[Bill-P]

I have a DT990 Pro, and the Fiio E11, the E17's equivalence of an amp. The E11 seriously struggles to keep DT990 distortion-free, and jacking up bass would be a death-flag.
 
I'm resorting to double-amping E11 -> O2 because the O2 adds enough power to remove the distortion but it doesn't have a bass boost. Other than that, I wouldn't plug the DT990 Pro directly into the E11, nor would I drive the DT990 with just the O2. Something about the O2 feels very lacking.

 

[bjgrenke]

 
Quote:

I have a DT990 Pro, and the Fiio E11, the E17's equivalence of an amp. The E11 seriously struggles to keep DT990 distortion-free, and jacking up bass would be a death-flag.
 
I'm resorting to double-amping E11 -> O2 because the O2 adds enough power to remove the distortion but it doesn't have a bass boost. Other than that, I wouldn't plug the DT990 Pro directly into the E11, nor would I drive the DT990 with just the O2. Something about the O2 feels very lacking.

 
Wow, didn't know it'd be this hard to drive 250ohm headphones 

 What do you guys recommend then? I find it ridiculous that not even the O2 can drive these.

 

[PurpleAngel]

 
Quote:

I have a DT990 Pro, and the Fiio E11, the E17's equivalence of an amp. The E11 seriously struggles to keep DT990 distortion-free, and jacking up bass would be a death-flag.
I'm resorting to double-amping E11 -> O2 because the O2 adds enough power to remove the distortion but it doesn't have a bass boost. Other than that, I wouldn't plug the DT990 Pro directly into the E11, nor would I drive the DT990 with just the O2. Something about the O2 feels very lacking.

On the Fiio E11, did you remove the battery and switch to the high power setting?
 
 

 

[PurpleAngel]

 
Quote:

Quote:

I have a DT990 Pro, and the Fiio E11, the E17's equivalence of an amp. The E11 seriously struggles to keep DT990 distortion-free, and jacking up bass would be a death-flag.
I'm resorting to double-amping E11 -> O2 because the O2 adds enough power to remove the distortion but it doesn't have a bass boost. Other than that, I wouldn't plug the DT990 Pro directly into the E11, nor would I drive the DT990 with just the O2. Something about the O2 feels very lacking.

Wow, didn't know it'd be this hard to drive 250ohm headphones 

 What do you guys recommend then? I find it ridiculous that not even the O2 can drive these.

First I've ever heard of the O2 (Objective 2) headphone amplifier not working well with 250-Ohhm headphone.
 
 
 
 

 

[bjgrenke]

 
Quote:

 
On the Fiio E11, did you remove the battery and switch to the high power setting?
 
 

Could be something like that, since I've heard from multiple people with the E17 + 990 Pros saying it works great.
 
 
Quote:

 
First I've ever heard of the O2 (Objective 2) headphone amplifier not working well with 250-Ohhm headphone.
Now I have heard on the O2 that the rechargeable batteries provide slightly less voltage then the regular batteries.
Not sure if that makes a difference in this case.
 
 

I assume you meant never, and neither have I. If I get the O2 I'll be using it mostly on wall power anyways. What I want to know now is, is the O2 Amp on my integrated DAC better than the E17 which is an amp/dac combo? Better as in the ability to drive my DT990 Pro's 250ohm.

 

[PurpleAngel]

 
Quote:

Quote:

On the Fiio E11, did you remove the battery and switch to the high power setting?

Could be something like that, since I've heard from multiple people with the E17 + 990 Pros saying it works great.
 
 
Quote:

First I've ever heard of the O2 (Objective 2) headphone amplifier not working well with 250-Ohhm headphone.
Now I have heard on the O2 that the rechargeable batteries provide slightly less voltage then the regular batteries.
Not sure if that makes a difference in this case.

I assume you meant never, and neither have I. If I get the O2 I'll be using it mostly on wall power anyways. What I want to know now is, is the O2 Amp on my integrated DAC better than the E17 which is an amp/dac combo? Better as in the ability to drive my DT990 Pro's 250ohm.

 
First off never mind what i said about the the rechargeables verses regular batteries,I got the O2 mixed up with the cmoys with twin batteries issues.
I'm sure the DAC on the E17 is better then the one built into the motherboard.
 
Amp wise.
You can get low cost single tube headphone amplifier off eBay, starting at $50.
Better ones start at around $75, ships from China, takes 10 days
The Indeed Mk2 (or G2) single tube seems like one of the better ones.
 
 

 

[bjgrenke]

 
Quote:

 
 
First off never mind what i said about the the rechargeables verses regular batteries,I got the O2 mixed up with the cmoys with twin batteries issues.
I'm sure the DAC on the E17 is better then the one built into the motherboard.
 
Amp wise.
You can get low cost single tube headphone amplifier off eBay, starting at $50.
Better ones start at around $75, ships from China, takes 10 days
The Indeed Mk2 (or G2) single tube seems like one of the better ones.
 
 

 
So what are you saying I do then? Get the E17 plus one of those tube amps? Or no 

 

[PurpleAngel]

 
Quote:

Quote:

First off never mind what i said about the the rechargeables verses regular batteries,I got the O2 mixed up with the cmoys with twin batteries issues.
I'm sure the DAC on the E17 is better then the one built into the motherboard.
Amp wise.
You can get low cost single tube headphone amplifier off eBay, starting at $50.
Better ones start at around $75, ships from China, takes 10 days
The Indeed Mk2 (or G2) single tube seems like one of the better ones.

 
So what are you saying I do then? Get the E17 plus one of those tube amps? Or no 

Get the tube amplifier $75 and a DD (DAC Destroyer, USB/DAC) $50.
So for $125 you get a headphone amplifier (with the DD) that can easily power up to 600-Ohm headphones.
The tube amplifier will output more voltage then the E17 and voltage is what you need for high Ohm headphones.
You would also need a Digital multi-meter (DT830, $7) to do fine adjustment and balance the right and left voltage channels.
This setup is for someone who like to tinker a little.
I'm just talking about one option for you.
 
 

 

[bjgrenke]

 
Quote:

 
Get the tube amplifier $75 and a DD (DAC Destroyer, USB/DAC) $50.
So for $125 you get a headphone amplifier (with the DD) that can easily power up to 600-Ohm headphones.
The tube amplifier will output more voltage then the E17 and voltage is what you need for high Ohm headphones.
You would also need a Digital multi-meter (DT830, $7) to do fine adjustment and balance the right and left voltage channels.
This setup is for someone who like to tinker a little.
I'm just talking about one option for you.
 
 

 
Ehh, as you can probably tell I'm new to this stuff and I don't really want to get into the 'tinkering' type of stuff for my first set up. Would it be a bad idea to get an e17 for now then dock it on an e9 if I find I still need more voltage? Either way I'm going to see what JDS labs will have to offer with an O2 Amp + Dac combo. If the price is right I might snag one of those instead.

 

[Bill-P]

 
Quote:

On the Fiio E11, did you remove the battery and switch to the high power setting?
 

 
Yes. That didn't help much, if at all.
 
Quote:

First I've ever heard of the O2 (Objective 2) headphone amplifier not working well with 250-Ohhm headphone.
 

 
Well, it does, but for adding bass, it's not the best option.
 

Quote:

Ehh, as you can probably tell I'm new to this stuff and I don't really want to get into the 'tinkering' type of stuff for my first set up. Would it be a bad idea to get an e17 for now then dock it on an e9 if I find I still need more voltage? Either way I'm going to see what JDS labs will have to offer with an O2 Amp + Dac combo. If the price is right I might snag one of those instead.

 

I think Fiio E17 + E9 is a actually quite a good combo. The E9 is quite capable the last time I tested it.

 

[bjgrenke]

 
 

Well, it does, but for adding bass, it's not the best option.

I understand that, and after listening to my headphones more extensively I realized that I probably won't need more bass, especially if I have an amp. There's always EQ if I need it.
 
 
 

I think Fiio E17 + E9 is a actually quite a good combo. The E9 is quite capable the last time I tested it.

That's good. I'll wait and see what JDS Labs has to offer for an O2 Amp/DAC combo.

 

[BGRoberts]

I've found the E17 to be good with my new D990/250's, which only have maybe 10 hours on them.  I've also hooked them to the O2, and really liked that combo.
At this moment, I'm running them from laptop>E17 (with line out adapter)>Bravo single tube amp. 
Diana Krall has only sounded better when I saw her live.

 

 

[stv014]

Quote:

Ehh, as you can probably tell I'm new to this stuff and I don't really want to get into the 'tinkering' type of stuff for my first set up. Would it be a bad idea to get an e17 for now then dock it on an e9 if I find I still need more voltage? Either way I'm going to see what JDS labs will have to offer with an O2 Amp + Dac combo.

 
The E17 alone could very well be fine. Especially if you do not use any bass boost, which does increase the voltage requirement significantly.
 

 

[Bill-P]

 
Quote:

I understand that, and after listening to my headphones more extensively I realized that I probably won't need more bass, especially if I have an amp. There's always EQ if I need it.
 
That's good. I'll wait and see what JDS Labs has to offer for an O2 Amp/DAC combo.

 
EQ doesn't give quite the same "kind" of bass boost that amp does. That's why some people still prefer using amps for boosting bass even though there are software EQs galore.

 

[stv014]

Quote:

EQ doesn't give quite the same "kind" of bass boost that amp does.

 
The bass boost of the E11 is basically also an (analog) EQ. Its frequency response graph is available at the site that is not allowed to be linked here, and it can be reproduced with a software parametric equalizer without major difficulty. Although the hardware boost of course has the advantage of being easy to use, and being applied to everything, rather than just music in a single player. However, it looks like the OP finds the bass quantity of the DT990 Pro (which is not lacking by any means) fine as it is.