Morph201
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2006
- Posts
- 2,630
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- 11
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Originally Posted by PFKMan23 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Not me. I find that even out of mid-high fi level headphones (K701, 650, 580, etc..), to get the most out of that you really do need to have comparatively hifi level stuff. IN essence, what you can find at the, for example, $300 pricepoint in headphones really doesn't translate over to amps or to sources. To see what it can really do you do need to spend a fair bit more. And yes I that if you are spending all that money on the transducer, but not on the other components, then you are undercutting that transducer. For me I've found that the source does make a fair bit of difference, even out of the same recordings, so I do belive that one should spend a fair bit on sources if they want to maximize their equipment. |
Originally Posted by vcoheda /img/forum/go_quote.gif well that is the debate and from the above you clearly are in the source last or not at all camp. if my source was an ipod and i could never have something better, i would probably get out of audio entirely. |
Originally Posted by Mogul /img/forum/go_quote.gif I don't mean to pick on one particular post (I enjoy reading your contributions), but this totally defines what I feel is far too prevalent in the hi-if hobby: equipment before music. You really wouldn't listen to music at all? To me that is like giving up eating unless you can have filet mignon at every meal. |
Originally Posted by Mogul /img/forum/go_quote.gif I don't mean to pick on one particular post (I enjoy reading your contributions), but this totally defines what I feel is far too prevalent in the hi-if hobby: equipment before music. You really wouldn't listen to music at all? To me that is like giving up eating unless you can have filet mignon at every meal. |
Originally Posted by PFKMan23 /img/forum/go_quote.gif I tend to take a different approach to his comment. To me that says, I just wouldn't care so much about the equipment side of things. |
Originally Posted by Asr /img/forum/go_quote.gif Speaking as one who's played quite a bit of CDP roulette, I can say that source absolutely matters, and it can also make you either tolerate, dis-like, or really like your CDs. Yeah, investing in sources is expensive, it's been the most expensive part of my equipment upgrade path. When I got my first post-Head-Fi source, a DVD player, I expected it to be my last - and well here I am, six sources later. I don't think I'd go as far as vcoheda in saying that buying new is a bad investment - it definitely has its advantages if you want a warranty and peace of mind and want to support a dealer (especially since sometimes dealers will give you a price break), but it has its downside with re-sale value. If you routinely check Audiogon, you'll see lots of sources are sold for 50%-67% of their MSRP. That's a HUGE chunk of change on the expensive sources. For the stuff that's in 9/10 or even 10/10 condition it's a downright steal. Needless to say my mantra is "Buy used on Audiogon, sell used on Head-Fi!" And the top-tier headphones absolutely scale with high-end sources. I've been cumulatively blown away at how much more music the K701 reveals as I've upgraded my source. It's literally unbelievable - for those who've heard the K701 on lesser equipment you might think you're satisfied now, but all you need to do is hear it with a high-end amp AND a high-end source, and it'll scale right up there along with them. Same thing with the HD650 and AD2000 - these headphones are just amazing with the scaling they're capable of. I don't even know how high they scale - my wallet is too afraid to find out. |
DACs have been around for years and the designers have pretty much figured out how to design them and produce them cheap. Even the crappiest DAC still sounds good. |
Originally Posted by rincewind /img/forum/go_quote.gif At least to me, we're not talking about $100 source and 1000 cans and amp... that's just stupid. I'm thinking $1000 on source, $500 amp and $400 cans will absolutely WHALLOP anything like 200 on source, 1000 amp, 1000 cans. And I mean completely obliterate. The 500/400 split will give a VERY clear window to the 1000 buck source and the music it's playing. The 1000 amp and 1000 cans will give a VERY good window to the absolute JUNK coming from the 200 buck source. I picked these numbers arbitrarily, but now I look at them, they are about right in real life |
Originally Posted by Hi-Finthen /img/forum/go_quote.gif A cost balanced mid priced system rewarding $300 cans a prepared signal to extract their higher sonic potential requires a precentage breakdown in the range of 40/30/20 % source/amp/phones minimum....IMO Of course there is a great range in what can be spent in such a system specifically with $2000 to spend. However, in my experience each hundred spent in source and amps has yielded more preformance potential attained in the headphones I've collected... I believe this is evidence of the importance of spending on the gear chain before the phones, in a balanced system in the percentages 40/30/20 for best results! I will not touch defining the term "Best' which misses the point, IMO. |
Originally Posted by Mogul /img/forum/go_quote.gif What are you doing with the other 10%? |