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Portable amp less important than years past?

post #1 of 11
11/18/11 at 3:53pm
Thread Starter 

Hello,

I am finding that as IEMs become easier loads as technology improves that portable amps provide less performance gain and I'm now happy to go without with many of my buds for travel.  iPod Classic alone.  I know, that's really un-audiophile of me.  Anyone else?  I never did use a portable DAC.  Maybe I'm just not spending enough wink_face.gif

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post #2 of 11
11/20/11 at 5:08am
I've actually been extremely impressed with the hp out on my Droid Bionic. It's not audiophile level but it makes me feel OK about not using an amp from time to time. First mp3 player I've felt that way about.
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post #3 of 11
11/20/11 at 6:42am

I am also enjoying my iem straight from the ipod classic and look forward to my desktop setup. Find the portable combo too bulky to be portable and the gain is not much to warrant using an amp amidst the ambient noise of riding the trains and buses.

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post #4 of 11
11/20/11 at 6:57am
I was of that opinion for a long while. However I've recently given my little T3D another chance and think it does open the sound up. I'm using it with a 6g nano and some good quality (but easy to drive) iems.

That said, I only bother with it for train rides, long car rides, etc. Just walking around, there is too much variable ambient noise to bother with it.
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post #5 of 11
11/20/11 at 8:17am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Pudu View Post

I was of that opinion for a long while. However I've recently given my little T3D another chance and think it does open the sound up. I'm using it with a 6g nano and some good quality (but easy to drive) iems.
That said, I only bother with it for train rides, long car rides, etc. Just walking around, there is too much variable ambient noise to bother with it.


Cool.  Long car rides where you're the passenger I hope!

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post #6 of 11
11/20/11 at 8:27am
Quote:
Originally Posted by svoboda123 View Post





Cool.  Long car rides where you're the passenger I hope!


Definitely!


I find headphones too distracting while I'm driving. I cannot concentrate properly and my Angry Birds score suffers for it.
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post #7 of 11
11/20/11 at 9:12am
Thread Starter 

HATE video games.  ADDICTED to Angry Birds.  Shameful fraction of my iPad time.

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post #8 of 11
11/20/11 at 6:47pm

There was a time, in-between cans, so to speak, that I only had my IEMs while saving up for another "home" purchase. During that time, my IEMs became my home cans.  With a HR micro DAC and Tomahawk, the Sure EC4 IEMs sounded great!  Without them, not so good. 

 

BUT, whenever I have had a complete home set-up, and I only use the IEMs for traveling, I made do with just the IEMs.  But, I sure miss the undeniable boost in resolution that came from the Tomahawk with the IEMs, and I definitely notice it when I am listening to, say, my iPad headphone jack. Yuck. (No offense to those above content with an iPod/iPad HP jack.  I'm sure my wallet wishes that I was. Ha!)

 

ksc75smile.gif

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post #9 of 11
11/20/11 at 6:47pm

I can't do it. I've invested a lot into my home system but I've so far even refused to carry a FiiO in public. It's just too silly looking to have your iPod strapped to an amp + a DAC with all kinds of boxes like it was incapable of even playing music on its own. I've always been dead afraid of portable amps. I've heard a couple and the differences were minimal at best. Not any hate on portable audiophiles though. I just haven't invested enough time/money into to enjoy it.


Edited by NinjaSquirt - 11/20/11 at 6:49pm
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post #10 of 11
11/22/11 at 3:46am

Depends on the level of listening you want to do and the phones in question.  I think if driver wars keep going the way they are a solid, technically competent amp will do wonders for odd impedance curves and powering through more complex crossovers.  Now we've got discus style dynamic drivers pushing one and even two dual drivers around 14.5mm in size (Radius, Sony, new Sennheiser).  It all depends.  If you care about what people think when they look at you well that's something else entirely.  wink.gif  Of all the IEMs I've tried there were only a few that didn't benefit from a clean, transparent amp to some degree.

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post #11 of 11
11/23/11 at 4:38am

I can't listen to my RE0 without my Headstage Arrow. :( 

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