[chriscu1]

I think that this portable is the one that makes my RS-1's sound their best (mind you, I'm JUST talking about portables). I own a 611, 565, and now this D-25 (all Sonys). I was pretty pleased with the 565, but the D-25 takes the crown. I keep the volume just past 4, and I like my music loud. At this volume I get lots of Grado love. Of course this is still no match for a dedicated amp. I notice that if I turn the volume much past 6, not only is it excruciatingly loud, but it gets pretty distorted. If I hook up my RA-1 to the line out of the D-25 and go louder, it just gets louder without getting distorted one bit (of course I'd still lose my hearing after a while listening past 12 o'clock on the RA-1

). The line out on the D-25 puts out some great sound. This has to be one of the best portables around, and definitely the best value for your money (if you don't care about anti-shock). $70 for the player, shipping, and Radio Shack AC adapter puts the smack down on any other source you could come up with for under $100.
Now my wife can DEFINITELY keep the 611.

 

[Russ Arcuri]

What distortion are you hearing with the D-25S? I was able to push the volume to almost 8 before noticeable distortion occurred, though I admit I never did so with the headphones actually on my ears. Around 5 or 6 I removed the headphones from my head and tried to determine whether they were distorting or not. I did this with Sennheiser HD580s, Grado SR-80s, and Koss KSC-35s. The point at which they seemed to start distorting did of course vary from headphone to headphone, but I never noticed it until a bit shy of 8.

 

[chriscu1]

I did another test, and it starts being noticeable where the 7 would be. This is indeed with the headphones sitting right on my ears. It sounds like someone's playing a loud radio station that's not coming in quite right. This is no way a complaint, though. I was just showing that even though it's a great headphone amp, it still comes nowhere close to what a dedicated amp can do. The sound is so loud with Grados at that level, though, that I probably wouldn't put it there even it was distortion free. Between 4 and 6 gives me a very loud and still clear signal. I don't have any high impedance cans so putting it at volume setting 8 with something like HD600's might sound different, like you say.

 

[Audio-Me]

Uhhh, why even crank the volume up to painful amounts???

Sounds silly.

Distortions @ high volumes won't affect you if you don't listen through them that loud!

 

[gloco]

The only time i noticed distortion was with the AKG 501's which i expected was past 8. My 7506's dont distort at all, and i keep the volume at a lean 3-4. Haven't tried the Grado's with it yet!

George

 

[roll-man]

I too experienced some distortion at about 7 1/2 - 8 from the headphone jack of my d-25s driving my hd580's. It was not too terrible, but it was certainly noticeable. Basically kinda rough around the edges. Quite frankly, as great as this player is, the headphone out isn't all that wonderful sounding. It struggled a bit with the 580's (what doesn't???). Again not horrible, just not audiophile. Oddly enough, it really drove my V-6's with authority, yet my Grado's sounded pretty bad. Now having said all that, the line out is a horse of a different color. Simply put, it sounds great. Really nice. Since this thing will spend its life sitting on my desk, I'll fortunately not really need to use the headphone jack. I think if I had no amp available I would use the headphone jack with my v-6's only....there seemed to be some magic there. At the moment, I'm listening to Kevin Eubanks "Turning Point" (great) with the d-25s line out, JMT altoids cha-47 & hd580's. It truly sounds spectacular....who needs a headphone jack anyway?