Hi All
I posted a while back about how much I'm loving my new Grado SR325X headphones. I'm now three weeks into ownership and I am still absolutely loving them. I have this thing where I think to myself that maybe I'm just imagining how good they are, then when the end of the day comes, which is when I do my music listening usually, I plug them in and, gosh, I am reminded that they really are that good.
I use them with my Meridian Prime Headphone Amplifier (that's its full name) which is a DAC/amp which has its own separate dedicated power supply. I also use them with an iFi Audio xDSD Gryphon portable DAC/amp, a wonderful device and they also sound great with that.
That Meridian DAC/amp might not be very well known in North America, I am in the UK, however it is actually quite an old school device, it was even old school when I bought it in 2019. We tend to associate Meridian with cutting edge digital technology but this DAC/amp is a competently designed analogue amp with a DAC, in fact the crossfeed on it is analogue and in my experience very good indeed.
I experimented with an Astell&Kern Kann Ultra DAP last weekend, I bought it online, but I had to return it because for me it just sounded absolutely dreadful. I think that a lot of digital processing like that for a headphone device maybe is a problem for me. That DAP has masses of detail and it is amazing, in one sense, what it can do but listening to it set my teeth on edge. I'm not against digital processing like that in general, but that implementation seems to be a problem for me. I listened to that DAP mostly with my Sennheiser HD800S cans but also a bit with the Grado cans, it was awful with both.
I'm listening to music with the Grados now using my Meridian DAC/amp, the source is Audirvana on one of my Macs. So good!!!!
Anyway here is a pic of my newfound love: