[VitalyDon]

wonder what it could bring more in term of sound.

IMHO, getting balanced is the game mainly imposed by marketing departments. They ask about twice as much money for the things they could have done without any balance. And balance as such is no guarantee of quality.

 

[NickT23]

There is already a fully balanced amp with same power as FA-10 in the works. Check their Facebook page and it might cost 3k or more. So you can check with them.

Can I see the link ? There will be a new FA-10 ? What do you mean ?

 

[NickT23]

IMHO, getting balanced is the game mainly imposed by marketing departments. They ask about twice as much money for the things they could have done without any balance. And balance as such is no guarantee of quality.

Yes the whole reason of balance of spitting two wires and everything, which so happen to avoid electronic filtering noise able ling to provide a cleaner signal, hence lower distortion and noise. Also, the extract more current meaning more power. But the amp itself is already powerful and most amp these days have super low noise/distortion ratio. However, implementing fully balance is always a good thing for pure audio which perceive it as the most complete engineering. Even if there are difference or not. But of course it will come with a cost. Thus, they should have different models with balance design or not fully balance and charge it different prices !

 

[NickT23]

It is the Volot ? Same power but balanced instead is quite expensive : wonder what it could bring more in term of sound.

Nothing ! No changes on the sound rather than provide more power and different current level that varies with volume knob. Unless you have a DAC to control the current of the amp with different gain settings. Balance is useless basically unless you like to play around with your headphones with different volume level with different gain settings. But at the end of the day, its the same. However, there are some people mentioned certain headphone sound better if connected to balance. Till this day, I would like see some proof with measurement and with my own hearing to proof that doubt.

 

[NickT23]

Yes design is similar in terms pf aesthetic but it is less deeper than the FA-10/12 so it is more desktop friendly.

Do you think is possible for us the gather as a group to request Vitalie from Flux to built his FA/FCN-10/12 similar size to the FA-12s ? Similar specs but different size while equipped with fully balance design ?

 

[teknorob23]

Now I understand why you go for FA-12 in general

Yep. As i've mentioned i think in a previous post, i've down sized my main rig after having a client going bust owing me a lot of money, from Hugo TT2/ Feliks Audio Euforia AE/ Focal Stellia. I managed to hold a bit of the money from the sale to get the Hugo2/2go and i found a pair of ex-demo HD820, the FA12 is an attempt to find a high quality amp to fill the very big shoes of the Euforia (which if you havent heard is a very neutral, not to warm tube amp. So far the FA12 does not come across overly warm at all, its pretty neutral with no peaks and troughs just a hint of warmth, to my ears at least.

 

[saadi703]

It is the Volot ? Same power but balanced instead is quite expensive : wonder what it could bring more in term of sound.

Since he wanted balanced so this is why I mentioned. I am quite happy with FA-10 being single ended since it is significantly cheaper.

 

[NickT23]

Yep. As i've mentioned i think in a previous post, i've down sized my main rig after having a client going bust owing me a lot of money, from Hugo TT2/ Feliks Audio Euforia AE/ Focal Stellia. I managed to hold a bit of the money from the sale to get the Hugo2/2go and i found a pair of ex-demo HD820, the FA12 is an attempt to find a high quality amp to fill the very big shoes of the Euforia (which if you havent heard is a very neutral, not to warm tube amp. So far the FA12 does not come across overly warm at all, its pretty neutral with no peaks and troughs just a hint of warmth, to my ears at least.

Honestly even before I heard about the FA-12 and from your impression, I even can tell and predict that the FA-12 is slightly warm and overall nuetral fidelity. So slight downwards sloping warmth and enhance technical performance and accuracy. So what you said referring to 'hint of warmth' am not surprise and can somewhat tell. Am good at predicting stuff.
So any how many solid state and dacs you own ? Honestly speaking I only own one. Am planning to have dac paired with my future FCN-10 !

 

[saadi703]

Can I see the link ? There will be a new FA-10 ? What do you mean ?

They have not named it yet but they are calling it Volot. I asked them about this product back in April before ordering FA-10 and they told me it might take another couple of months and then I asked them the price for it and they said that they have not priced it officially yet but it would be 3-3.5k. Here is the link of their Facebook page:
https://www.facebook.com/175723716301984/posts/518195208721498/?d=n

 

[tholt]

Today I received the FA-12, and turns out that the SE input only works with the SE output, which is kind of odd, and I wasn't expecting that.

That is odd. I guess it's really being a purist design, but hardly practical. First HP amp I've heard that does it this way.

A warm amplifier on high end nuetral/resolving headphone is a bit of a waste. HD800S is perfect for it. Unless you go with tubes, now that is a different story with the Abyss 1266 Phi. Giving a warmer characteristics will take a way clarity of the resolving headphone itself.

I disagree, but to each their own. One man's "neutral" is another man's "boring" is another man's "bright" and on and on. I'm out of the neutral game. I'm into enjoyment. I love the Abyss for what it does better than any other headphone -- resolution, speed, clarity, soundstaging, bass. You can get all of those with a capable amplifier, some more or less than others depending on the amp. What I'm not crazy about is that for me, it can get a little hot on top and a little thin through the middle. But that can be mitigated with a complementary amp. Right now I am using a tube amp, best I've heard so far, but always curious of other options and open minded to different sounds.

 

[teknorob23]

Honestly even before I heard about the FA-12 and from your impression, I even can tell and predict that the FA-12 is slightly warm and overall nuetral fidelity. So slight downwards sloping warmth and enhance technical performance and accuracy. So what you said referring to 'hint of warmth' am not surprise and can somewhat tell. Am good at predicting stuff.
So any how many solid state and dacs you own ? Honestly speaking I only own one. Am planning to have dac paired with my future FCN-10 !

I only have the Chord Hugo2 DAC. I do have dragonfly cobalt and chord mojo, but i only really use those for travelling. By all accounts the FCN-10 has a pretty good DAC implementation of its own, what DAC are you looking to use?

 

[artist777]

That is odd. I guess it's really being a purist design, but hardly practical. First HP amp I've heard that does it this way.

Found out a little. If the circuit is balanced from input to output, then it will not be able to work simultaneously with balanced and unbalanced TRS output. For a balanced output, all four channels of the amplifier are required, for a TRS output, only two channels are needed and a common ground (which is not required for a balanced output). If you need the work of all the outputs at the same time, I think it is easier to look at the FA-12S model.

 

[saadi703]

Honestly even before I heard about the FA-12 and from your impression, I even can tell and predict that the FA-12 is slightly warm and overall nuetral fidelity. So slight downwards sloping warmth and enhance technical performance and accuracy. So what you said referring to 'hint of warmth' am not surprise and can somewhat tell. Am good at predicting stuff.
So any how many solid state and dacs you own ? Honestly speaking I only own one. Am planning to have dac paired with my future FCN-10 !

It is mentioned on Flux website as well that it is warm sounding amp.

 

[NickT23]

That is odd. I guess it's really being a purist design, but hardly practical. First HP amp I've heard that does it this way.



I disagree, but to each their own. One man's "neutral" is another man's "boring" is another man's "bright" and on and on. I'm out of the neutral game. I'm into enjoyment. I love the Abyss for what it does better than any other headphone -- resolution, speed, clarity, soundstaging, bass. You can get all of those with a capable amplifier, some more or less than others depending on the amp. What I'm not crazy about is that for me, it can get a little hot on top and a little thin through the middle. But that can be mitigated with a complementary amp. Right now I am using a tube amp, best I've heard so far, but always curious of other options and open minded to different sounds.

You may disagree, but am referring to full objectivist with actual truth in audio spectrum and synergy level. But either way, there is no right and wrong because the way I evaluate, I may prefer the inferior gear because it sounds good to my ears but in actual truth there are better gears out there regardless of personal preference or not.

What tube are you using anyway ?

 

[passernger10000]

So, how many people here actually own a Flux Labs FA-10 or 12?