[preproman]

Quote:

Some of you guys seem to be chasing either consensus or absolutes.  The only absolute is that there won't be any consensus

 
For myself, I felt the Dark Star and EF-6 both are slightly better with the HE-6 than the speaker amps I've used.  I haven't tried something like a $10K Pass amp, nor will I be.  In the case of the Dark Star, the cost makes considering speaker amps seem pretty prudent.  In the case of the EF-6, it might be tougher to find a speaker amp that would be as good.
 
That said, my vintage Marantz 2285 receiver does nearly as good a job as the EF-6, was much cheaper, drives speakers, has a nice FM tuner and phono stage...etc etc.

 
 
Well, there you have it.  One mans opinion. 

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

Some of you guys seem to be chasing either consensus or absolutes.  The only absolute is that there won't be any consensus

 
For myself, I felt the Dark Star and EF-6 both are slightly better with the HE-6 than the speaker amps I've used.  I haven't tried something like a $10K Pass amp, nor will I be.  In the case of the Dark Star, the cost makes considering speaker amps seem pretty prudent.  In the case of the EF-6, it might be tougher to find a speaker amp that would be as good.
 
That said, my vintage Marantz 2285 receiver does nearly as good a job as the EF-6, was much cheaper, drives speakers, has a nice FM tuner and phono stage...etc etc.

 
Exactly my point, thanks!

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

 
 
We have to work with what we have.  It really doesn't matter if said group is small, medium or large a conclusive consensus can be made from any one.  Hell, I can get a conclusive consensus from 3 people.  A consensus for the sake of this discussion simply means the majority.  
 
I think it's a pretty nice size group of people we have here.  It changes from time to time, but there's a good number of people on a few threads that actually contribute or have contributed their findings.   That's why I find it hard to believe how any of this speaker amp talk can be considered HYPE.  We are not the first and we wont be the last to find these things out.

 
Oh we certainly have a pretty nice size group here....but how many among this group have been able to directly compare any-random-speaker-amp versus the likes of Dark Star, EF-6, Levinson, B22, or whatever else?  I personally don't consider the speaker amp talk to be be hype at all.  I just think it's a bit one sided that the handful of high power high performance HP amps (none of which I have any intention to ever buy) are automatically condemned as inferior to a 1973 Daewoo

It's not that speaker amps aren't appropriate, they are, it's that the few HP amps that are also appropriate shouldn't be dismissed so easily as is common
 
Sure you pay twice as much for the same thing that route...but it doesn't deserve dismissal

 
As far as monoblock hype....yeah, that's hype that accidentally started due to the fact that you and HC are probably the most active in this thread and are both running blocks.  Nevermind that your blocks cost you both less, combined, than a lot of the stereo amps in use (HC really offset that FVM figure!

)  No doubt Elysian's FW stereo + Placette can stomp all of our amps, mono, stereo, or HP, at any price

 

[preproman]

Quote:

 
As far as monoblock hype....yeah, that's hype that accidentally started due to the fact that you and HC are probably the most active in this thread and are both running blocks.  Nevermind that your blocks cost you both less, combined, than a lot of the stereo amps in use (HC really offset that FVM figure!

)  No doubt Elysian's FW stereo + Placette can stomp all of our amps, mono, stereo, or HP, at any price

 
 
Yeah - and I don't know how it was considered hype??  We just shared our experience.  That was it.

 

[paradoxper]

Quote:

 
 
 

Spoiler: Warning%3A%20Spoiler!

 
Sorry paradoxper but,
 
Why all this hype / hyperbole talk? When is it "NOT" hype / hyperbole anymore?
 
Lets do this:
 
Define hype / hyperbole:
 
Define consensus:
 
 
This thread is now over 455 pages long and from the start it's been said vintage amps, vintage receivers and speaker amps are preferred SQ wise over any headphone amp to drive the HE-6s - this is including the Dark Star and EF-6. I'm not saying that their not some that prefer the Dark Star or the EF-6 - I'm saying it's more that prefer speaker amps over other headphone amps SQ wise.
 
MikeK200 and has lived with the MJ and a cheap (in cost) $200 speaker amp for a few months now. By this time the wow factor, new toy factor and what ever else you'll like to call it should be gone by now. He has said he gets at least a 25% increase in SQ over the MJ with the HE-6s.
 
Now Mikes and elwappo99 amp is Emotivas cheapest amp. So this companies statement amp (XPA-1) is said to be only a 10% increase in SQ over the MJ when this amp has won multiple awards and rave reviews for it's sound quality and is said to best other amps 2Xs it's price in SQ.  This to me unbelievable. But these are all subjective opinions.
 
WOW - you put your HE-6s on a pair of 500 watt mono blocks?  I thought what I have is Overkill..  
 
Now what's hype or hyperbole is that now all of a sudden the MJ is the headphone amp that can drive the HE-6 within 10% SQ wise of what a speaker amp can?  When other well know headphone amps can not - when compared to speaker amps. Really? Now that's "HYPE".  I can't wait for their Statement amp.
 
Although it was a pure accident how I ended up using my Emotiva amps (UPA-1s) to drive the HE-6s - their was a full consensus among both seasoned head fi'ers that both sets of mono blocks (Rotels and UPA-1s) were more than a 10% sound quality increase over any headphone amp I had and we heard at the time.  
 
Hell it was said by the Head Fi'er that brought over the B24 that the B24 CRUSHED the Dark Star in SQ in a head to head session. This head fi'er also agreed that the Emotiva monos and the Rotel monos bettered the B24 in SQ - Go figure. No hype just reality.
 
Just to be clear - I'm not advertising Emotiva - but for the price (less than the MJ) and the size (form factor) this amp (Mini-X a-100) is a no miss for the HE-6 (for some).  
 
I'm now on the hunt for a pure class A amp (First Watt, Audio-gd Master 3) to replace my UPA-1s.
 

 

Fair enough. The wording within hyped/hyperbole was not fitting. I see your point, yet it doesn't discount mine.
We're all going to have differing experiences and preferences with gear. And there's never going to be a consensus,
because there's really no best amp for HE-6. There's a ton of good options and that includes Emo mono's.
 
I apologize as it seems my comments took this thread to what I consider into a derailment, argument/banter.

 

[preproman]

Quote:

Fair enough. The wording within hyped/hyperbole was not fitting. I see your point, yet it doesn't discount mine.
We're all going to have differing experiences and preferences with gear. And there's never going to be a consensus,
because there's really no best amp for HE-6. There's a ton of good options and that includes Emo mono's.
 
I apologize as it seems my comments took this thread to what I consider into a derailment, argument/banter.

 
 
Aww man paradoxper you know how we do it in the HE-6 thread.  We're all family here.

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

 
 
Yeah - and I don't know how it was considered hype??  We just shared our experience.  That was it.

Oh I didn't say you were hyping it at all.  It's just that you and HC being the most active HD-6 commenters for the most part and speaking often of blocks ended up being picked up on by a lot of folks who glance at this thread and ended up being interpereted as "monoblocks are best for HE-6" as it spun off to other threads. 
 
Personally I question the value of monoblocks even in speaker environments.  They have their place when extreme power, or positioning amps at the end of a long balanced cable run, interference between a long run requiring balanced connections to near the point of the speaker, subs (obviously) and 4ohm speakers at large.  But even in the stereo world I think the need for blocks is audiophile hype.  (Actually bridged mono serves another useful purpose of effectively halving the speaker impedance.  A very good thing for 10ohm speakers, a very bad thing for 4ohm speakers....but bridged mono isn't the same as true blocks.)
 
Point is, as I said, the effect isn't actively related to anything you've said....it's a passive accidental effect from being so darn chatty!

 

[preproman]

Yeah - I've got to be more careful.

 

[Happy Camper]

In fairness, the speaker amp issue was introduced pretty early in the threads. My intent was to point out options that aren't considered for a headphone. Those options have yet to be explored with the fineness of today's new toys. If someone can find a good value in a speaker amp, they can upgrade their source or some other part of their system. And with that, I'll step out of ya'all's party.

 

[preproman]

N0 HC,
 
We got to share our experiences from the other Audio Stores we have yest to visit.  I'm sure our nick names will be the Hype'em up boys - but that's ok, we still will be having a ball.

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

N0 HC,
 
We got to share our experiences from the other Audio Stores we have yest to visit.  I'm sure our nick names will be the Hype'em up boys - but that's ok, we still will be having a ball.

 
Hehe, your experiences are very interesting, and certainly appropriate for HE-6! And most of what you guys tried last time and liked more than your blocks were indeed not blocks

 

[.Sup]

I don't know if the Mjolnir brings the HE6 to it's maximum potential but I don't really care. It sounds really good and that's next to my HD800 which is great. So far it is really smooth especially on top. I could really see me owning this and the HD800 together.

The first thing is that the weight distribution is so much better than the HE500. I don't know how thats possible but my neck was getting sore after an hour or so with the HE500 but the HE6 is just fine.

Both with velour pads?

 

[dleblanc343]

I posted something on topic earlier in the gungnir thread and felt I should contribute to the conversation here a bit. I work in a hi-fi shop so I get to play around with speaker and headphones stuff very often. I recently tried pretty much the whole store's inventory feeding the gungnir as a source for everything I used. I feel the mjolnir bested everything overall, and I believe the fact that it's paired with the gungnir makes it so. They were, after all, made to complement each other. Also, running balanced may have a big impact on this too (even though I was using 600$ rca interconnects when pairing with the speaker amps).
 
"Ive heard them on all of the rotel integrated's and two mono, a roksan integrated, some audiolab integrated's, vintage quad 303 and quad preamp feeding it, a vela audio integrated and for headphone amps, the mjolnir, bha-1, b22, ef-6, wa22 and little dot mk vi...

I settled for the mjolnir as its less cumbersome and did "more things better" than most of the speaker amps. The quads (which are completely modified and slightly modernized) sounded so amazing and musical, but resolution really took a hit because of its age. And they didnt stage very well unfortunately. Rotel was too sharp.

I wish i could try some emotiva monos locally, curious about the hype around them and the he-6"
 
As for the headphone amps, I did not try any of them with the gungnir (besides the mojo), as I compared them before I owned it.
 
I also forgot to mention that I also tested some cambridge audio integrated's, arcam solo series mini amps and a NAD integrated ( but they were all mediocre).
 
As I said in the other thread (in quotes), I'd be curious to hear the HE-6 with emotiva gear. Even though I tried higher end stuff than the emotiva mono's (UPA and XPA series),  it's often just about the synergy; and maybe the emotiva's are simply a good pairing. The Rotel mono's are pricy, but the match was just not there for me.
 
So there you have it, for me it's the mojo/gungnir so far; but the mjolnir is still the bottleneck in there. It's still a bit sharp sometimes but otherwise very impressive. I think it's much much better than HiFiMAN's own ef-6 (which I almost got).

 

[hawkhead]

Worth pointing out that EF-6 and Darkstar were not even around when HE-6 was released
 
I had a WA6 SE (which was wonderful with the RS-1) and disappointing with the HE-6 compared to the speaker amp

 

[preproman]

Quote:

I wish i could try some emotiva monos locally, curious about the hype around them and the he-6"

 
 
Here we go with this word again..