AKG K702 65th Anniversary Edition - Page 61

Quote:

Originally Posted by dcfis 


so the m stage and agd? any specific one? I see they have a wide range

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There is also a Headroom Micro Amp listed in the Headroom "Garage Sale" on the main page.

It's my favorite amp for the Q701 and plays well with everything, including the K601, K400 and K501.

It's not really warm, but doesn't have that cold and analytical sound that some other amps do.

It's very flat and transparent.

It's normally $350, but they have one there for $200. I just upgraded the power supply on mine because I like it so much.

It's also nice with the HD-650. The output impedance is also 0.1 ohm

Totally underrated amp IMO.

BTW it has the same opamp as the M-Stage, but not sure how similar they are. To me this doesn't mean much.

Quote:

Originally Posted by imackler 

Anyone using a budget amp on these, like the Magni (I think I read about one person who was) or maybe others? What do you like? I've got a chance to buy a pair for a great price but I've got nothing to amp them with, besides the Soundlab. Any chance anyone on this thread is using the portable Neco Soundlab V3 with them? 

 

Has anyone been concerned about this specification? Are there any amps over that i should stay away from? 

Max. input power

200 mW

I've used the Magni with my Anni's with good results and am currently using an Audio-GD SA-31.  The Anni is well rounded enough I think to pair with most amps but I think they benefit more from decently transparent amps in which I would consider the Magni and SA-31 to do well in that regard.  Even though the SA-31 is somewhat warm and "musical" I still find it be very transparent.  I don't equate transparency with brightness or forward/aggressiveness.  For instance, I've previously owned the Lyr, which although nice and powerful and euphonic with the right tubes, I don't find to be very transparent of an amp.

As far as the max input power and selecting an amp,  I wouldn't be too worried about an amp being too powerful.  My SA-31 is capable of 8000mw into 50 ohms but the gain is rather low so I can take it rather high into the volume range to get to my normal listening level.  It is possible to reach the drivers limits though before you reach your ears limits and that is an unfortunate flaw of all of the x70x series, though I find it less noticeable with the Anni's and usually only on busier heavy rock music.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mad Lust Envy 

Depends on what you want. I have owned 2 AMP/DACS, (NFB-5 and Compass 2) and one power amp (SA-31). The K702 pairs up well with all three, but would like the warmer internal chips like the Dual WM8741 found on the NFB-5.32, and asked for on the Compass 2 before ordering (I have the Sabre ES9018 on the Compass 2 which is more neutral).

If you wanna use an external DAC or need analog inputs (for your own DAC), the SA-31 is pretty hard to beat. However, the dacs in the Compass 2 and NFB-5 were just fine by me.

So if you're fine with an amp/dac all in one, and don't need an external analog input (to hook up another dac, or Ipod, etc into), I would go with the NFB-5 at least, budget-wise. If you want all the bells and whistles (internal dac AS well as analog input for other stuff):

Compass 2 with:

Dual WM8741
WM8805
OPA-Moon (for the line in, if using external amp/mp3 players, etc).

Keep in mind, I currently use the Compass 2 with ES9018 and DIR9001, which is a more neutral setup and still sounds absolutely stellar (with no desire to upgrade). Just mentioning the warmer setup which would might be more synergistic with the K702.

Ultimately, the changes will be subtle. Having used the NFB5 with moon op amp vs stock, and SA-31 with warmth jumpers, the changes were very subtle to nearly unnoticeable from the neutral setup.

Hearing that, why not go for the NFB-15?

A lot better for the money, and seeing as it's an upgraded version of the NFB-12, which from my own experience sounds great with K701's, it should work just as well. But then again, I don't have much experience outside of the NFB-12, other than portable amps...

Anyone tried these with the old famous Heed Canamp? The old saying was something like

"Everyone with a canamp has some AKGs, but not everyone with AKGs has a canamp."

Thanks guys for the amp discussion. I want to upgrade my amp/dac section to something that make my annies really shine. I was heavily considering of getting m-stage, but I'm having hard time deciding the dac part. I'm participating in hifi exhibition after couple of weeks and will test M-DAC and Dacmagic plus there. If nothing blows my mind I think I'll go for the Aune T1, which seems to deliver a great value for the price (160€ delivered) and supposedly has great synergy with annies. It is said that T1 doesn't have the typical warm sound associated with tube amps, which further convinces me that this could indeed be great pair with annies. It is also very beautiful looking unit. I'm really looking forward of toschek's tube comparison. The T1 unit I'm looking from ebay has upgraded 6922 tube. Upgrade from what? From previous inferior tube or what?

So it's the tube type then. Thanks!

just a head's up: they're back down to $409 on Amazon. I went for it and just cancelled my order for the new pads. Hoping it'll be worth it!

Well, I finally got my headphone bag in.  Here's the link again.

First thing I noticed right away is the construction.  It is very well put together.  The material is of good quality and feels strong, and the amount of padding feels nice (maybe about 1/4" thick?).

The design of the bag is tapered, so it's much wider in the bottom half and then gets thinner near the top.  That makes sense as it mimics the typical shape of headphones and keeps the padded sides closer to them.  The only downside to this is that the width of the space between the zipper start and end points is a touch narrow, at least for the Annies. I had to work them in by pulling up a bit on one side and then up on the other; I didn't feel I could just slide them into the bag without dragging the sides against the Annies.  Perhaps over time the bag will stretch out a bit, though.  I experienced a similar issue with the included bag for the PortaPros, but it loosened up eventually.

Anyway, once the earcups get past that narrow point, they have a decent amount of room in the bottom.  Not too tight and not too snug.  There's a soft fabric pouch on the back wall of the bag to hold the cable in, which is great.  Due to the orientation of the phones, though, I'm hesitant to stand the bag up with the cable still plugged in the left earcup, because the weight of the phones would be sitting on the cable's flexible-bendy part (not really sure what that's called ).  I'm currently keeping the bag stored on its back so I can keep the cable plugged in, but I'd probably unplug it if I had a need for this to stand upright.

In conclusion, it's a well put together bag, with adequate padding, but just a bit narrow in the middle. For the price, though, it's excellent and does the job!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dougr33 

just a head's up: they're back down to $409 on Amazon. I went for it and just cancelled my order for the new pads. Hoping it'll be worth it!

Pads: ~$60

Special eddies: $409

That's, uhhh, quite the jump.

Quote:

Originally Posted by 2enty3 

Pads: ~$60

Special eddies: $409

 

That's, uhhh, quite the jump.

haha, save the difference and get a pair of HE-400!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mad Lust Envy 

The Annie is better than the HE400 in everything but bass.

How about the HE-4?