Amping for AKG Q701 - Page 18

I find that my Audioengine D1 does quite an excellent job amping the Q701's. My Schiit Valhalla does sound better but not by much. Honestly I can't believe the Audioengine D1's aren't more popular around here.

Hi, i planned to buy this headphone for gaming. But will this headphone do a very good job with my Xonar Essence ST? or do i need a separate amp? thanks.

If memory serves the ST has the TPA6120 - which will drive them just fine, it will work well for gaming.

 

 

 

Yup, this definitely. The Asus Xonar has an incredibly powerful amp built in, and has a lot of further functionality, if you really get into hifi stuff! 

I run the Q701 with a Bellari HA540 tube amp and it sounds incredible. Very good throughout the frequency spectrum. I absolutely love it. Don't let anyone tell you low impedance cans won't work with tubes. Both my Q701 and AH-D2000 work very well with them.

I have a pair of Q701s, and they surely demand more than some of my other cans (HFI-2400 / Grado SR 225i). I currently have a Violectric HPA V100, which has more than enough power to drive them, and like the other two Violectric Amps (http://www.violectric.de/Pages/en/products/index.php), it features 5 pre gain settings -4/+2/+8/+14/+20 dB, and an 8 dB default amplifier gain. I use my Q701s with the at +6db and it is a perfect and more than sufficient volume match. I range between 10 and 3 o'clock with the volume dial, and I still have a higher gain setting left for even more demanding cans.
I believe both the V90 and V100 offer a fantastic price/quality relation, and which is really hard to beat. Especialy if you stick to a pair of Q701s and maybe upgrade the cable.

Hope it's a valuable hint for you.

 

Cheers! 

Hi Guys

 

I wanted tube amp that could drive Q701 in the $100-400 range. I want a classic, warm and muscial tube sound. I listen to all kinds of genres from classical to rock to electronica. Please recommend any tube amps in that price range, also i will not be tube rolling anytime soon. The amps I have looked at are:

Littledot 1+

Littledot MKII

Bravo Audio Ocean

Schiit Vahalla

Littledot MKIV

 

Thanks

TomodachiF:

As you know, the K701/2s & Q701s require an Amp that can provide sufficient current and voltage, and a couple of pre gain settings are surely welcome to get close to the sweet spot of your match. The Q701 needs 3.2 Vrms, that's 4.5 volts peak; At 62 ohms, that's 72 mA of peak current. So the Q701s need a low output impedance and quite a bit of voltage and current. IMO, that's the equation you have to solve first. Once you got a list of the tube Amps that match those characteristics, you can make the money math. Saving a bit more and waiting to get something better always pays off.

Cheers!

if e10 is not good enough for you, you may wanna try matrix m-stage

 

I'm still a newb in these measurements, but something tells me 3.2v is a maximum rating rather than a minimum. If I got that right, at 3.2Vrms, the drivers will output 336dB SPL. Isn't that a bit much? Also, at 62 ohm with 0.2W max rating, would not the max current rating be 57 mA? At 72mA, you'll be driving these at 322 mW, which will blow both the headphones and your hears up.

 

 

 

As a general rule of thumb, amplifiers with high voltage swings and low output current (like OTL tube amps) will be better matched with higher impedance headphones (150 ohms and up). Lower impedance cans, like the Q701, will usually be better driven from an amplifier with low output impedance and high current. From my experience, my Q701 sound fantastic with both my NFB-12 and MSSH. Both these amplifiers have insane amount of current available, but don't really have much voltage swing. The MSSH clips at around 1 Vrms, but honestly your hears will bled by the time you get there. I tried my Q701 with the O2 at the last local Meet, and they sounded like hear tweeters with this amp. I concluded that the O2 lacks the current needed to properly control these headphones. Others came to the same conclusion with other amplifiers. You can use this as a base line to see if those amplifiers you listed fit the bill or not.

 

I cannot recommend any of the amplifiers you listed over the other, as I have no personal experience with any of them. I am sure this forum hosts enough reviews to answer your question though. When all else fails, you can make your choice based on availability, price, features and even look. I know that's what I ended up doing. 

I definitely don't think the O2 lacks sufficient current to power a Q701.  I don't know why head-fi always thinks that if it's thin sounding then it needs more power.  Could we be looking over the fact that the AKGs just might be thin to begin with, or the O2 might sound thin compared to more colored/warmer amps in general?

 

Also, I'm not sure how you got 336db, but that number is literally out of this world.  I don't think anything could produce a sound that loud.

 

THANK you... It's like when I tried the O2 with the Ety ER-4S I HATED the result. Thin+thin= Still thin, maybe thinner. The O2 is a splendid amp, and many users overlook it's natural tendency to uncolour sound and move on to a coloured amp and think it's significantly better than the O2.

 

TO EVERYONE ON HEAD-FI... Numbers doesn't matter in the real world, as long as it sounds good to YOUR ears that's good enough. People who doesn't buy something because "oh the numbers don't match up" are the ones who are missing out... Who cares? Before my EF5 amp, I used my 600ohm AKGs with my EF2A which was rated up to 300ohm headphones and they sounded good to me. So what?

 

LOL 336db.

Trafomatic Head One amp sounds really evry nice with my Q701 (with PlusSound Exo cable).
The music sounds very natural, rich warm, very nice euphony too I am really delighted of this HP + amp association.

Just as point of reference, I'm currently using:

 

laptop -> E17 DAC (+4 bass / +0 treble) -> Q701 and very satisfied with results. It still feels very balanced, too. I might consider a E09k dock or tube down the road, but this works for me for now.