[shipsupt]

Looking forward to hearing your impressions Mike.

We had a bit of a mini-meet before the show with CEE TEE and some other head-fi'ers the other night. Took the opportunity to listen to my solo with quite a few portables... MKII, Pico Slim, Pico, D12, P-51, Mini^3... Interesting to get everyone's impressions, but time was not in our favor to pick our clear favorite combo. The group used a wide range of customs for most of the listening.

The jury is still out for me as to what amp I'll ultimately pair with the solo. I'm planning to take the MKII with me for an upcoming trip to Europe, but I was impressed with the Slim and the Ray Samuels caught my ear, wish we had an SR-71 there... The others certainly didn't disappoint.

 

[nc8000]

I just ordered a Solo and a SR-71B. Took delivery of the Solo a few days ago and have been playing around with it in my system and it is remarkable how spooky good its DAC and iPod transport really is.

While waiting for the SR-71B to get here, I plugged the DAC into my headphone amp with some el cheapo generic cable that came with some long ago forgotten piece of audio gear as it was the only thing I had around. And even with something like that I was floored with how clear and tonally correct the DAC sounded. When I use it as an iPod transport and source into my DAC and play on my full range speakers, again it is remarkable how good the audio is.

This Solo is an incredible piece of gear. I am really looking forward to getting the SR-71B hooked up. The audio is so high quality, I may spring for the ALO universal cable just so I can listen to the balanced output.

My only issue is I wish that a detection circuit would be there to tell when the unit is plugged in so it will charge my iPod.

When it gets here tomorrow, I'll post some photos.

There is absolutely no point in getting a SR71-B if you are not going to use balanced phones. A balanced source would make it even better but that far I haven't gone as that makes my portable rig too bulky

 

[mikemalter]

Quote:

There is absolutely no point in getting a SR71-B if you are not going to use balanced phones. A balanced source would make it even better but that far I haven't gone as that makes my portable rig too bulky

I spoke with Ray Samuels about that and actually the SR-71B does not require a balanced source to output a balanced signal.  Whatever the source is, the balanced outs are sending a balanced signal and the RCA outs are sending a single ended signal. 
 
Also, it's not the phones that need to be balanced, but the cable.  The cable has to be terminated for balanced, I think there are three connectors for each channel vs. two for rca.  And I think that the balanced connector for that amp is pretty tiny.
 
What was the bulky aspect of the rig you are thinking about?
 
 

 

[mikemalter]

 
Quote:

Looking forward to hearing your impressions Mike.

We had a bit of a mini-meet before the show with CEE TEE and some other head-fi'ers the other night. Took the opportunity to listen to my solo with quite a few portables... MKII, Pico Slim, Pico, D12, P-51, Mini^3... Interesting to get everyone's impressions, but time was not in our favor to pick our clear favorite combo. The group used a wide range of customs for most of the listening.

The jury is still out for me as to what amp I'll ultimately pair with the solo. I'm planning to take the MKII with me for an upcoming trip to Europe, but I was impressed with the Slim and the Ray Samuels caught my ear, wish we had an SR-71 there... The others certainly didn't disappoint.

What did people think of the Solo with the different portables?
 
 

 

[cooperpwc]

Quote:

I spoke with Ray Samuels about that and actually the SR-71B does not require a balanced source to output a balanced signal.  Whatever the source is, the balanced outs are sending a balanced signal and the RCA outs are sending a single ended signal. 
 
Also, it's not the phones that need to be balanced, but the cable.  The cable has to be terminated for balanced, I think there are three connectors for each channel vs. two for rca.

I thgink that NC8000's explanation was perfectly clear. You just didn't understand it, perhaps because you are dealing in the theoretical whereas NC8000 was an early adopter of the Protector.
 
BTW, the balanced connector has two leads for each channel including a powered ground, i.e. a total of four leads, versus three leads with a standard headphone cable, i.e. shared ground for the channels. With custom headphone cables, like RCA cables, there may be separate grounds for each channel but this is not especially relevant since the grounds are passive.

 

[nc8000]

No the SR71-B does not require a balanced source to output a balanced signal to the headphones, it has a phase splitter build in that converts a single ended input signal to a balanced output signal (just like the Protector does) but you will allways get a better result if you feed it a proper balanced input signal. My reference to bulk was that in order to gat a balanced input signal I would need something like iBasso's portable balanced dac and then pair it with the Solo and that would be much too bulky for my liking.
 
And whenever we talk about balanced phones that means that they are cabled with a balanced cable. A balanced cable has 4 wires in total, 2 wires for each driver, a plus signal and a minus signal which essentially is the reverse of the plus signal. In balanced drive there is no ground. Single ended drive has 3 wires in total, a plus wire for each driver and a shared common ground. The 2 main reasons for doing balanced headphones is to get rid of the common ground as signal can leak between the 2 channels through this and to get the double voltage swing by having a plus and a minus signal rather than a plus and a zero signal.
 
And my reference to the SR71-B not being worth it if you are not going to use balanced headphones is simply that you then pay for 4 amps but only use 2 so for purely single ended drive you will be able to find the same sound quality for less money or better sound quality for the same money by chosing a normal single ended amp.
 
Quote:

I spoke with Ray Samuels about that and actually the SR-71B does not require a balanced source to output a balanced signal.  Whatever the source is, the balanced outs are sending a balanced signal and the RCA outs are sending a single ended signal. 
 
Also, it's not the phones that need to be balanced, but the cable.  The cable has to be terminated for balanced, I think there are three connectors for each channel vs. two for rca.  And I think that the balanced connector for that amp is pretty tiny.
 
What was the bulky aspect of the rig you are thinking about?
 
 

 

 

[mikemalter]

Quote:

I thgink that NC8000's explanation was perfectly clear. You just didn't understand it, perhaps because you are dealing in the theoretical whereas NC8000 was an early adopter of the Protector.
 
BTW, the balanced connector has two leads for each channel including a powered ground, i.e. a total of four leads, versus three leads with a standard headphone cable, i.e. shared ground for the channels. With custom headphone cables, like RCA cables, there may be separate grounds for each channel but this is not especially relevant since the grounds are passive.

Ok, thanks.
 
 

 

[mikemalter]

 
Quote:

No the SR71-B does not require a balanced source to output a balanced signal to the headphones, it has a phase splitter build in that converts a single ended input signal to a balanced output signal (just like the Protector does) but you will allways get a better result if you feed it a proper balanced input signal. My reference to bulk was that in order to gat a balanced input signal I would need something like iBasso's portable balanced dac and then pair it with the Solo and that would be much too bulky for my liking.
 
And whenever we talk about balanced phones that means that they are cabled with a balanced cable. A balanced cable has 4 wires in total, 2 wires for each driver, a plus signal and a minus signal which essentially is the reverse of the plus signal. In balanced drive there is no ground. Single ended drive has 3 wires in total, a plus wire for each driver and a shared common ground. The 2 main reasons for doing balanced headphones is to get rid of the common ground as signal can leak between the 2 channels through this and to get the double voltage swing by having a plus and a minus signal rather than a plus and a zero signal.
 
And my reference to the SR71-B not being worth it if you are not going to use balanced headphones is simply that you then pay for 4 amps but only use 2 so for purely single ended drive you will be able to find the same sound quality for less money or better sound quality for the same money by chosing a normal single ended amp.
 

 
Good points and lots of good information, thanks.
 
What is your opinion from a sonic point of view of the quality of the audio in the SR-71B?
 

 

[nc8000]

I think the SR71-B is a fantastic amp but the only reason I upgraded from the Protector was to be able to drive the HE-4 properly, otherwise I would have stayed with the Protector as I have no intention of going balanced source portably. I have a balanced cd-player at home and have tried it into the SR71-B and that takes it another step up and truely does rival many good home amps and comes rather closer than I like to my RPX-100 that cost 4-5 times as much. I have all my headphones terminated balanced in the Protector plug and then have pigtails to connect them to my RPX-100 balanced and other amps single ended.

 

[shipsupt]

Quote:

 

What did people think of the Solo with the different portables?
 
 

 
Typical meet conditions, not enough time, background noise etc... made meaningful comparisons difficult at best.  
 
Verbally everyone indicated that they liked what they were hearing with the Solo vs. without when they used it with their own portable amp and source, the ones they had plenty of experience with.  So some good subjective opinions.  
 
Once they started swapping amps there were just too many variables, but I'm sure a few had their opinions formed.  I'll see if I can't get them to stop in here and offer up some impressions.
 
 

 

[mikemalter]

Quote:

I think the SR71-B is a fantastic amp but the only reason I upgraded from the Protector was to be able to drive the HE-4 properly, otherwise I would have stayed with the Protector as I have no intention of going balanced source portably. I have a balanced cd-player at home and have tried it into the SR71-B and that takes it another step up and truely does rival many good home amps and comes rather closer than I like to my RPX-100 that cost 4-5 times as much. I have all my headphones terminated balanced in the Protector plug and then have pigtails to connect them to my RPX-100 balanced and other amps single ended.

I'm new to the balanced world having come over last year from being a two channel vinyl guy and the expense of balanced was prohibitive for me. 
 
My main rig is a Woo WA22 which likes a true balanced input, and really does sound better fed that way.  I too have balanced connectors on my headphone cable and also have a single ended one as well.  The WA22 is not a balanced output so it was kind of a waste to get another cable, but it might be handy to have around in the future.  Thinking about it now, the best way for me to go would have been to get the universal cable offered by ALO which has all the connectors necessary for many different types of connections.  But I did not know about them at the time and I really liked the Cardas cable on my HD650's so I went with them again when I got my HD800's.

I've just started listening to the SR-71B as it arrived this morning.  Paired with the Solo it is just spookie good.  At some point I'd like to get a balanced input adapter to fit the SR-71B and maybe the universal cable from ALO so I can listen in balanced mode.
 
Do you know of any vendors who make good inexpensive adapters?  ALO would make me a pair for my balanced headphones, but they charge several hundred dollars and I am not sure I will use them enough to justify the cost.  So, if there was an inexpensive option I could dip my toes so to speak.
 
I take it you really like your HE-4's.  My only experience with ortho's is with a pair of the Audeze LCD-2's (not the most recent release the one before) and they were good, but not as open and detailed to my ear as the HD800 so I sold them.  How do the HE-4's stack up to the LCD-2's to you?
 

 

[mikemalter]

 
Quote:

 
Typical meet conditions, not enough time, background noise etc... made meaningful comparisons difficult at best.  
 
Verbally everyone indicated that they liked what they were hearing with the Solo vs. without when they used it with their own portable amp and source, the ones they had plenty of experience with.  So some good subjective opinions.  
 
Once they started swapping amps there were just too many variables, but I'm sure a few had their opinions formed.  I'll see if I can't get them to stop in here and offer up some impressions.
 
 

I'm really liking the Solo / SR-71B combination.  Just took delivery of the SR-71B today and so far I'm really impressed.  For those who want to take a high quality music experience with them when they are away from their home systems, this works.  The only thing is that the iPod drains fast and the Solo will not charge it even when it's plugged in so that could be an issue.  I'm measuring battery life in my iPod today.
 
 

 

[cooperpwc]

Quote:

.    
My only issue is I wish that a detection circuit would be there to tell when the unit is plugged in so it will charge my iPod.

This is a very good idea. I somehow doubt that they can add this with a firmware update but I sure wish that they could.
 
(I think the issue would be whether thre CLAS can turn iPod charging on and off. That charging fiunction does not seem to be built in.)

 

[nc8000]

Quote:

I think the SR71-B is a fantastic amp but the only reason I upgraded from the Protector was to be able to drive the HE-4 properly, otherwise I would have stayed with the Protector as I have no intention of going balanced source portably. I have a balanced cd-player at home and have tried it into the SR71-B and that takes it another step up and truely does rival many good home amps and comes rather closer than I like to my RPX-100 that cost 4-5 times as much. I have all my headphones terminated balanced in the Protector plug and then have pigtails to connect them to my RPX-100 balanced and other amps single ended.

I'm new to the balanced world having come over last year from being a two channel vinyl guy and the expense of balanced was prohibitive for me.

My main rig is a Woo WA22 which likes a true balanced input, and really does sound better fed that way. I too have balanced connectors on my headphone cable and also have a single ended one as well. The WA22 is not a balanced output so it was kind of a waste to get another cable, but it might be handy to have around in the future. Thinking about it now, the best way for me to go would have been to get the universal cable offered by ALO which has all the connectors necessary for many different types of connections. But I did not know about them at the time and I really liked the Cardas cable on my HD650's so I went with them again when I got my HD800's.

I've just started listening to the SR-71B as it arrived this morning. Paired with the Solo it is just spookie good. At some point I'd like to get a balanced input adapter to fit the SR-71B and maybe the universal cable from ALO so I can listen in balanced mode.

Do you know of any vendors who make good inexpensive adapters? ALO would make me a pair for my balanced headphones, but they charge several hundred dollars and I am not sure I will use them enough to justify the cost. So, if there was an inexpensive option I could dip my toes so to speak.

I take it you really like your HE-4's. My only experience with ortho's is with a pair of the Audeze LCD-2's (not the most recent release the one before) and they were good, but not as open and detailed to my ear as the HD800 so I sold them. How do the HE-4's stack up to the LCD-2's to you?

I do like the HE-4 but will tomorrow be receiving a HE-500 to replace it. To me the HE-500 betters the HE-4 in all aspects. Have never heard the LCD-2 so can't comment. All my cable work is done by either Whiplash or qusp and neither are what you would call inexpensive.

 

[Jazzyfi]

I just got the CLAS + RX2 this morning. Might try it with the protector tonight.