Complete newcomer needs help understanding some things about E10 and Hd650

1) I put the gain on low for listening on my head and high for listening to the phones as if they were speakers. It's just a preference.

2) You have very high end headphones with the HD650s and another person who had the combination with the E10 found it grainy. With a better DAC/AMP pairing, they should sound excellent.

Quote:

Originally Posted by hipjazzop 

Hey, 

 

English is not my first language but I'm gonna try to make myself clear. 

 

I just got myself the HD650s the other day. These are my first good headphones. Before these I've only had the Sennheiser HD408. 

 

Since I didn't want to buy the craziest equipment for the first time, I got the Fiio E10. 

 

Right now I'm listening to 320kbps songs on my computer. The Fiio E10 is connected via USB to my Mac and headphones are in the E10. 

 

I have a few questions and I would greatly appreciate if you could help me understand some things here. 

 

1) What exactly is "gain" on the amp?   Is it better to have the amp set to 8 out of 8 and the computer almost max volume on Low gain or should I set the gain to High and keep both the amp and computer down a little bit. It basically brings me the same "loudness".

 

2) I think that these headphones sound really great but honestly I was expecting a bit more. Instrument separation could be better and voices could be clearer I think. Could that be because I've only listened to them for a few hours and they need more time to "burn in"? 

 

I appreciate all the help, explanation and advice I can get. 

 

Thanks!

   

You can think of the low gain as performing a multiplication (thus amplifying and making the signal larger so louder) and the high gain as performing a higher multiplication, with about a 7 dB difference in this case.  The volume control then does a division.  There are some differences that are being obscured by this simplified model though.

It's generally pretty much the same mostly, but the low gain and high volume control is slightly preferred unless you need the extra volume provided by high gain and high volume control.

Tyll has a pretty interesting article on headphone break-in.  Most changes are probably psychological and not due to the headphones actually changing, since there's little evidence of very significant changes in the headphone's sound itself. The fit and pads also have something to do with it.  IMHO most of the conclusions he makes are logically sound (no claims made that aren't supported by evidence) except the reference to his blind listening test, which unfortunately has some significant flaws and thus does not represent good data.

http://www.innerfidelity.com/content/measurement-and-audibility-headphone-break

E10 is not amazing, but it's solid enough and if you're getting enough volume for your listening, something else is unlikely to be very significantly more accurate.  This means that you may not really get much better instrument separation and clarity using anything else...maybe.  Such a high-impedance headphone should not difficult to drive in a technical sense, though many believe otherwise.

In the most simple terms, volts are what are at play.  Your music leaves your source between 0-5 volts, typically.  Your amplifier has to increase the volts to drive headphones and speakers.   Volts and watts are related, so that's why you typically hear about an amplifier's watts.  Watt = volts x amperes.

The E10 is a decent little amp for what it is, especially in its price bracket.  It's a good starter amp and should serve you well.  Also, if you're going to be running 320 kbps lossy files, it doesn't make too much sense to go all out on a super high end amp.  But, welcome to the disease of audiophilia.  Your first amp is a gateway drug.

Quote:

Originally Posted by hodgjy 

 Your first amp is a gateway drug.

+1