[FooFighter]

Oops, my bad, the Oor is actually connected to a TT2, not May. Apologies for the confusion!

Then I don't understand it at all.
Doesn't TT2 deliver 9,4V at high gain out of XLR?
That's louder than any output I know...
Maybe something for @MatW to comment on now

 

[lucasratmundo]

It seems TT2 outputs 5v from XLR when in DAC mode. I'll try using the TT2 as a preamp to the Oor to see if I get different results.

 

[MatW]

It seems TT2 outputs 5v from XLR when in DAC mode. I'll try using the TT2 as a preamp to the Oor to see if I get different results.

I no longer have a TT2, but looking at the manual, it puts out 2.5V "on all outputs". Does that mean 5V with dual XLR?

If it's 2.5V and not 5V it would be close to the Qutest, which I have set at 3V. With the Qutest and a relatively 'quiet' song (some songs are recorded much louder than others), I was also at 2-3 o' clock in high gain, with the Susvara. With more energetic songs it would be 11-12 o' clock though. I don't listen very loud, probably 75 dB. I also expected to have more room left on the volume dial, in that situation.

With the Dave though, which puts out 6V through the balanced XLR connections, most songs were plenty loud for me in medium gain, ~12 o' clock. If the TT2 indeed puts out 5V, you likely either listen much louder, or to more subdued music, e.g. classical. Or there is something wrong with the OOR.

 

[lucasratmundo]

I no longer have a TT2, but looking at the manual, it puts out 2.5V "on all outputs". Does that mean 5V with dual XLR?



If it's 2.5V and not 5V it would be close to the Qutest, which I have set at 3V. With the Qutest and a relatively 'quiet' song (some songs are recorded much louder than others), I was also at 2-3 o' clock in high gain, with the Susvara. With more energetic songs it would be 11-12 o' clock though. I don't listen very loud, probably 75 dB. I also expected to have more room left on the volume dial, in that situation.

With the Dave though, which puts out 6V through the balanced XLR connections, most songs were plenty loud for me in medium gain, ~12 o' clock. If the TT2 indeed puts out 5V, you likely either listen much louder, or to more subdued music, e.g. classical. Or there is something wrong with the OOR.

Thanks for sharing. Yeah, a 2.5v output from the TT2 would explain the results in my system. I don't listen very loud either, between 75dB and 80dB. I'll try TT2 in preamp mode and pair the Oor with the May tomorrow and report back.

 

[lucasratmundo]

Thanks for sharing. Yeah, a 2.5v output from the TT2 would explain the results in my system. I don't listen very loud either, between 75dB and 80dB. I'll try TT2 in preamp mode and pair the Oor with the May tomorrow and report back.

I'll also try TT2 as preamp to the Oor in bypass mode to see if it sounds different.

 

[GoldenSound]

I understand but honestly I wouldn't feel comfortable needing to run a Poweramp at 75% throttle (does that translate correctly from the OOR measurements at 3 o'clock?) to reach a comfortable listening level with my favorite headphone.
As a comparison: am running Susvara at 75% throttle out of my underpowered Shanling M30 directly in Transistor (OPAMP mode) without additional Poweramp for a comfortable listening volume.

Oops, my bad, the Oor is actually connected to a TT2, not May. Apologies for the confusion!

Did a quick test. With a 4v input, high gain, 3 o'clock on the put the OOR would be outputting about 11.5v if the music itself was absolutely full-volume with 0 headroom.

This equates to about 2w at susvara impedance. The amp is capable of >8w.

Really is worth checking what output level you're actually getting using a multimeter though, otherwise we can only speculate based on your music and how loud you like to listen which leaves a LOT of room for error.

 

[GoldenSound]

Couple key things:

1) Volume pots are (almost always) logarithmic. So even just going based off rough pot position can be massively inaccurate.

2) The output level of the amp is VERY unlikely to change as it would require the physical value of components to change.
The issue with 'losing power' was that the amp shut-off and went into over-protect early (around 4w). Not that it had less gain/lower output level.

3) You cannot tell how powerful an amp is or how much headroom is available based on pot position. The pot adjusts gain. You can have a VERY high gain 3w amp and be really loud at 10 o'clock. And then have a lower gain amp with 10x the power but you need to turn it up to 3 o'clock. Volume pot just adjusts gain. It doesn't tell you how much current capability or power the amp has.

 

[lucasratmundo]

Couple key things:

1) Volume pots are (almost always) logarithmic. So even just going based off rough pot position can be massively inaccurate.

2) The output level of the amp is VERY unlikely to change as it would require the physical value of components to change.
The issue with 'losing power' was that the amp shut-off and went into over-protect early (around 4w). Not that it had less gain/lower output level.

3) You cannot tell how powerful an amp is or how much headroom is available based on pot position. The pot adjusts gain. You can have a VERY high gain 3w amp and be really loud at 10 o'clock. And then have a lower gain amp with 10x the power but you need to turn it up to 3 o'clock. Volume pot just adjusts gain. It doesn't tell you how much current capability or power the amp has.

This is very helpful context, thanks for sharing, @GoldenOne!

 

[whitefang]

Couple key things:

3) You cannot tell how powerful an amp is or how much headroom is available based on pot position. The pot adjusts gain. You can have a VERY high gain 3w amp and be really loud at 10 o'clock. And then have a lower gain amp with 10x the power but you need to turn it up to 3 o'clock. Volume pot just adjusts gain. It doesn't tell you how much current capability or power the amp has.

This^

A lot of people seems to still confused with this.
Remember some portable amp back then with some non sense gain just to give an illusion of "powerfulness"
gets the hd800 pretty loud even before 9o 'clock position, then it clips before even hitting 12 o'clock. Leaving more than half the pot useless.

 

[Sense]

I'll also try TT2 as preamp to the Oor in bypass mode to see if it sounds different.

Interested to know if it sounds different…I have a TT2 and was thinking about picking up and OOR and a Susvara at some point.

 

[MatW]

The point here is that the OOR does not seem to be able to drive the Susvara to play very loud, if it's fed with a 3v input. Despite all the power it has available. It's loud enough, certainly for me, but I was able to turn the volume up to 100% in high gain without it getting super loud, probably not over 90 dB. With a fairly quiet song, I should add.

To emphasize again, it's not an issue for me at all, also because I usually pair the OOR with less demanding cans, but I can imagine for Susvara owners (with <3v source) that they'd feel better with more room left on the volume dial.

 

[whitefang]

The point here is that the OOR does not seem to be able to drive the Susvara to play very loud, if it's fed with a 3v input. Despite all the power it has available. It's loud enough, certainly for me, but I was able to turn the volume up to 100% in high gain without it getting super loud, probably not over 90 dB. With a fairly quiet song, I should add.

To emphasize again, it's not an issue for me at all, also because I usually pair the OOR with less demanding cans, but I can imagine for Susvara owners (with <3v source) that they'd feel better with more room left on the volume dial.

So it is the opposite of the problem, not enough gain to actually utilize the power it is capable to output.
Just saw the official data that the high gain has 16db for balanced and only 10db for single ended.
Certainly not enough to provide the headroom for very demanding planars.

 

[FooFighter]

As we re yet talking about having powerful headphone amps - without going for speaker amps, which alternative PURE HEADPHONE amps are having more juice than OOR IN THE SAME price tier?

 

[whitefang]

Seems the team lacks a bit of experience in designing consumer headphone amps.
The gain is probably an easy fix and one could try to ask to custom make one with higher gain when ordering.

the Benchmark HPA4 also have the same problem with inadequate gain, but if you pair with DAC 3 which has insane output it is not a problem.

Really have to say FLUX LABS does a really good job on this matter as their amp has tons of power and also right gain level.
they also used relay volume control with a lot of steps, so even with highly sensitive headphone there is still plenty of room to accurately adjust the volume despite the high gain.

As we re yet talking about having powerful headphone amps - without going for speaker amps, which alternative PURE HEADPHONE amps are having more juice than OOR IN THE SAME price tier?

There are quite a few
GSX MK2 has slightly lower power but still powerful enough to drive anything. Mytek THX88 and HPA4 has about same power as GSX mk2
Flux amps have even more power than OOR.. also Dynahi and CFA give stupid amount of power.
I consider Ragnarok to be a headphone amp even though it is also a speaker amp.
if you include used market then RSA Dark Star and Cavalli Liquid Gold.

 

[whitefang]

if you want to know the actual numbers, just from my memory, it might be wrong but wont be too far off

Mytek 888: 6W into 16 ohms
Benchmark HPA4: 6W into 16 ohms
GSX mk2: 6W into 32 ohm
Liquid Gold: 9 or 10W into 50 ohm
iFi pro iCan: 14W into 16 ohms
Ragnarok: 12 or 15(?)W into 50ohm
Flux FA-10: 16W into 32 ohms,
Flux VOLOT should have even more power but IDK
Dark Star(undisclosed, but I am pretty sure it is more than the 8W OOR)
Custom Dynahi/CFA3: can have more power than everything above depending on your build

note that the GSX, Dynahi & CFA are pure Class A power
Flux claims class A but I am not certain, it doesn't get as warm as any other Class A I know of. therefore I doubt given its power.
Ragnarok and Liquid Gold is partially Class A, change to Class AB on high power.
All others pretty sure does not run Class A.
it is just for your information, I am not going to debate if Class A power is superior or anything. I am not knowledgeable enough to discuss about this anyway. But "Class A" seems to be a thing some people care about.