[tomb]

Quote:

I have a friend who is a professional musician...He listened to my 3 channel b22 ($800+) and was like "eh"... and then listened to my Millett MAX ($200+,12FM6) and raved for an hour...he bought a spare board from me and built his own. I feel my b22 is the finest amp I have ever built, he felt it was just ok.

 

[KimLaroux]

Quote:

I have a friend who is a professional musician...He listened to my 3 channel b22 ($800+) and was like "eh"... and then listened to my Millett MAX ($200+,12FM6) and raved for an hour...he bought a spare board from me and built his own. I feel my b22 is the finest amp I have ever built, he felt it was just ok.

 
Gotta love musicians. 

 
There's a reason all guitar amplifiers are so colored. 

 

[skeptic]

I thought the reason (with respect to guitar amps) was that most (all?) people have an innate preference for even order harmonic distortion...so when you kick a guitar amp into overdrive, you want to make sure that is what you are generating - rather than odd order distortion that is going to make your listeners head for the door.

 

[Satellite_6]

I forgot about this thread, was just annoyed about the more stupid comments but probably should not have bothered posting.
 
"Conversely, The O2 measurements all the faibois are using as their bible to defend their opinions come from the same guy who designed the damn thing. A creator cannot be perfectly objective towards its own creation. Something can only become a scientific fact after the results have been replicated from different teams not having any interests in the final results."
 
See Innerfidelity for conformation of the measurements. The O2 measured better than seven other amps IIRC. 
 
"For instance. If I look at the graphs of the HE-500s and even the worlds best SS amp with silver wire and a fancy 6.3 mm plug, I would be lead to believe that they sound amazing. However, I think they sound like total junk IMO."
 
Yeah well the HE-500's measure like junk so. . . no.  
 
"If you're trying to sound like an objectivist, you're doing it wrong. This is a personal attack on the designer of B22, you've not shown any evidence that the B22 is not a good amp, where as third party measurements previously posted have shown that the B22 measures well."
 
Very well I took a look at them, the guy might be able to design overly expensive well performing amps at least. Congrats you seem to have a brain.

 

[Mach3]

  Just another FYI, but as for amps ... if you really study AMB's measurements on his products, you'll find that AMB's M3 is better in noise and distortion than the B22:
 
THD
M3: 0.0009, B22: 0.0011
 
Noise
M3: -97.4dB, B22: -90.3dB
 
Here again, what does this mean?  Should people be buying the M3 as the ultimate headphone amplifier because of its low distortion and noise level?  I don't know AMB's specific sales statistics, but I bet everyone would agree that he sells more B22's than M3's.  AMB must be fooling us all ... but he and Morsel designed and built the M3 years before he thought about and designed the B22.  That doesn't make sense.  Why design, build, and sell a supposedly superior product that measures worse?  I guess he should've built/bought an O2 and forgot about it.

 
OK - without being cagey or confrontational ... an M3 may very well be more appropriate as a pre-amp.  However, when it comes to different loads, reactive loads, varying loads with all sorts of different designs/applications of headphones, the B22 seems to be the preferred choice for many people, regardless of the poorer measurements.
 
All that said for me - I still prefer tubes, and their measurements are much worse than any of the above.

Quotes from Ti Kan himself
 
One must be careful when comparing the RMAA measurement results between the M3 and β22 published on my website (and even more so when comparing such measurements taken by someone else on different test setups). The M3 that was tested was set to a gain of 5, whereas the β22 had a gain of 8. When an amp has higher gain, its measured noise floor, distortion figures and stereo crosstalk will also be higher. If the two amps had the same gain I don't think you'd find that the M3 to be such a clearcut "winner" any more.
 

 

[tomb]

 

  Just another FYI, but as for amps ... if you really study AMB's measurements on his products, you'll find that AMB's M3 is better in noise and distortion than the B22:
 
THD
M3: 0.0009, B22: 0.0011
 
Noise
M3: -97.4dB, B22: -90.3dB
 
Here again, what does this mean?  Should people be buying the M3 as the ultimate headphone amplifier because of its low distortion and noise level?  I don't know AMB's specific sales statistics, but I bet everyone would agree that he sells more B22's than M3's.  AMB must be fooling us all ... but he and Morsel designed and built the M3 years before he thought about and designed the B22.  That doesn't make sense.  Why design, build, and sell a supposedly superior product that measures worse?  I guess he should've built/bought an O2 and forgot about it.

 
OK - without being cagey or confrontational ... an M3 may very well be more appropriate as a pre-amp.  However, when it comes to different loads, reactive loads, varying loads with all sorts of different designs/applications of headphones, the B22 seems to be the preferred choice for many people, regardless of the poorer measurements.
 
All that said for me - I still prefer tubes, and their measurements are much worse than any of the above.

Quotes from Ti Kan himself
 
One must be careful when comparing the RMAA measurement results between the M3 and β22 published on my website (and even more so when comparing such measurements taken by someone else on different test setups). The M3 that was tested was set to a gain of 5, whereas the β22 had a gain of 8. When an amp has higher gain, its measured noise floor, distortion figures and stereo crosstalk will also be higher. If the two amps had the same gain I don't think you'd find that the M3 to be such a clearcut "winner" any more.
 

I doubt it - most likely due to the opamps in the M3.  They are inherently superior with regard to S/N and other measurements compared to fully discrete.  Nevertheless, the point of my post was that the B22 was superior as an overall amplifier experience.  Those same highly engineered opamps often have protective circuitry and other internal characteristics that may become limiting in a musical listening environment.  Hence, the idea of "fully discrete" as something desirable.
 
I'm not sure you got the point ... whether you disagree or not with the measurements. 

 

 

[jasonhanjk]

Want to compare amps over an RMAA result? Which is a beginner / newbie equipment.
 
Anyway, back to the O2 result I build with a gain of 1.
I did get 0.0008% THD and -118dBV noise.

 

[Mach3]

 
I doubt it - most likely due to the opamps in the M3.  They are inherently superior with regard to S/N and other measurements compared to fully discrete.  Nevertheless, the point of my post was that the B22 was superior as an overall amplifier experience.  Those same highly engineered opamps often have protective circuitry and other internal characteristics that may become limiting in a musical listening environment.  Hence, the idea of "fully discrete" as something desirable.
 
I'm not sure you got the point ... whether you disagree or not with the measurements. 

 

 
My point is, measurements need to be done in the same condition for it to be valid. Which is why I posted the different gain setting stated by Ti Kan himself.
People tend to overlook the actually testing condition and make their decision before looking at the bigger picture. 
I wonder how the measurement will differ if the M3 gain setting was changed to 8x or the Beta22 reduce to 5x.
 
I am in no way knocking the O2, M3 or Beta22
 
I actually own and modded the O2 amp and the Beta22.
Based on the measurement posted by NwAvGuy the O2 has better measure than the M3.
According to AMB website the M3 has better result than the Beta22.
That would mean the Beta22 is the worst amp out of the three base on measurement people have posted.
I love my O2, it does what it does at a ridiculous low price performance.
But I will often turn to my Beta22 if I wanted the best possible sound.

 

[Hifihedgehog]

Having owned both, I believe the HifimeDIY is on par or better than the ODAC. I will likely get the HifimeDIY in the very near future because the ODAC offered nothing over it for me. (For your information, I have listened to all these headphones to date, many of them with my signature's listed equipment

Spoiler: Warning: Spoiler!

I have extensively demoed (or owned, in bold) the following headphones: 
[size=11.0pt]AKG K812, K712, K702, K701, [/size][size=9.75pt]Q701[/size][size=11.0pt], K550, K271, K240 Studio, K77; Audio Technica ATH-M50X, [/size][size=9.75pt]ATH-M50, ATH-M40X, ATH-M40fs[/size][size=11.0pt]; Beats by Dr. Dre Executive, Pro, Solo HD, Studio; Beyerdynamic T5 P, [/size][size=9.75pt]DT 990 Premium 600 ohm, DT 990 Pro,[/size][size=11.0pt] DT 880 Premium 250 ohm, [/size][size=9.75pt]DT 880 Pro, DT 860[/size][size=11.0pt], DT 770 Pro-80; Bose Quietcomfort 15, Quietcomfort 3, Quietcomfort 2, AE2; [/size][size=9.75pt]Creative EPH-630[/size][size=11.0pt]; Denon AH-D7100, AH-D600, AH-D340; Etymotic ER-6; Grado PS500, Grado GS1000, RS1i, RS 1, RS 2i, RS 2, SR325is, SR325i, [/size][size=9.75pt]SR225i[/size][size=11.0pt], SR225, SR125i, SR125, SR80i, SR80, SR60i, SR60, iGrado; [/size][size=14.6666669845581px]The House of Marley Redemption Song;[/size][size=11pt] [/size][size=9.75pt]Koss Porta Pro, KSC75, The Plug[/size][size=11pt], UR10; Phonak PFE (with gray filters); Sennheiser HD 800, HD 650, [/size][size=9.75pt]HD 600[/size][size=11pt], HD 598, HD 595, HD 558, [/size][size=9.75pt]HD 555 (also modified to HD595)[/size][size=11pt], HD 380, HD 280, HD202, [/size][size=9.75pt]HD201[/size][size=11pt], PX 100, Momentum On-Ear, Momentum Over-the-Ear; Shure SRH1540, [/size][size=9.75pt]SRH940, SRH840[/size][size=11pt], SRH440, SE835, SE535; Skullcandy [/size][size=9.75pt]Aviators[/size][size=11pt], Crusher, Hesh; Sony MDR-X05, MDR-XB500, MDR-7506, MDR-V6, MDR-55, [/size][size=9.75pt]MDR-CD30[/size][size=11pt] (I almost forgot about these; purchased at a garage sale about 10 years ago); [/size][size=9.75pt]Superlux HD681, HD688B[/size][size=11pt]; [/size][size=9.75pt]Ultimate Ears TripleFi 10 (family member owns them)[/size][size=11pt]; Ultrasone HFI-780; Westone UM Pro 30, UM Pro 20, UM Pro 10.[/size]

 
The HifimeDIY has better crosstalk performance and, given its inferior testing equipment compared to the ODAC's testing equipment, it has likely equal or better distortion, noise and dynamic range performance.
 
 

Source: http://ko.goldenears.net/4075631
 

Source: http://rmaa.hege.li/ODAC.htm