[Tristate]

Hey all.
 
I'm currently using a pair of Denon D2000 (which i btw love) together with a Asus Xonar Essence STX card and it works great. The only thing thats sort of bugging me is that even if i turn up the volume to full in the xonar sound config, the headphones are not always as loud as i want them to be. 
Now, you can choose your gain tuning to match your headphones (in this case the D2000s have 25 ohm if im right), but the question i have is - if i want them to be louder, can i boost their gain without damaging them ?
The Xonar panel have three options:
 
Normal 0db (0-64 ohm)
High Gain (12db 64-300 ohm)
Extra High Gain (18db 300-600 ohm).
 
When you switch mode, the software tells you that you can damage your headphone if you boost it too much.Thats pretty obvious, but can i boost them to 12 db and turn the volume way down (which i usually need because the high gain is much louder than the "normal" gain), without damaging them over time ?
 
Thanks in advance!
 
/David
 

 

[fabio-fi]

 
Quote:

it could be worth investing into a dedicated HP amplifier. There are some cheap and good ones around.
 

I'd go this route. 

 

[Dom de B]

I'm pretty sure you will damage your ears before you damage your headphones.
 
All you are doing is sending more volume/power to your headphones.
 
The only problem with high gain is with most amps is comes with high/higher distortion.
 
 

 

[Sophonax]

 
Quote:

I'm pretty sure you will damage your ears before you damage your headphones.
 
All you are doing is sending more volume/power to your headphones.
 
The only problem with high gain is with most amps is comes with high/higher distortion.
 

^ This.
 
Just make sure that you turn down the volume control to the minimum before you switch gain settings, then slowly increase the volume control until you reach the desired listening level.  This prevents accidents where switching the gain while playing music could send too much power to the headphones (and your ears) unintentionally.
 
If you follow the above advice about slowly increasing the volume, I imagine your ears will start hurting long before the headphones are damaged.
 

 

[Tristate]

Okey, thanks for the help guys! I will take it slowly.

 

[MalVeauX]

Quote:

Okey, thanks for the help guys! I will take it slowly.

Check to make sure your windows system volume is 100%, then make sure the volume knob in your STX's software is up. Also, make sure whatever playback software you're using is also showing 100% playback in the Volume Mixer.
 
I just cannot fathom how you cannot get the D2000 loud enough even on the lowest gain setting on any soundcard, not just the STX, but any soundcard. I can plug my D2000 into my Xonar DG and it's too loud at 100% volume. So I'm guessing you just having your volumes at different levels between system volume and player volume and the STX software's volume.
 
Very best,

 

[Hifianddrumming]

Late, but I would go for a nice cheap amp or Dac/amp It will improve the sound a fair bit as well  as offering that volume without the noise floor (as said before).