[ninetailsaudio]

so I have this pair of headphones I really liked, but I noticed the drivers are 32 Ohm and most headphones I've tried are 48 Ohm to 50 Ohm, per driver. I want to swap the current drivers in favor of some open Air 48 Ohm drivers. I'll remake the ear cups if I have to, thats not an issue, I'm some what decent at soldering so I got that covered.

now do Ohms/Impedenace matter when connecting them to my current headphones pcb, will I have to wire a converter, treble bleed circuit(my back ground is in guitar and speaker wiring, not professionally, just hobbyist), will I head to step up hook capacitors and/or resistors in some way for it to work? And lets say they work if I don't need to do that will it effect the tone or volume (like guitar Pots do from 250 Ohms to 500 Ohms)?

Also is the charge typically going into headphones ac or dc?

in guitar we have both Active pickup and Passive though I have a feeling its going to be like wiring a Speaker Cabinet. Still better safe than sorry.

 

[Tjj226 Angel]

You are making things way more complicated the need be.

First off lets cover some basic theory and then we will look at your particular case.

Lets assume you have normal dynamic drivers meaning there is a speaker cone and a voice coil. The impedance of your headphones is the measured load that is reflected back to your amplifier. The only thing you would need to do is find an amplifier that can "drive" your headphones at that impedance. Most amplifiers on the market can drive headphones between 32 and 600 ohms, so this generally isn't even an issue most people even worry about.

The impedance of the driver has very little to do with sound quality. On paper higher impedance on dynamic headphones should sound better since it usually indicates that the manufacturer is using thinner wire on the voice coil which makes it lighter weight and will produce less distortion. HOWEVER, in the real world that rarely ever matters. I can find 32 ohm headphones that sound great, and 600 ohms headphones that sound like crap just as easily as I can find 32 ohm headphones that sound like crap and 600 ohm headphones that sound great.

The thing that matters more than anything else is how the driver was developed, engineered, and produced. A very simple well made driver can sound a thousand times better than some poorly made super expensive exotica driver.

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As far as capacitors and resistors go. Uh no. If your headphones are just basic headphones, then it should just be one wire in and one wire out with the driver in between. If you see capacitors in there, then you will be better off just buying new headphones.

 

[ninetailsaudio]

You are making things way more complicated the need be.

First off lets cover some basic theory and then we will look at your particular case.

Lets assume you have normal dynamic drivers meaning there is a speaker cone and a voice coil. The impedance of your headphones is the measured load that is reflected back to your amplifier. The only thing you would need to do is find an amplifier that can "drive" your headphones at that impedance. Most amplifiers on the market can drive headphones between 32 and 600 ohms, so this generally isn't even an issue most people even worry about.

The impedance of the driver has very little to do with sound quality. On paper higher impedance on dynamic headphones should sound better since it usually indicates that the manufacturer is using thinner wire on the voice coil which makes it lighter weight and will produce less distortion. HOWEVER, in the real world that rarely ever matters. I can find 32 ohm headphones that sound great, and 600 ohms headphones that sound like crap just as easily as I can find 32 ohm headphones that sound like crap and 600 ohm headphones that sound great.

The thing that matters more than anything else is how the driver was developed, engineered, and produced. A very simple well made driver can sound a thousand times better than some poorly made super expensive exotica driver.

-----------

As far as capacitors and resistors go. Uh no. If your headphones are just basic headphones, then it should just be one wire in and one wire out with the driver in between. If you see capacitors in there, then you will be better off just buying new headphones.

I'm just wondering how if it matters for swapping the drivers. I'm not talking about sound quality at all. I'll be using them to monitor out an audio mixer and will be making custom mods to my headset, because I can, not because of sound quality. though the Drivers are from a reputable brand where as the ones in my headset are generics. They're a high fidelity set from a hi-fi pair, if that answers anything about quality, I'm not relating impedance to that though

the only thing I need to know is can I wire them direct, or do I need to match the impedance from my headset pcb to my new drivers. I'll probably get an external amp though my mixer is 75 db on audio processing so I can probably wire them direct, I may still get an external preamp just to have even more control.

in cabinet speakers matching impedance is a must, if not we wire the speakers differently to cut the impedance to match the input source, or dial things in with Gain Knob. At least it works that way with guitar amps to speakers, wondering if its the same?

 

[Tjj226 Angel]

I'm just wondering how if it matters for swapping the drivers. I'm not talking about sound quality at all. I'll be using them to monitor out an audio mixer and will be making custom mods to my headset, because I can, not because of sound quality. though the Drivers are from a reputable brand where as the ones in my headset are generics. They're a high fidelity set from a hi-fi pair, if that answers anything about quality, I'm not relating impedance to that though

the only thing I need to know is can I wire them direct, or do I need to match the impedance from my headset pcb to my new drivers. I'll probably get an external amp though my mixer is 75 db on audio processing so I can probably wire them direct, I may still get an external preamp just to have even more control.

in cabinet speakers matching impedance is a must, if not we wire the speakers differently to cut the impedance to match the input source, or dial things in with Gain Knob. At least it works that way with guitar amps to speakers, wondering if its the same?

The bottom line is that you should be able to swap drivers directly and not notice any issues. If you do, just chuck in a resistor in parallel to make your higher impedance headphones look like a 32 ohm load.

 

[ninetailsaudio]

The bottom line is that you should be able to swap drivers directly and not notice any issues. If you do, just chuck in a resistor in parallel to make your higher impedance headphones look like a 32 ohm load.

Thank You I think I'll do that.

 

[ninetailsaudio]

The bottom line is that you should be able to swap drivers directly and not notice any issues. If you do, just chuck in a resistor in parallel to make your higher impedance headphones look like a 32 ohm load.

It would Look something like this right, just in case I need to go the resistor route if wiring direct doesn't work.

 

[MDR30]

Experiments are fine and sometimes succesful. If luck is on your side it will be an improvement.

BUT.

A V8 engine in a Fiat or a twostroke in a Cadillac isn't the optimal solution.

 

[ninetailsaudio]

Experiments are fine and sometimes succesful. If luck is on your side it will be an improvement.

BUT.

A V8 engine in a Fiat or a twostroke in a Cadillac isn't the optimal solution.

yeah, but the proof of concept is worth it to me.