I actually saw in a few of Zeos Pantera's videos that he had the iHA-8 on his desktop when he was reviewing other stuff, he did review the tube amp and the DAC from this new line from Cayin, but nothing yet for the iHA-8 and I haven't seen him realizing a review for this product nor have I seen him with the amp on his desk again, wonder if you know something about this?Also, @erick Muller—huge thanks for always taking the time to write such detailed impressions and help others out.
I can really tell you truly love the iHA-8, your passion really shows!
Cayin iHA-8: Fully Balanced "Hyper" Class-A Headphone Amplifier
- Thread starter Andykong
- Start date
This amp is a no brainer for anyone who owns a he6 he6se he6sev2. Pairing is excellent.
TitaniumDust
100+ Head-Fier
I just received my iHA-8 a few days ago. It is not burned in but I can already tell that it will replace my Soloist 3XP on my desk. As others have said, it does run quite hot, so I wondered if putting a small USB-powered cooling fan on TOP of the unit (not below) such as the one pictured would cause any negative issues with either internal components or sound quality. It does cool the case to a temperature just a little above ambient. Maybe a rep from Cayin frequents this forum and can provide any insight and let me know if this is a good or bad idea? Thanks!
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Actually, I’d recommend pointing the fan at the side of the iHA-8 rather than placing it on top. The side panels of the iHA-8 are designed to act as heatsinks — they dissipate most of the heat and you'll notice the grooves, which are there to increase interfacial area of heat transfer. A fan blowing across that area will will have better result than place it on the top.
And, I'd also suggest not to place the fan in direct contact with it. It’s better to leave a small gap, this way any vibration from the fan won’t be transferred directly to the amp.
TitaniumDust
100+ Head-Fier
Thank you @Gold Fox ! The fan I pictured/used has rubber bumpers about one inch thick so there is a nice gap. When I placed the fan on top, it also did a great job of cooling the side heatsinks as those were only luke-warm. Sounds like using the fan will cause no negative effects on the amp, and I don't have to worry about burning my hand. LOL
Edit: I noticed the left side heatsink where power comes in gets the hottest, so I put the fan on that side. Seems to work well and the fan does not touch the amp therefore imparting zero vibration.
Edit: I noticed the left side heatsink where power comes in gets the hottest, so I put the fan on that side. Seems to work well and the fan does not touch the amp therefore imparting zero vibration.
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Yeah I also noticed that the left side gets hotter that the right side... both are really hot, specially after a few continuous hours of use, but the left side is specially hot, like uncomfortably hot to the touch..... it's definitively going to be challenge during the summer to have both my serenade, the iHA-8 and my OTL tube amp, the TA-84 all turned on at once.
The left side gets hotter because torwards the front there appears to be two large regulators? In close proximity sinking heat into the side. I’m fairly sure they are power supply related. Perhaps Cayin can confirm?
Correct — the left side houses the power supply section. You can refer to this picture to identify the specific components involved.
I noticed it as well! since then there has been some time passed and we did not see the amp in the background of any of his other videos, so he must have already reviewed it and sent it back, at least that is my guess.
I wonder though why we don't see the review of it, we seen his review of the iDAC-8.
This might sound like a conspiracy theory, but he has been promoting recently one of his collaboration amps (Valencia i think its called).
Could it be the iHA-8 compares to it to make it worth a delayed review release?
Ok far fetched i know but still would love to hear his review on the unit.
I suspect something similar.I noticed it as well! since then there has been some time passed and we did not see the amp in the background of any of his other videos, so he must have already reviewed it and sent it back, at least that is my guess.
I wonder though why we don't see the review of it, we seen his review of the iDAC-8.
This might sound like a conspiracy theory, but he has been promoting recently one of his collaboration amps (Valencia i think its called).
Could it be the iHA-8 compares to it to make it worth a delayed review release?
Ok far fetched i know but still would love to hear his review on the unit.
Zeos collab with Orchad Audio for the Valencia has as one of it's main features that it's a pure power amp for headphones... well the iHA-8 can also be a power amp with the line and pre switch on the back of the amp, but with the iHA-8 in comparison to Zeo's Valencia you don't need to have a pre-amp to control the volume, yes the valencia has more raw power than the iHA-8, but it's also more expensive and Zeos at the time was promoting the pre-sale of it, so it's indeed kind of suspicious the fact that we saw the iHA-8 on his desk being used to listen to headphones at least for a couple of reviews at the beggining of the year, and now we have nothing.
I checked Zeos patreon page and you can usually see what's coming down the pipeline on his channel and didn't see an uploaded video for the iHA-8, I don't think that we're going to get a review from him for the iHA-8, maybe someone here that has a direct line to Zeos can ask him why hasn't he review this amp despite having it for some time.
MellowGold
100+ Head-Fier
I also find it a bit odd that he reviewed the iDAC-8 and the HA-2A but not the iHA-8. With Valencia being twice the price of the iHA-8 but with a limited feature set, it's hard for me to believe that it would be an upgrade to the iHA-8 in any fashion. The power specs of the Valencia are only marginally higher than the iHA-8 when Hyper Mode is considered.
Yep, that's why it's kind of suspicious... I started unsubscribing from a lot of audio review channels recently, Zeos has been one of those for like a month or so now, he still pops up now and then on my recommendations from the YT algorithm, but given Zeos history, it wouldn't be the first time he does something shaddy like this, or he reviews a product that turns out to be vaporware and it sells really well on pre-sale but never comes out to market and people that bought on early get screwed in the process, he has a history of this kind of stuff unfortunately, anyways, he's obiously going to get a cut from the sales of valencia, and any product that might eat onto the pre-sales and sales of this amp is going to affect directly his pocket so it wouldn't surprise me at all that Zeos just decided not to review the iHA-8 for this reason alone. Why would you buy Valencia if you could get basically the same with the iHA-8 at a lower price but also you don't need a pre-amp to actually use it?
Edit: I was checking the specs for Valencia on Orchard Audios page and it's significantly more powerful than the iHA-8, specially for lower impedances.
Valencia's page
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MellowGold
100+ Head-Fier
True, Valencia does has crazy high power at lower impedances but I can't see how someone would need something like 17W into 32ohm. Even with low sensitivity/lower impedance 'hard to drive' planars, the iHA-8 appears to have more than enough power.
Why would he promote a product that hurts his bottom line? He makes a commission off every Valencia sold. That’s why I learned to disregard his reviews. It’s become a joke at this point.
Besides headphones like Susvara OG or Abyss 1266, maybe even Tungsten mostly because it seems it's delivering more than 3w at 150 ohms, more headroom is never a bad thing, specially if it's good quality power and it's well control, which I have no doubts the Valencia is going to deliver on that, it should, Orchard audio is an excellent company, only heard good things about them.
But you're correct, the iHA-8 has more than enough power for any headphone, the only one that I still have some doubts if it drives it sufficiently well would be the modhouse tungsten, on paper it should, if you try to apply an intensive EQ profile tho I think the iHA-8 might not be enough.
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