[Barry S]

...  
It uses an I/V conversion volume control which I think is similar to what's used in the Ragnarok (@Barry S correct me if I'm wrong)...

Not sure if it's the same, but the Rag uses a relay-switched stepped attenuator with 1.2 db steps--I've gotten addicted to the sound of the relay.

 

[Psalmanazar]

It's all making sense now. The Element is just an ODAC rev b + more powerful amp that doesn't clip combo with better industrial design. Seaber told me that WASAPI and ASIO were "non-standard drivers" and my mouth dropped. JDS Labs just seems more and more a Chu Moy/nwavguy cash in business with all of the outsourced components, poor driver implementation, and lack of testing. They hide behind the objective glass wall as there are better performing, more functional, and cheaper alternatives available.

 

[gandhisfist]

Barry S what happened to your mustachioed avatar? That had me cracking up earlier.

 

[ScottFW]

 
Ok, good point. I'm also on the hunt for really crappy usb sources to clean up.

This just occurred to me last night...
I have an old laptop that I was planning to use as a digital music source in my main system, but can't because it dumps so much friggin noise into the iFi DAC. A different laptop (the one I bring to meets, but is also used by the wife so can't permanently reside with my loudspeaker rig) has no significant noise on the USB with everything else in the chain being equal, so the noise is definitely coming from within that older laptop. Happy to test your Wyrd if you want to loan it to me! OTOH, I could probably afford to just buy one.

 

[DrivenUnder]

  It's all making sense now. The Element is just an ODAC rev b + more powerful amp that doesn't clip combo with better industrial design. Seaber told me that WASAPI and ASIO were "non-standard drivers" and my mouth dropped. JDS Labs just seems more and more a Chu Moy/nwavguy cash in business with all of the outsourced components, poor driver implementation, and lack of testing. They hide behind the objective glass wall as there are better performing, more functional, and cheaper alternatives available.

I also recently learned that WASAPI and ASIO are not only non-standard, but are sub-par audio engine implementations. From what I'm finding, Linux (and therefore Android) uses a much more robust audio conversion engine, and therefore has the potential for much better sound. If you do a bit of Googling on ALSA and AudioFlinger, you can learn more.
 
Here is an interesting little blurb from this page..../http://geeknizer.com/complete-guide-to-android-smartphone-audiophile/
"Android is Linux at heart, it uses modified Linux Kernel optimized for battery and memory. The app runtime lives in a highly optimized Java Virtual machine called Dalvik VM, advent of mastermind Andy Rubin and his team.

Linux uses ALSA, the most advanced sound engine every made by humans. Its not just advanced in terms of features, but also the best sounding. We cannot tell you how much better it is than the Windows Direct sound architecture found in Windows 7, 8, etc. Even with windows audio mods like ASIO4all, JACK, you simply cannot match the bit-perfect quality from ALSA system found on Linux.

We had been running Linux PC as our Audiophile system for a year now, and it simply beats every other OS ever built when it comes to bit-perfect audio. When we first made this move, we were couldn’t believe our ears, it was miles apart from Windows."

 

[Psalmanazar]

  I also recently learned that WASAPI and ASIO are not only non-standard, but are sub-par audio engine implementations. From what I'm finding, Linux (and therefore Android) uses a much more robust audio conversion engine, and therefore has the potential for much better sound. If you do a bit of Googling on ALSA and AudioFlinger, you can learn more.
 
Here is an interesting little blurb from this page..../http://geeknizer.com/complete-guide-to-android-smartphone-audiophile/
"Android is Linux at heart, it uses modified Linux Kernel optimized for battery and memory. The app runtime lives in a highly optimized Java Virtual machine called Dalvik VM, advent of mastermind Andy Rubin and his team.

Linux uses ALSA, the most advanced sound engine every made by humans. Its not just advanced in terms of features, but also the best sounding. We cannot tell you how much better it is than the Windows Direct sound architecture found in Windows 7, 8, etc. Even with windows audio mods like ASIO4all, JACK, you simply cannot match the bit-perfect quality from ALSA system found on Linux.

We had been running Linux PC as our Audiophile system for a year now, and it simply beats every other OS ever built when it comes to bit-perfect audio. When we first made this move, we were couldn’t believe our ears, it was miles apart from Windows."

That site's bsing. ASIO is the professional standard and is bit-perfect if whoever made your external DAC/soundcard/sound interface wasn't stupid and had their device disable the windows volume control to prevent Windows resampling in exclusive mode (uh not the JDS Labs ODAC). WASAPI is the slightly higher latency built in Windows version and functions the same in exclusive mode. It's actually harder to set up bit-perfect audio on Linux than on Windows as you have to manually disable ALSA resampling usually in the console.

 

[gandhisfist]

Unrelated to the meet, but the HD800 I bought off head-fi just arrived and I've given it a listen with a lot of my normal music listening.  Imaging and separation is definitely a step up, but I'm still not getting all the microdetail that people love to talk about with these cans.  A lot of my other headphones have a similar sonic signature (though generally with more linear bass extension) and I really can't detect any difference in detail retrieval.  I am thinking maybe if I give these a few days of exclusive listening and then switch back i may find that I miss something, but so far I can't detect anything in my music that I couldn't before.

 

[sheldaze]

  Unrelated to the meet, but the HD800 I bought off head-fi just arrived and I've given it a listen with a lot of my normal music listening.  Imaging and separation is definitely a step up, but I'm still not getting all the microdetail that people love to talk about with these cans.  A lot of my other headphones have a similar sonic signature (though generally with more linear bass extension) and I really can't detect any difference in detail retrieval.  I am thinking maybe if I give these a few days of exclusive listening and then switch back i may find that I miss something, but so far I can't detect anything in my music that I couldn't before.

No modifications? They sound okay? Different from the ones Smitty had at the meet earlier this year?

 

[Billheiser]

Interesting! But not shocked. You've already got good headphones including detailed, resolving ones. I respect but don't love the 800 and the imaging/soundstaging seems to be their strong point.

 

[gandhisfist]

No modifications.  To be honest, I don't have a great memory of how the ones Smitty had sounded at the meet, its been too long for me to recall very well.  But they are a 29* serial, so they may be a later model than Smitty had and might be slightly warmer if he has a significantly older serial # model.

 

[yage]

  Unrelated to the meet, but the HD800 I bought off head-fi just arrived and I've given it a listen with a lot of my normal music listening.  Imaging and separation is definitely a step up, but I'm still not getting all the microdetail that people love to talk about with these cans.  A lot of my other headphones have a similar sonic signature (though generally with more linear bass extension) and I really can't detect any difference in detail retrieval.  I am thinking maybe if I give these a few days of exclusive listening and then switch back i may find that I miss something, but so far I can't detect anything in my music that I couldn't before.

 
Maybe if you switched to the Rag + Yggy you'll enter microdetail nirvana... (not that I'm encouraging you to simply throw money at the problem...)

 

[gandhisfist]

   
Maybe if you switched to the Rag + Yggy you'll enter microdetail nirvana... (not that I'm encouraging you to simply throw money at the problem...)

 
Haha, of course not, no one would ever encourage throwing money at an audio problem to solve it!
 
Honestly, I've heard so much about people being able to extract extra details from their music even on more modest setups than mine that I was hoping it would come through on my Lyr 2/Bimby stack.  I think that should be a good enough source, but maybe I'm wrong.

 

[Psalmanazar]

@gandhisfist
The HD 800 drivers are technically amazing but the treble is so ridiculous bright, the presence region is weird, and the 6kHz resonance is horrible. The sound is also so diffused throughout the housing of the headphone that it lacks the weight the warm upper bass and lower mids should give it. I just can't stand listening to them compared to the HD 600/650.

 

[gandhisfist]

Psalmanazar A lot of my headphones have a similar peak but it doesn't bother me at all. I've just seen a lot of hyperbole about the detail of these cans on Reddit and elsewhere, generally from the same small group of people that are insistent on how technically capable the headphone is and how its able to retrieve detail that no other headphone is capable of retrieving and i'm finding that isn't the case at all. Maybe its the music I listen to, maybe its the source gear, its hard to say, but I just don't get it.

 

[Psalmanazar]

@Psalmanazar A lot of my headphones have a similar peak but it doesn't bother me at all. I've just seen a lot of hyperbole about the detail of these cans on Reddit and elsewhere, generally from the same small group of people that are insistent on how technically capable the headphone is and how its able to retrieve detail that no other headphone is capable of retrieving and i'm finding that isn't the case at all. Maybe its the music I listen to, maybe its the source gear, its hard to say, but I just don't get it.

A lot of it is there isn't really any more detail there you're meant to hear. Microphones can only capture so much. Like the drivers of the HD 600 are already so good they present everything there except for the lowest subbass (if it's even there. Those Yamaha Subkick mics are basically synthesizers); they resolve about as much as the near and mid field monitor speakers used to mix and master the records. The HD 800 have even more detail than that so it's like watching an old TV show like Seinfeld in HD. Then you have the artificial treble spike (way more than any AKG. We're talking Beyer treble mountain of death) that brings that detail way forward. Like it isn't supposed to be so obvious that the cash register in Pink Floyd's money was pasted into the mix from a different analog tape but it is on the HD 800 You're not supposed to hear how quick and dirty old Beatles records actually were with people bumping into stuff in the background or they didn't care if you heard it on a good system but but it wouldn't be emphasized enough to matter. It's like a Blu Ray where you can see the matte lines from special effects shots in old movies that would've been unnoticeable in a theater after being printed onto film only now the matte lines are 5x as wide type of thing with that treble mountain.
 
All of this stuff (even your AKG K7XX which is slightly grainier than the HD 650) is already so much better than what the average consumer listens on anyway.