I've been lurking around Head-Fi for about a year now, really benefitting from the vast wealth of knowledge and information here. You all know your stuff and are really passionate about sound - I love it!
As I've read thousands of posts about mods, recables, amps, opamps, etc I've built my system to include the Asus Xonar XTS with OPA627 (x3) and partially modded Denon AH-D2000 cans. I'm really happy with the set up! I know the OPA627s were a big investment for a $200 sound card, but the sound quality is amazing and 100% of my music is digitally sourced on my PC, anyway. (Incidentally, I upgraded from the Fiio E9/E7 combo - way better... night & day, esp once you add the OPA627 opamps.) I run the RCA outputs to a Marantz receiver for those times when I don't want something sitting on my head, so the PC card is a good fit for me.
So, on to my problem... After partially modding the Denons (Dynamat Extreme on the ear cups and center of the driver) and swapping in the OPA627s, I thought the sound was right near perfect. I was really impressed! But everyone kept talking about the cheap cable of the D2000... and I had a 10' section of Mogami W2534 in use as an extension, so why not swap the cable and get that last little improvement?! So I did. I carefully de-soldered the old cable and installed the new Mogami. The result: the bass is now overpowering and flabby again and I have to turn up the volume considerably to get the same loudness that I was used to. ??? This is not at all what I was expecting. I opened the Denons and added a small amount of fiberloft to help reduce the bass and it got better. Then I switched from normal gain to high gain (the +12 "middle" setting on the Asus) and reduced the volume. NOW it's starting to sound better. The bass is tight again, though there's more quantity than I want still. But I'm concerned that I had to up the gain after the recable...
All I can figure is that my solder joints are bad. I reused a Neutrik 1/4 phone jack from the headphone extension (which was made only about 1 week ago), utilizing the solder that was already on the jack. I also neglected to remove the old solder from the drivers, opting instead to melt it and solder the new wires into it. Could that be causing my problem? Could old solder raise the impedance in the cable itself? I'm planning to re-do the whole cable job by cutting the cable back an inch and soldering a new Neutrik jack and then removing the old solder from the drivers and properly soldering the wires with fresh solder. (I want to add some Techflex anyway, so I at least have to resolder the drivers to do that.)
I'm new to this stuff, though I've read thousands of posts and done my research to know what I want, what to avoid, and generally what to do. I'm really surprised at the impact the new cables had - and that it changed the sound in this way. I expected more from the high end, not from the low end, and I never expected the bass to become overwhelming. But the gain thing is what has me really scratching my head...
Thoughts?? Thanks people!
