[tama]

You have maxed out your Dacmini and it doesn't drive your HE500 load enough? Is it the stock dacmini?

Well... I just upgraded my Heaphones to HE500s and while it can push them just fine, it's clear to me I'm going to need a more powerful Amp to drive them. So while I love the DACmini, it just doesn't have quite enough power for the volume levels I want. Nothing against the Mini though. It's a fantastic piece of equipment. 

 

[bareyb]

Quote:

You have maxed out your Dacmini and it doesn't drive your HE500 load enough? Is it the stock dacmini?

It's stock with the +8 dB gain. I can turn it all the way up and for MOST of my material it's "right there" and gets plenty of volume. In fact, a lot of the time I have it at about 3 o'clock and it's enough. For other softer material I have found it's not quite enough and it starts to get fairly strident if I push it too hard. Usually I can back off the volume a little and it sounds very clean.
 
My other issue is, for some reason it crashes my computer every night and each morning I come out and have to do a hard reboot. So that's a little bit of a concern as well. Not sure what's happening there as it works fine while I'm using it. 
 
At any rate, I sent them a PM asking about the Gain upgrade and they never got back to me.  At this point I don't think the gain mod is really going to help me anyway. It's just going to move the point of distortion farther back in the Volume's range and probably wouldn't gain me any useable volume anyway.
 
I actually ended up starting a thread looking for a more powerful DAC and Amp All-in-one solution. Bottom line is the Burson Conductor has the most power you can get in an all-in-one, so that's what I went with. It will be here tomorrow and we'll see how they compare. 

 

[mikemercer]

The output is a clean watt on the DACmini, which is also a good reason for its standing the test of time.  That said, I use one occasionally, but not as my main reference anymore.  It's still a KILLER buy.  
 
HE500's aren't happy with a clean watt?

 

[zeinharis]

Quote:

HE500's aren't happy with a clean watt?

 
Sure they do, i love mine

 

[aras]

Quote:

It's stock with the +8 dB gain. I can turn it all the way up and for MOST of my material it's "right there" and gets plenty of volume. In fact, a lot of the time I have it at about 3 o'clock and it's enough. For other softer material I have found it's not quite enough and it starts to get fairly strident if I push it too hard. Usually I can back off the volume a little and it sounds very clean.
 
My other issue is, for some reason it crashes my computer every night and each morning I come out and have to do a hard reboot. So that's a little bit of a concern as well. Not sure what's happening there as it works fine while I'm using it. 
 
At any rate, I sent them a PM asking about the Gain upgrade and they never got back to me.  At this point I don't think the gain mod is really going to help me anyway. It's just going to move the point of distortion farther back in the Volume's range and probably wouldn't gain me any useable volume anyway.
 
I actually ended up starting a thread looking for a more powerful DAC and Amp All-in-one solution. Bottom line is the Burson Conductor has the most power you can get in an all-in-one, so that's what I went with. It will be here tomorrow and we'll see how they compare. 

Please let us know how it compares to the dacmini.

 

[bareyb]

Quote:

Please let us know how it compares to the dacmini.

Will do. I hope it sounds as good as the Mini. I'm very happy with the sonic characteristics of it. Very nice Bass and sweet highs. I probably have hearing loss or something because everyone always turns it down when I let them wear my headphones. Only reason for leaving the Mini is to get more volume. That's it. Otherwise it's a great little package that lightweight and easy to move. I'd think the Mini would be enough power for most folks. It's got 3/4 of a wpc RMS (which a lot of mfrs. would call 1.5 wpc). That's no slouch for such a small package. 

 

[zeinharis]

Quote:

Will do. I hope it sounds as good as the Mini. I'm very happy with the sonic characteristics of it. Very nice Bass and sweet highs. I probably have hearing loss or something because everyone always turns it down when I let them wear my headphones. Only reason for leaving the Mini is to get more volume. That's it. Otherwise it's a great little package that lightweight and easy to move. I'd think the Mini would be enough power for most folks. It's got 3/4 of a wpc RMS (which a lot of mfrs. would call 1.5 wpc). That's no slouch for such a small package. 

 
 
The conductor have 4W of power output because i believe the conductor is using the same amp sections as the soloist, it's a very solid for an SS amps, i haven't tried it myself, but i've tried the soloist with my HE-500 and the result is pretty good

 

[bareyb]

Quote:

 
 
The conductor have 4W of power output because i believe the conductor is using the same amp sections as the soloist, it's a very solid for an SS amps, i haven't tried it myself, but i've tried the soloist with my HE-500 and the result is pretty good

Yep it's the exact same Amp section. It's probably closer to 3 wpc at 32 ohm, but it still by far the most powerful AIO. Most all of them top out at about 1.5 watts.  The only thing that would make it perfect is if it had a remote control, but that is apparently not that easy to find (there's exactly one that I could find). So if it sounds good and has some power to spare I should be very happy with it. But you never know until you hear it. Tomorrow I will know more.  

 

[bareyb]

UPDATE: Well... I had an epiphany last night when I was setting everything up out in my workshop (as I do every night) and it occurred to me that if the unit had a remote control, I could simply leave it on the work bench and operate it from my work area without having to constantly move the unit around. It would also allow me to leave it plugged in and not have to break down the whole system each night and morning...
 
Anyway, long story short, I decided NOT to go with the Conductor (I refused delivery and sent it back unopened) and to go with the Benchmark DAC2 (or possibly DAC1 for $500.00 less). It's got a remote control, a very good headphone amp, and  preamp outs so I figure even it I outgrow the Amp inside it, I can use the DAC part and buy a separate Amp. In other words, it's a lot more scalable and with the money I save I could afford to buy a Lyr or some other more powerful Amp.
 
So there it is, I feel like a tool that I didn't think of it before but then again this whole journey into HiFi has be wrought with mistakes and poor decisions (mostly for the sake of trying to save some $$$). I hope the Benchmark is a good way to go. I will of course post impressions. 
 

 

[dukeskd]

Quote:

UPDATE: Well... I had an epiphany last night when I was setting everything up out in my workshop (as I do every night) and it occurred to me that if the unit had a remote control, I could simply leave it on the work bench and operate it from my work area without having to constantly move the unit around. It would also allow me to leave it plugged in and not have to break down the whole system each night and morning...
 
Anyway, long story short, I decided NOT to go with the Conductor (I refused delivery and sent it back unopened) and to go with the Benchmark DAC2 (or possibly DAC1 for $500.00 less). It's got a remote control, a very good headphone amp, and  preamp outs so I figure even it I outgrow the Amp inside it, I can use the DAC part and buy a separate Amp. In other words, it's a lot more scalable and with the money I save I could afford to buy a Lyr or some other more powerful Amp.
 
So there it is, I feel like a tool that I didn't think of it before but then again this whole journey into HiFi has be wrought with mistakes and poor decisions (mostly for the sake of trying to save some $$$). I hope the Benchmark is a good way to go. I will of course post impressions. 
 

Just a FYI,
 Grace and Mytek also have remotes.

 

[bareyb]

Quote:

Just a FYI,
 Grace and Mytek also have remotes.

Comparing the GRACE to the Benchmark as we speak. It looks like it's got comparable features. The Mytek has about half the power from the headphone amp than the other two. I'm hoping to get one that's powerful enough to use "on the go" (transportable) and then use the preamp outs to go to a nicer (more powerful) Amp that will remain on my workbench. That would be Heaven. The remote control is now key in my mind. That's the "have to have" feature to make it all work. So I guess that narrows the field considerably. 
 
As i understand it, Apple only uses 24 bit for iTunes "out" anyway, so the DAC1 is already more than I need. The DAC2 is tempting and more "future proof"  but I can't get past the fact that with that extra $400.00 I could have a head start on a really nice Amp. Decisions, decisions... DAC1 or DAC2? Any thoughts? I'm leaning towards saving the $$$ and getting the DAC1. It's available on PRIME (DAC2 is not)  and it could be here tomorrow if I order it now...  

 

[bareyb]

Just heard from GRACE. Here are the specs for the M Series all in ones:
 
 

[size=medium] Hi Barry,
The m903 and m905 both contain reference quality headphone amplifiers and DA converters. The power output capabilities are listed below.


m903
32 Ohm 2100mW
50 Ohm 1548mW
300 Ohm 271mW
600 Ohm 136mW

m905
32 Ohm 2300mW
50 Ohm 1620mW
300 Ohm 294mW
600 Ohm 147mW

Please let me know if you have any further questions.
Best,
Michael

-- 
Michael Grace
Grace Design
mbgrace@gracedesign.com
http://www.gracedesign.com
303-443-7454 x108[/size]

 

[pekingduck]

Something strange happened to my DACmini earlier today, I could hear a high-pitched whining noise after plugging my XP8000 battery pack into it. The sound was from within the DACmini, not through the headphones. It's there even when no music was playing. There's no noise if I used the AC adapter.
 
Any idea what caused the noise?

 

[pekingduck]

By the way, I received my HE500's today and the DACmini drives them well. In fact I can't turn the volume knob pass 12:30 even with softer material (very well recorded classical pieces). With pop/rock albums is like 9:00/10:00 for me.

 

[zeinharis]

Quote:

By the way, I received my HE500's today and the DACmini drives them well. In fact I can't turn the volume knob pass 12:30 even with softer material (very well recorded classical pieces). With pop/rock albums is like 9:00/10:00 for me.

 
Did you do the 1 ohm mod?. Congrats on your purchase, they are wonderful headphones