[ConGrUenCy]

After reading a lot on this forum (about 2 hours a day for an entire week and one hour a day after that), I decided to get a pair of Grado 225i headphones, since all the music is listen is rock (progressive and psycadelic if you're interested). I've been waiting 20 days for them to arrive and they are coming tomorrow! Since I stay in India, and Grado don't have outlets here, I asked my uncle to get it from me when he comes from the US. Anyway, I got some questions-
1) I may decide to get amps for it soon, so which would you guys suggest for 150- 200$. Many people say Grados go well with tube amps, so I was considering one from littledot, so is that better, or headroom or ibasso?

2)Would it be better if I got an amp first or a DAC first? Which will improve the listening experience more?

3) Just out of curiousity, I was wondering, what are the sound signatures of Beyerdynamics and Denon headphones; like you have Grado for the in your face sound which works with rock and Senns for the laid back sound. So what do these two sound like?

 

[userlander]

beyerdynamic are a little "smoother" than Grado, a little less "in your face" - somewhere between a Grado and a Senn is how I think of it, with a wider soundstage. A lot also depends on the model you're talking about, but each brand does have a kind of base signature.

Whether you should get an amp or a dac depends a lot on your source now. If you're just going out of a computer or laptop or something like that, definitely get a DAC first. With a good DAC you might not even need an amp, although a good amp can improve the performance. With a poor source, a DAC is more important though, imo.

 

[ConGrUenCy]

My source is an iPod Nano 4th gen and an MSI laptop.

 

[fjrabon]

Denons sound kind of similar to Grados, except their peak is around 6K, whereas Grados have a spike around 3-4K. And Denons have substantially more bass.