HE-500, LCD2, D5000, DT770, SR80, on a speaker amp (Emotiva mini-X A-100) Project - Page 25

I bet they are tied together. Usually you only worry about the ground if the amp are monos, meaning dual mono in a single chassis or in separate chassis. But it is still good practice to check those grounds with the manufacturer.

Yes, for all headphones, you ultimately have two conductors going to each ear, but when the ground of each pair is joined to a 3-conductor 3.5mm or 6.3mm TRS plug, it's a given that you will be inserting that plug into the TRS jack of an amplifier that is designed to work with a common ground (unbalanced, single-ended), three-conductor output jack.

But a speaker amp is (Edit: might be) designed to work with segregated grounds. It's not safe to assume that you can connect the two grounds of four speaker terminals, to reduce four conductors down to only three.

Yes, there is such a thing as a TRRS jack. Look no further than any iDevice, where examination of a matching plug reveals one additional ring - a fourth conductor for a microphone vs. the more common 3-conductor 3.5mm TRS plug.

From tip to base, the iDevice TRRS supplies left audio, right audio, ground and mic. Apple intentionally deviated from the pattern used by Motorola, Samsung and others with Droid devices that also have TRRS jacks to support a microphone. Apple reversed the mic and ground conductors! They put the ground closer to the tip, placing the mic last, so that IDevice owners must purchase iDevice headsets.
Edited by zilch0md - 12/2/12 at 8:00pm

 

Thanks for the info.

 

So looking at the SX-950 schematic found below, does it look safe? Section F11

 

http://akdatabase.com/AKview/displayimage.php?album=44&pos=103

 

Now the Simaudio integrated I have is possibly a different scenario.

You can easily check if the ground is common between the speaker terminals by continuity.

Excellent!

Looking to the bottom-right corner of the schematic, you can see that all three sets of speaker terminals share a common ground, so the SX-950 can handle a simple four-conductor to three-conductor adapter, safely.

Mike

 

Congrats! Just like I said in post #361.

Yes, indeed!  

 

That was a high-probability hunch, that turned out to be correct for the SX-950.

 

I especially liked this part:  

 

 

Anybody who is thinking about buying an Emotiva mini-X A-100 for use with unbalanced headphone cables, might consider calling Emotiva to ask if the speaker terminal grounds can be shorted to create a single-ended, three-conductor, adapter cable.  

 

Yes, they will probably say, "Sure, no problem."  But why roll the dice?

 

 

So in the case of the Simaudio, there is a chance it will not work? The Simaudio is labeled as a dual mono, but only has one large toroid transformer.

Just means getting a 6 cable with speaker connections. Does your 500s have a 4 pin xlr or is it hard wired to a 1/4" male jack? If it has the xlr, just
get a xlr to speaker spade adapter. If it's hardwired to a 1/4" jack, either mod that cable or buy another with speaker leads or that adapter shown by ALO.

I think it would be neat to power my Mad Dogs with a power amp, and I have the perfect amp for the job, a Monarchy Audio SM-70 Pro. It's Class A and 25 watts. However, the Mad Dogs are fairly efficient and using any type of "speaker" amp is probably way too much overkill. On that note, this is an extremely nice sounding amp, being just slightly on the warm side of neutral, plenty of bass depth, detail and impact, and a wide sound stage. It's also bridgeable. All I'd need is a decent preamp.

 

Hmm... Now I'm really thinking.

 

If you really like the sound of that amp - then I say go for it.  What I did was got my Mad Dogs Re cabled to dual entry at the cups down to a 4-pin XLR terminator, So I can use this adapter cable:  Works like a champ..

 

 

 

 

 

I'm not trying to hijack the thread, so I'll send you a PM in a few minutes.

Received my HE-500's today. Arrived with the large hard box instead of the travel case. Enjoying them now!

 

Hey by chance, can you take a picture of them? I would greatly appreciate it! 

The Emotiva arrived today. This thing has a lot of depth!!!! In the pictures, I was expecting somewhat of a square like top plate. This thing is quite long actually and weighs a good bit, with more weight at front end. All the jacks are super solid. Nothing flimsy with the construction. Only two things I have minor complaints with. The ON/OFF/AUTO flicker at the back is somewhat hard to reach, if you're reaching over the amp from the front as the speaker outputs of the right channel are right above it. The knob is quite smooth and does have a hint of resistance to it. Personally would've liked the feel more if it was a bit more weightier, but who knows, maybe I'll end up liking it more for that later on.

 

Included with the power cable were two fuses. Not sure if I should be happy for the company's preemptive outlook or worried if this will happen down the lane. Although with five years of warranty, it shouldn't matter too much.

 

The unit also has a brushed aluminum front panel. I assumed it was going to be the standard non-brushed black. Just throwing that out there for those who don't like that. Although personally I like it, and it'll complement my Marantz nicely as it also has a brushed aluminum front plate.

 

No sound impressions yet...no cables here. Chris_Himself has shipped them so it's on route. Now I just have to play the waiting game.