[castleofargh]

  Balanced home speakers amps can have thousands of watts not just hundreds. Because balanced amps are more powerful. )

"balanced amps are more powerful" if left alone is clearly a false statement, yet you insist on it even at the price of misleading people who are reading this. Steve Eddy just warned about that a few times now, to no avail it seems. more powerful than what?
 
let's be better than this and stop trying to mislead and antagonize everything for the fun of it. superjawes answer is as good as it gets.

 

[eugenius]

Yes, most headphones don't need much power.
 
I'm running my HD600 on the Headroom BUDA on low gain, under 12 o'clock. With some classical I have to use medium gain.  With a HE6 though or even an old AKG, most likely I'd need high gain. And the BUDA is one of the most powerful headphone amps there are.
 
So, balanced amps have more power. Unless they don't - like when you compare a balanced portable amp with a single ended home amp.

 

[Zaubertuba]

Really, the balanced vs. SE argument is not one for audiophiles to have.

 
The best response I've seen yet.
 
"Balanced" lines came into being as a means to send signals long distances with maximum noise rejection. Push-pull amplication (which is really what we're talking about) came shortly thereafter.  There are some native advantages to it, some of what you've seen folks arguing about here, but such arguments over it's merits are generally is a little silly because there are so many implementations out there, both "good" and "bad," you pretty much have to compare specific components to see if there's really a cost-benefit to doing so.
 
For the OP, the benefits of a short run from your desktop source to your headphone amp may or may not benefit from being balanced--with well-shielded interconnect you probably won't have any issues.  As superjawes succinctly put--there's no harm in running SE to a balanced amp if it was designed to be hooked up that way.  It's certainly not worth purchasing a different source if you don't have any problems with EMI/RFI.
 
In my situation, however, I run balanced "cradle-to-grave" because I'm familiar with the topology from my work, the connectors are convenient to me, and it covers a multitude of problems and sins (mostly noise rejection--which is what the topology was originally intended for) that otherwise might be difficult to exorcise.
 
It also sounds good to me, but I'm not going to try and convince somebody else to change their SE setup because of that.  

 

 

[superjawes]

I think it's fine having a discussion about balanced vs. single ended...just not from a listener's perspective. As a listener you only need to answer these questions:

"Will this amp sound good with my headphones/speakers?"

AND

"How much does it cost?"

You can answer these questions by reading the measurements and price tag.

Now if you are designing an amp of your own--as part of your job or hobby--then sure, explore everything you can find about balanced vs. SE amps.

 

[crowdedthehouse]

I think you're ALL missing the point. I was asking about ONE amp that can run balanced and SE. I am not comparing two separate amps. I don't care about speakers. I don't care what bridge you're building or where it goes.

Let me clarify, it's one HEADPHONE amp that has balanced and SE inputs and outputs.

It's nice that you all have an opinion about a bunch of crap I have zero interest in at this point in time. In fact, possibly very intelligent statements, of which I fell asleep reading.

If you guys wanna keep going off topic, here's an idea. Why don't you all PM each other or start your own threads? If not, maybe just GTFO of this thread.
I keep getting irrelevant email notifications.

 

[mikeaj]

I think you're ALL missing the point. I was asking about ONE amp that can run balanced and SE. I am not comparing two separate amps. I don't care about speakers. I don't care what bridge you're building or where it goes.

Let me clarify, it's one HEADPHONE amp that has balanced and SE inputs and outputs.

It's nice that you all have an opinion about a bunch of crap I have zero interest in at this point in time. In fact, possibly very intelligent statements, of which I fell asleep reading.

If you guys wanna keep going off topic, here's an idea. Why don't you all PM each other or start your own threads? If not, maybe just GTFO of this thread.
I keep getting irrelevant email notifications.

 
For a user in your situation, with an amp that offers both, use whichever output is more convenient to plug in and use. If the headphones are wired and terminated for balanced, use that. Otherwise, use the other.
 
You should get the same experience in practice.

 

[eugenius]

Comparing single ended outputs with the balanced out on the same amp usually is more about output impedance than power. The single ended outputs tend to have different output impedance by design - usually higher. 

 

[crowdedthehouse]

Thanks mikeaj and eugenius for the direct and to the point answers.

I just thought it would be a waste of time and money buying balanced interconnects and headphone cables if the source wasn't balanced. Thanks to everyone who has helped me understand a little bit more theory.

Having said that, everything has changed since I first started this post and my source will now be balanced as I will hopefully have an RWAK120-B soon!

 

[cjl]

  Comparing single ended outputs with the balanced out on the same amp usually is more about output impedance than power. The single ended outputs tend to have different output impedance by design - usually higher. 

I would expect the output impedance of the single ended outputs to be lower on the same amp, not higher. On a well designed amp though, the difference shouldn't be enough to matter.

 

[ab initio]

  I would expect the output impedance of the single ended outputs to be lower on the same amp, not higher. On a well designed amp though, the difference shouldn't be enough to matter.

If the balanced amp is essentially two single-ended amps with one amp's polarity reversed, then you would have double the output impedance of the equivalent singled ended version. The current has to go through both amp sections to complete the circuit; hence, two amplifier outputs in series. In general, that factor of two might not be quite so exact depending on the topology of the amplifier.
 
Cheers

 

[Steve Eddy]

If the balanced amp is essentially two single-ended amps with one amp's polarity reversed, then you would have double the output impedance of the equivalent singled ended version. The current has to go through both amp sections to complete the circuit; hence, two amplifier outputs in series. In general, that factor of two might not be quite so exact depending on the topology of the amplifier.

That's correct. Thank you for correcting yet more misinformation being spread about "balanced" amps.

se

 

[Steve Eddy]

I think you're ALL missing the point. I was asking about ONE amp that can run balanced and SE. I am not comparing two separate amps. I don't care about speakers. I don't care what bridge you're building or where it goes.

Let me clarify, it's one HEADPHONE amp that has balanced and SE inputs and outputs.

It's nice that you all have an opinion about a bunch of crap I have zero interest in at this point in time. In fact, possibly very intelligent statements, of which I fell asleep reading.

If you guys wanna keep going off topic, here's an idea. Why don't you all PM each other or start your own threads? If not, maybe just GTFO of this thread.
I keep getting irrelevant email notifications.

Ok, here's the long and the short of it.

Balanced at the input is all about common mode noise rejection. In a domestic situation, this isn't really going to be a problem, so no real benefit there.

"Balanced" at the output is mostly about marketing. There's no inherent advantage. And if you're coming in single-ended, there needs to be an additional phase splitter circuit involved to drive the "balanced" output. If in single-ended operation the amp has enough power to adequately drive you headphones, that's the simplest, most direct means of doing it.

se

 

[SilverEars]

Here is AK240's specs:
 

Audio Performance

1. Frequency Response
2. Signal to Noise Ratio
3. Crosstalk
4. THD+N
5. IMD SMPTE
6. Output Impedance

1. ±0.023dB (Condition: 20Hz~20kHz) Unbalance & Balance
   / ±0.3dB (Condition: 10Hz~70kHz) Unbalance & Balance
2. 116dB @ 1kHz, Unbalance / 117dB @ 1kHz, Balance
3. 130dB @ 1kHz, Unbalance / 135dB @ 1kHz, Balance
4. 0.0007% @ 1kHz, Unbalance / 0.0005% @ 1kHz, Balance
5. 0.0004% 800Hz 10kHz(4:1) Unbalance / 0.0003% 800Hz 10kHz(4:1) Balance
6. Balanced out 2.5mm (1ohm) / PHONES 3.5mm (2ohm)

I understand that balanced you need two channels per side(one opposite polarity), and the voltage at the headphone is the difference between + and - channels which essentially doubles one channel voltage, but subtracts the noise picked up in the line.  Single ended the output impedance seems quite straight forward, but for balanced how is it figured?  Also, notice that specs are not too much different for SE vs Balanced for the AK240(1dB more SNR after common mode noise rejection?), but the output impedance of balanced out is half of single ended.  What could be going on here?

 

[ab initio]

  Here is AK240's specs:
 
I understand that balanced you need two channels per side(one opposite polarity), and the voltage at the headphone is the difference between + and - channels which essentially doubles one channel voltage, but subtracts the noise picked up in the line.  Single ended the output impedance seems quite straight forward, but for balanced how is it figured?  Also, notice that specs are not too much different for SE vs Balanced for the AK240(1dB more SNR after common mode noise rejection?), but the output impedance of balanced out is half of single ended.  What could be going on here?

completely different amplifier circuits
 
cheers

 

[FrankCooter]

Ok, here's the long and the short of it.



Balanced at the input is all about common mode noise rejection. In a domestic situation, this isn't really going to be a problem, so no real benefit there.



"Balanced" at the output is mostly about marketing. There's no inherent advantage. And if you're coming in single-ended, there needs to be an additional phase splitter circuit involved to drive the "balanced" output. If in single-ended operation the amp has enough power to adequately drive you headphones, that's the simplest, most direct means of doing it.



se

 


Totally correct and should be repeated daily on all Head-Fi forums. There is no subject here that is more misunderstood and more abused than the whole "balancing" mania.

I know you must feel it's like beating your head against a stone wall, but there's a few of us out here that appreciate your efforts to bring sanity and science into the discussion.