heard it.  The amps were DIY as far as I'm aware.  I'm sure more info will be posted below.

Ray was also showing off his SR71b and hearing it power the HE-6 was extremely impressive.  Many home amps cannot power the HE-6.  It certainly wouldn't be my top buy for just that headphone, but certainly for the price (I believe he said under 700) to have a portable amp offer balanced and able to drive such a difficult headphone was really really special.  I would like to hear that amp with the HD800 and LCD2.

I was able to hear the T1 on numerous rigs....and of course I own one at home, but hearing it on numerous rigs made me feel a little disconnected from the headphone.  In every rig I tried, I preferred the LCD2, HE-6 and  HD800.  At home though, I love the T1 just as much.

Really had fun and I hope all the donations fully paid off, Eric certainly deserved it.....wonderful guy and his Woo Rig was great sounding (and in my opinion, as well as my girlfriend's) the best looking amp in the room:-)

It was my first meet. I had a lot of fun, met a lot of great people, such as Brittany Harvey, Ray Samuels, Vinnie Rossi, Fang, Yikes, Bozebottom (or whatever his name is), Revolink, the list goes on and on. I got a pair of Cardas balanced DT880 05s for a good price, but the entire auction was insane. I wish I had more cash too. Now I just need a balanced amp for the Dt880 (suggestions welcome.) Vinnie's setup impressed me, as he had his Isabellina HPA running some LCD2s with a nice copper cable. Something was funky with the CD player he had, so I said I had a player with coaxial out. He hooked it up to the Isabellina, and the music sounded fantastic. Ray Samuel's SR-71b driving the HE-6s was very impressive, both for the sound and the tiny size of the amp. It has almost half the footprint of an Ipod touch. I guess you could say I like Orthos, as the HE-6 and the LCD-2 impressed me. Brittany Harvey was there with the JH demos, and I tried the JH5 then the 16. I am definitely a 16 guy. It sounded very right to me. Ari (Nikongod) has a nice setup with some t1s and HD800s from a CD player and a turntable he offered for auction. I listened to more and have more impressions, but I will post those later. Overall, it was an overwhelmingly positive experience, and everyone was extremely generous, friendly, and willing to chat.

Got home and a little tired.  I've missed the last two meets so it was good to get back.

This was an interesting meet for me in that admittedly, I was a bit selfish.  I spent extensive listening time with the T1 and the HD800 on my own system and spent very little time on other's systems.  As for the T1 - I am in love.  I haven't been following impression threads so I'm sure this has been documented time and time again but I was surprised how different they sound from my fav 'phones - my DT990/600.  Thankfully, I had brought my 4-pin balanced jack to SE plug so I could plug both 'phones into my HR Desktop Balanced amp for side-by-side comparison.  It truly revealed how dark my 990s are.  I'm just so used to their sound, I never gave it any thought.  The T1s just open up the sound.  I found them to be a smooth sounding headphone and incredibly versatile.  I kept queuing up my fav songs from all different genres and the T1s delivered every time.  Honestly, I felt myself get emotional with a particular song - that's how involving I found them to be.

As for the HD800s - they were a surprise to me.  I admittedly have a bias against Sennheisers.  I just haven't heard one that I really liked.  Boy did that change after listening to the 800s.  I timed it so that I listened to them when most were out of the room eating lunch.  It was really noisy in our room so the quieter environment was welcome to listen to such an open 'phone.  HUGE expanse of sound!  They also seem to have bottomless bass response.  I have to admit it did a slightly better job in handling Massive Attack's Protection opening HEAVY bass hits than the T1s.  Very smooth sounding headphone and pretty true sounding which I have found to be not the case with Senns.  I freely admit I enjoy a colored sound and just never dug Senn's coloration.  The 800s however, are pretty transparent.  Wonderful experience.  They are also amazingly comfortable.  Easy to imagine a multi-hour listening session with them without any fatigue or physical discomfort.

If I had to choose between the two - I probably would choose the 800s.  I don't have a Senn in my stable and they certainly are a very different looking headphone which sonically matched very nicely with my amp.  If I have my way though - one day, I will own both.

As for the meet itself - the usual great collection of gear and folks.  Enjoyed talking to Peter from Beyerdynamic.  Finally got myself a turntable thanks to Ari's donation to the auction.  Got into a bit of a bidding war but I was determined to go home with the Sony.

I did enjoy listening to Frank's (DeadEars) McIntosh / MAD / LCD-2 set-up.  Incredibly smooth and natural sounding and was blown away listening to a Rodrigo & Gabriela cd (Live in Japan).  I also tried my RS-1 on his system with the same CD - suhweet!!!

A huge shout out to the manufacturers that showed up and continue to support our meets.  A big thanks to Vinnie/RWA for footing for lunch for all.  Very generous.  Ray Samuels was his usual hilarious and generous self.  He even won a $100+ bid for a pair of headphones which he gave back to the auction while still paying his winning bid.  In other words he more than doubled the amount paid for the headphone.  Someone walked away with a brand new $200+ Beyerdynamic (donated by the kind folks from Beyer) headphone for $62!  Big ticket item from the auction?  HiFiMan's prototype 'phones - $500+!  Typical Head-Fi generosity.

Also cool to meet The Man - Jude.  Unfortunately it was brief as I met him at the door as I was leaving but I got a warm greeting from him as he recognized my Head-Fi handle.

Thanks to all for another terrific meet!

I was exhausted right after the meet but came home and got my second wind so figured I'd post something.

I would like to thank EVERYONE who came out for the meet.  It's the mix of MOTs and members, all so generous with their equipment, that makes these meets so spectacular.

Special thanks to Beyerdynamic, Ray Samuels Audio, JH Audio, Red Wine Audio and HeadDirect for coming and donating such fabulous gear to the auction. A big reason members come to these events is to hear your latest gear so thanks for supporting the community.

Very special thanks to Vinny Rossi of Red Wine Audio for springing for lunch for the entire meet.  I've run quite a few events at hotels.  I don't know what the bill came to, but it must have been expensive.  Your generousity is remarkable and very much appreciated.

I said I got my second wind but used it up uploading my photos.  Is there any way to include photos in posts other than uploading them one at a time?  When I tried to paste code from Flickr it wouldn't work.  Anyway, it's tedious and I'm beat.  So I will let the photos speak for themselves instead of writing up any impressions right now.  If a picture is worth a thousand words, here's about 30,000 of them. 

Erik I am glad it was a success and wish I would have made the trip. I look forward to reading the impressions from all the guys. Looks like some interesting stuff was there and a great bunch of people many who I met at the NJ meet. I will try to get to the next one and I know CanJam is in NY and I do plan to attend that and stay up for the whole time.

Just a few quickies... Another great meet & mucho thanks to Erik for organizing.  Nice size room, enough A/C outlets, good location, etc.

Over-the-top equipment donations from vendors & head-fiers too.  Wish I could have stayed to bid on some.  As it was I just made it home in time to carve the turkey:)

Great lunch courtesy of Vinnie - another unexpected treat.   Great talking with & getting to know more members, glad I could make it for sure.

No pix from me as I'm not a camera guy, but think there will be plenty posted here over the next couple days....

Excellent turn out, I want to thank everyone that brought their equipment for members to try with special thanks to the vendors for their donations to the auction and to the organizers of the event for donating their time. I had to leave early, but hope to stay for the auction next time. 

George

My first meet, and I had a great time, except I had to leave too early.  The room was full of nothing but warmth, goodwill, generosity, enthusiasm, and some great sounding rigs.  Two surprises: how good certain vintage CD players sounded; and what a great source it was for finding new music.  I heard a couple of albums I'll have to buy, which will probably lead to whole new areas of delight.  Thanks to all.

Here are a few quick impressions.

I spent a good amount of time listening to They Beyerdynamic headphones especially comparing the DT990 to the DT880.  I like the DT880 better.  It seems to give a more balanced and neutral presentation and athough the DT990 seems to have a better soundstage.  I also tried comparing the 250 and 600 ohm models but that was almost impossible under meet conditions.  All I could really tell was that the higher impedence headphone wasn't as loud. Volume matching was another reason the comparison was particularly challenging.

I'm also interested in the AKG headphones and spend a little time comparing the K601 vs K702.  I thought the 702 was in a way more refined but I also thought it was much brighter.  The K601 was no slouch in detail or clarity and the smoother presentation made it the clear winner to me.  I've read the threads about trouble amping the K601s.  Through the CTH it seemed to be powered just fine.  daveDerek lent me his K601s so I'll be confirming that in the coming weeks.

Ray's SR71B is truly a marvel.  The photos of the board above are of that amp.  It easily powered the HD600s and HE6s.  The HE6 sounded marvelous through that tiny powerplant as did the HD600s.  Another great product from RSA is on the way.

Bill's (lmwsjm) Audio GD system was impressive.  I liked the idea of the modded Denons.  It was a totally different headphone to the Denons I've heard previously, sounding much more light and airy as you would expect.  Great job modding.  I know if it were me the headphones would have been ruined.  Turned them into a totally different headphone though and not at all bassy as the Denons can be.  Most people would probably just by a different headphone if they wanted that kind of sound.  I salute Bill's ingenuity!

I listened to a bunch of other stuff but either was too brain dead to form lasting opinions or there was too much ambient noise to listen too critically.

Of course the best part of the entire meet was getting to talk to friends, old and new.  Head-Fi is an awesome community - online and off - and I'm proud to be a part of it. 

Thanks again for everyone that came out!

I do want to add a big thank you to a pair of Jacks: Jack from the Micca Store for lending us the Fiio F9/F7 combo; and Jack Woo from Woo Audio for lending us the WA2.  If you had a chance to hear either of these pieces please post your impressions, even if they are only brief.

Fiio E9/E7:  This is a very unique modular amp/DAC combo.  If I understand it correctly the F7 is a stand alone DAC that can be used via USB from a notebook or computer transport.  The E7 fits into the E9, which is what seems to be a very powerful headphone amp.  I have not had a chance to try out this gear extensively as it only arrived at my house on Thursday, but as far as power goes, it seemed to drive the DT880 600, K601 and Grado HF-1s I threw it at equally well.  I'd have to spend more time in a quieter environment to give it any more of an evaluation than that, but it looks like a very interesting product and a great value.

WA2: I believe this was a stock amp with the stock tubes.  To me the sound of this amp is very elegant and has the stereo-typical tube sound.  Luscious midrange, warm, musical feel, extended soundstage.  If you want to experience tubes in all their glory look no further than the WA2.

Thanks again, Jack and Jack.

Omg

Why ain't in NY!!!!!

Please share some more with us.

Once again, I didn't get to listen to everything I wanted to listen to, but that's fine as I spent most of the time getting to talk to members.  Kerry and Ari were particularly helpful in explaining things for my DIY projects.  Wavoman was particularly generous in giving me an SRD7.  I will now have to make a beautiful electrostatic amp to utilize the jacks or feel horrible.about taking it.  Vinnie of Red Wine Audio was very gracious of providing lunch.  I particularly liked this because it helped keep the middle of the meet more coherent so there was no need to break from the meet to eat or hold back on eating to enjoy everyone's company and the gear.

I got to meet Jude and Fang for the first time and that was an honor.  It still feels odd since I now know how close Fang lives to me.  And thankfully immtbiker's HE6 was free so I got a chance to listen to Fang's latest headphones.  Driven out of an Luxman with an Oppo source was amazing--that reminds me I need to ask immtbiker for that name of the artist since the CD was so great.  I quite liked it a lot and see why it is held in such high esteem.  I do wish I had a chance to listen to the HE4 and that I will get a chance to listen to them in a quiet environment sometime--maybe I'll just have to buy both to find out 

Doug's LCD2 setup is like the way I had it when I was checking my friend's for any build problems but it had a better source.  This is further makes me feel that the LCD2 benefits more from a better source than a better amp (as long as you have something decent to run it, but you do not need to spend thousands for towards that effect).

I do regret not spending enough time with doompigeon's eXstata hybrid and ss with my O2 but I really liked how my SRXmk3 Pro sounded out of them.  Once again, doompigeon, your dad did some beautiful wood work on the amps.  doompigeon and his father had a wonderful setup and it was fun to talking to them and Andrew about Stax.  Stax mafia is everywhere.  I also wish I spent some time at the JH booth since I wanted to hear the demos, but my wallet is breathing a large sigh of relief.  

Erikzen did a great job organizing everything and Yikes was quick at quieting the room and getting the auction through quickly and efficiently.

Dinner was great and then the small group of us that went to the bar later was very fun--it was great meeting you daveDerek.  The talk about audio fell to the background due to politics again but it was a fun conversation.

Overall it was a great meet and I hope the next one is just as great if not better.

EDIT: I mixed up doompigeon and his father.  Whoops sorry.  Too many names for my small brain to keep up with.