Quote:
Originally Posted by
shrimants 
I was kind of trying to shy away from "entry level" as that is the mistake i've made with things for years. Example: I used to buy the 10 dollar sony sport clips thinking they sounded crazy amazing. After that, I tried listening to a set of Koss RS-40's. They were my dads from back in the day when they were rather expensive (considering he bought them in india). My mind was blown. After those finally died on me (faulty cabling, too young and stupid to fix) I tried koss plugs as the sound isolation is what I was after. I'd only listen to metal and some rap and was more concerned with expanding my collection of music than actually listening to it. I switched from those to Creative EP-630's and once again my mind was blown as they were the closest to the RS-40's I had listened to. then I stuck with those for quite a few years, and switched to Bose On ears. The difference in clarity was noticeable but the difference in sound quality was not. Still, those served me well until I lost my creatives and needed a set of IEM's to replace them. I figured i'd take the plunge and get the best of both worlds: expensive headphones that have been used/refurbished so they wont cost me half a year's allowance. I got monster turbines and my mind was blown. Literally, I flinched the first few times I listened to music. I ahhhhh /reacquired/ most of my music in FLAC and am in the process of listening to it again.
tl;dr
Dont wanna go entry level. Go big or go small+regret it later+spend money in the end going big anyways.
Right now, i'm recovering from my "ignorance is bliss' phase of music listening. I have had a taste of the other side and now i NEED high quality stuff. :P
Thanks for your help. Still looking for pricing on the gamma1+2. My dad said that since its a constructive project, if I keep my grades/studies up he might just fund the entire thing, and hes got a friend at work that knows how to use a CNC mill like its nobody's business! Much better idea to build a DAC and then (later) a headphone tube amp than it is to build a model gundam and just look at it, eh?
I don't think you really understand. "Entry level" in a DAC brings you 99.9% of the performance of $1000 DACs. We're talking "entry level" in price, not in performance. And "entry level" is a misnomer anyway, if you're comparing to $10 headphones. The proper "entry level" analogue is the 25 cent DAC in your computer. After you upgrade from that, the audible differences between DACs are minor - measurable but more often than not inaudible as the differences are tiny, and even then what sounds "better" is a problem.
Check out this listening test, for example:
http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/542968/nuforce-udac-2-listening-challenge
My point is that while the differences between headphones are huge, and the differences between an inadequately powerful (or too-high impedance) amplifier and one that is powerful enough are apparent (audible clipping, etc.), the differences between DACs are nearly inconsequential unless there is a conscious effort on the part of the designer to color the DAC in some way. The same goes for amplifiers that meet the minimum power/impedance requirements for a particular transducer.
My point is that as far as I am concerned, money spent on expensive DACs - having heard them myself - is money wasted that could be spent towards better transducers, an adequate amp, or more music - the things that really matter.
Edited by BlackbeardBen - 3/24/11 at 5:03am
