[MrYman]

Hi all! I am no technical person, so I apologize in advance for any stupid questions I might make... I have Sennheiser HD 600. Now I am deciding to buy a MP3 player. I wonder if there is any portable player which can run my 300 Ohm Sennheiser... Or is it a must for me to buy a portable amp?

My best choice for player so far is a CD-MP3 player iRiver 550, 2nd best choice Dioneer DCP-400, and 3rd Sony D-NE1. iRiver has headphone output specified at 12mW + 12mW @ 16 ohm, Dioneer 7mW + 7mW @ 16 ohm. Seems this is not enough to drive/run my headphones, right? So, my question is how much mW should be enough for my headphones to sound loud enough? Though, I saw that Creative Jukebox 3 (hard disk based MP3 player) has 100mW headphone out. And NEX ia (CF memory based player) 30mW @ 32 ohm. This seems quite a bit more powerful than any CD-MP3 player I saw. So, please let me know, should I buy an amp, or is it there some portable MP3 player which is "strong" enough?

This might be stupid, but let me ask anyway please: can I connect headphones to line-out port of CD-MP3 player? E.g. Dioneer line-out has 500mW...

Lastly, I'd also like to connect portable CD-MP3 player to car system, is something like Dioneer 500mW line-out fine? iRiver 550 has an optical line-out port, better option, right?

Thanks for your time and info! Boyan

 

[usc goose]

welcome to head-fi, sorry about the wallet. (somewhat standard greeting here)

the zen i think is 100mw. but generally people crazy enough to use hd600s as portables are crazy enough to carry dedicated amps. good luck with the search.

edit: oh yeah, there's no problem connecting directly to the line out. you just have to be happy with whatever volume it want's to give you.

edit#2: i think i have the zen power rating right now.

 

[MrYman]

Hey, thanks for your reply and welcoming me

No, I won't really need this headphones on the road - walking/running/biking, but when I sit or lay down comfortably...
Either at home or on vacation etc. I just got a lot of MP3 CDs -- and I prepare MP3's at top VBR quality (LAME MP3 encoder with --r3mix option)...

So, would you say ZEN with 100mW is enough to run such headphones, or should I buy a portable amp?

Also, is 500mW line-out on Dioneer400 portable CD-MP3 player too loud if I connect Sennheiser HD 600 there?

Thanks!

 

[usc goose]

well it seems like an iRiver 550 and a portable amp is what i would go with in your situation. i've never heard the iRiver but i do have a JMT made portable meta42 that works very well with my hd600.

anyone else?

 

[MrYman]

Thanks for recommendation! Now I need to find out more about these portable AMPs... I saw this page: MINT (smaller meta45 version) -- good choice?

I know nothing about portable amps... How much does MINT cost? What about Meta45? Are people here making such amps to sell to me? I do not know if I'd pay a commercial amp, with about same capability but costing 3x more.... Any more recommendations, anyone?

P.S. Somewhat different question... can I post these questions to amp & headphones forums as well, or you think people who check those forums check this one (portable audio) too?

 

[blessingx]

Definitely get an amp if you're already lugging around the 600's. If an amp is include in the mix it opens a lot more options obviously.

Also r3mix is no longer top VBR quality. Since you're using LAME, --aps and --ape both best it. They'll both produce larger files those. I'm not a r3mix basher as some are (the size still makes it useful), but --aps isn't much larger (based on musics complexity). Some have even called for the r3mix preset to be removed.

 

[usc goose]

tigger's site
xin's site

these are pretty much the top dog's of the portable amp world. JMT is up there too but you have to PM him. And I see you found tangent's site.

meta42 is regarded the best, and super tweakable. i've never heard xin's supermini but people seem to say it sounds damn good and it's the smallest and runs a long time because of the aaa's instead of using the 9v's that most meta's run. mint is the stripped down meta.

and you can post in other forums but it's usually not a good idea to ask the exact same thing in more than one forum.

good luck with the search.

 

[MrYman]

Thanks to both of your for your informative replies! I think I'll go with meta42 amp. Anyone here who knows where I could buy it in Europe, or can I order it only from USA? $100 seems a good price for it... If this cannot be found in Europe, maybe you could recommend some amp which is available in Europe, about as good and at similar price?

 

[MrYman]

Hmm, I've just decided to buy meta42 for portable CD-MP3 player, when I remembered I saw somewhere
that portable CD-MP3 players do not send MP3 audio signal to line-out, just normal CD audio? True?!
(Due to copyrights.) Are all portable CD-MP3 players like this? If so I guess I have to buy portable
hard disk player or memory based player with line-out.... Please advice!
Of portable CD-MP3 players I think of these choices: 1) iRiver 550, 2) Dioneer 400, 3) Sony D-NE1...

 

[austonia]

i wouldn't obsess too much on manufacturer's rated output levels, there is no standard by which they test. you would do better to ask people who own the products if they can power a particular headphone. For instance, my iRiver iFP-390T player is rated at only 12mw/16ohm, however it powers my Ety ER4S (100+ ohm) to a loud level without distortion.

 

[gus_tavo]

Quote:

Originally posted by MrYman portable CD-MP3 players do not send MP3 audio signal to line-out, just normal CD audio? True?! (Due to copyrights.) Are all portable CD-MP3 players like this?

I think the iMP-550 is the only line-out(CD/MP3) that functions when playing other formats. Check #6. on this post.

 

[MrYman]

thaks austonia & gus_tavo, that's good info