[Silver]

I am listening to my Grados with my D-777 a lot recently. I am quite satisfied by the sound. However, I just find the highs (e.g. electric guitars) sound somewhat shrill and fatiguing. I wonder if an amp like CHA47 and SuperMini can help the situation?

 

[markl]

Maybe, but it may be your source that's to blame. Maybe you just don't like the Grado sound, have you considered other cans? Buying an amp for cans that cause you fatigue maybe not best strategy, maybe throwing good $$ after bad for you.

 

[Hirsch]

Quote:

Originally posted by Silver I am listening to my Grados with my D-777 a lot recently. I am quite satisfied by the sound. However, I just find the highs (e.g. electric guitars) sound somewhat shrill and fatiguing. I wonder if an amp like CHA47 and SuperMini can help the situation?

Maybe, but a pad replacement may do it as well, and is a lot cheaper. Yellow Sennheiser HD-414 replacement pads work very well on Grado's. You can do a search for information. Head-Fi member vwap cuts and dyes them so that they are as close as you can get to the Grado flat pad (best pad for Grado's, but no longer made). You can get the pads directly from Sennheiser, but will need to cut them to fit.

 

[Silver]

I have the vwap pads and I don't think the source is to blame since it is probably one of the best Sony PCDPs. I wouldn't say the highs are really untolerable, that's why I wonder if an amp can help the situation(make the highs a bit smoothier) since the "modfication" of the highs I guess can be done by a slight dark sounding amp?

 

[gpalmer]

I second Hirsch's suggestion. Change the pads first.

 

[Silver]

I HAVE THE VWAP PADS... See the above post.

 

[Hirsch]

Quote:

Originally posted by Silver I HAVE THE VWAP PADS... See the above post.

I don't have a D-777 anymore to test. However NO pcdp however good (I still have Denon DCP-150, Sony D-303, D-555 and a half dozen others) is going to have a high end that can be considered "good" in an absolute sense.

The amp section of a Supermini is going to be better than that of the D-777, and might be worth trying. It's not a dark amp, but it's a lot smoother than the output of the Sony's built in amp. I don't know how much it's going to help the problem that's bothering you, though.

 

[Gord SW Ont]

When I first got into headwize/head-fi a couple of years ago, I exchanged my Sony's pcd AC power adapter for a 1.5 amp regulated linear power supply I got from RS. I heard a noticable improvement ... it seemed to smoothe out a kind of raspiness in the high end.

I wasn't really trying to improve the pcd (as I wasn't really aware of a problem) but I had two of these power supplies and put the primary one on the TAH which resulted in an improvement as expected. Then one day I sat there happily listening to my headphones and remembered the other power supply. So I decided to hook it up as well and was surprised to hear an additional improvement. I guess even with these portable components good power can make a difference.

Gord.

 

[blessingx]

At least for me I found adding a crossfeed (my case Pink's X-Feed MKIII) made the 80's highs more acceptable, but if you really want to clear up your problem upgrade to the 225's (not the 325's which I've found to also have irritating highs). Alessandro route may be a possibility also (though don't know).

 

[Chinchy]

Since you already have the vwap pads, you can also try downgrading your pads to stock Senns with no hole. That might reduce some of the shrill highs and give it an overall warmer sound. Although I haven't tried the vwap pads, I did find that I preferred the stock Senn pads and the Grado comfies as well on my Grado SR-60's to something like bowl pads where there was a hole. You might want to try that as well, as that would still be cheaper than any of the other mods/additions you might try.

But as someone previously mentioned, you could also upgrade to the SR-225's. It has a wonderful sound.

 

[Rizumu]

The highs of the SR60 are a little untamed with the vwap pads but it sounds horribly muffled and dull when there's no hole (i.e. using the unmodded Senn pads). I don't think I really liked the SR60 until I used it with vwap pads. So, I'd recommend a source upgrade to be honest.

 

[dd3mon]

Just buy the Senn's (not the pads, the phones)

-dd3mon

 

[mkmelt]

The one time I seriously auditioned the Grado SR-80 headphones they were connected to a NAD integrated amplifier. As I recall, turning down the treble tone control from a 12 O'Clock position to around 10 O'Clock made a big improvement in taming the high end. Likewise, I recall bumping up the bass tone control to around a 1 O'Clock position. Sometimes tone controls can be your best friend.

 

[Silver]

Quote:

Originally posted by Rizumu The highs of the SR60 are a little untamed with the vwap pads but it sounds horribly muffled and dull when there's no hole (i.e. using the unmodded Senn pads). I don't think I really liked the SR60 until I used it with vwap pads. So, I'd recommend a source upgrade to be honest.

I think the D-777 is probably one of the best PCDPs ever made... If I wanna upgrade my source, I have to pay hundreds of dollars to get a Marantz CD6300 KI which I simply can't afford atm.

BTW, mine is not a SR-60. It is a SR-80.

 

[Silver]

Double post sorry.