[cangle]

Hi guys. Fa-12 user here. I've been a little disconnected from the forum due to work...

I was today listening to some music, and about 30min after turning the amp on, the left driver stopped sounding. I did some troubleshooting and connected the headphones to another amp to see if it was headphones or amp....
The headphones worked, so i plugged back the headphones into the fa12, shut down the unit, and turned it back up.
It's been working fine since then, about 2hours. Should I worry?
What can be the reason behind this channel going off suddenly?

Thanks!

Did you check the wiring on the headphone like if the left and right cables were securely connected to the headphone? Also could have been that the headphone cable was not all the way inserted into the connection on the amp. Hopefully it wasn't the amp but let us know if it happens again or if you figure it out.

 

[Honeypot]

Its first time I experience a channel going off on any of my amps....

I rapidly tested on an amp i have right next to the flux and headphones were ok. when I connected back to the flux the left channel remained off.
Only after power cycle it brought back the sound.

It wasn't the headphones...
I am 100% Shure it was the amp.

I'm still listening to it without a hiccup.
If it happens again, I'll contact Flux.

Anybody with electronic knowledge can explain the event?

 

[lalawilson168]

I have and reported it, it kind of went away when I switched it off n left it off for 30 mins. It hasn’t happened again so far

 

[haasaaroni]

Are you amping HE6se with liquid platinum ? It delivers 3.6w @50 ohm, should be enough I guess (FA-10 is 10.5w @50 ohm) : I’m curious to hear your comparison, maybe having both will not be necessary

Yeah I’m using the HE6se with the LP. Except that one day I plugged both the HE6se and Arya into my jumper-installed Emotiva and *holy crap* did the sound take leaps forward...on both! Maybe even more so with the Arya. The FA-10 just shipped, and I can’t wait to hear what it does to them. 10.5w is a crazy amount of power, I think it puts out even more than the Emotiva Basx A-100 into 50 ohms.

 

[Jimmyblues1959]

Yeah I’m using the HE6se with the LP. Except that one day I plugged both the HE6se and Arya into my jumper-installed Emotiva and *holy crap* did the sound take leaps forward...on both! Maybe even more so with the Arya. The FA-10 just shipped, and I can’t wait to hear what it does to them. 10.5w is a crazy amount of power, I think it puts out even more than the Emotiva Basx A-100 into 50 ohms

Interesting. The BasX A100 has long been viewed as the most powerful headphone amp that you can purchase
for the money (with the jumpers installed). And it is very close power wise to the FA10, for about $250 delivered (5 year factory warranty I believe).

Will be very interested to hear your impressions of how the FA10 and A100 compare using the aforementioned headphones.

 

[Terriero]

Did you check the wiring on the headphone like if the left and right cables were securely connected to the headphone? Also could have been that the headphone cable was not all the way inserted into the connection on the amp. Hopefully it wasn't the amp but let us know if it happens again or if you figure it out.

Now that you have been using your combo (Pontus 2 + FA12) during some time... What do you think of that combo? What about sinergy with your HD 800S? Thanks in advance.

 

[cangle]

Now that you have been using your combo (Pontus 2 + FA12) during some time... What do you think of that combo? What about synergy with your HD 800S? Thanks in advance.

Thanks for the reminder, I forgot to post my impressions of that combo. I've been really happy with it so far. I do think it took some time to warm up but maybe just 1-2 days not the 10 days that was recommended to me. However, it's been about 10 days so the performance of the dac definitely shouldn't be changing. Also last week I got a pi2aes in the mail which I am now using as a roon endpoint outputting music over i2s to the pontus ii.

Compared to the ADI-2 and the FA-12 the sound with the Pontus II is more lively with better bass clarity, texture, and slam. The detail retrieval seems to be a bit better in the treble region especially with female vocals and the other difference I've picked up on is a wider sense of space in the music I listen to. Even on the LCD-4z which isn't really known for having a wide soundstage, the sound is definitely wider however I still don't notice much depth to the sound but that could be more of an issue with the headphones I have or what I am expecting when I refer to depth.

I haven't been listening to the 800S much as switching between the 4z and the 800S can be a bit of an adjustment so in the past couple weeks since receiving this dac I would say the 800S has been about 20% of my listening time. I think with the Pontus II that the sound of the 800S has become a bit more full. It still sounds kind of thin to me especially compared to the 4z but now vocals have more body to them and the low end sounds a bit better too. If you find that your setup makes the 800S sound sort of clinical or you are just looking for more warmth then I would say that the Pontus II is a good option. I'm going to listen to the 800S some tonight and if I notice anything else I'll let you know.

Edit: Been listening to 800S on the pontus ii, fa-12 combo since I posted this response and one other thing I notice is that I don't get fatigued as much by the 800S as I used to. Probably a result of a smoother treble presentation from the pontus ii. It's definitely not lacking in detail though. Also I think the imaging is a bit more precise with this dac but again I'm not getting much depth (music is not coming from in front of me it's still mostly in my head sounding mostly for vocals)

 

[Terriero]

Thank you very much. I hope you don't forget your other headphones when you receive the 1266s

 

[cfranchi]

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts! I did end up ordering the FA-10 on the advice of Viacheslav at FluxLab. Wasn’t quite ready to ditch my Bifrost 2 in favor of another DAC yet to make the jump to the FCN-10.

So I have received HEK v2, I’m burn-in it for 200 hours as it seems that it really affect HEK sound (bottom end extension and clean treble from what I have read at Headfonics).

HEK is a really beautiful headphone, massive but light, don’t know why people complain about build quality. Confort is top notch, it just disappear (I have headspot with my HE6se).

I initially listened to HEK at medium gain (FCN-10) : sound was soft and nice (12 o clock), spacious but not HD800s level (but far more coherent). Then I turn up the volume at 1 o clock (sound level was still acceptable for me, I listen medium-loud generally) HEK became more engaging but still behind HE6se immediateness. Then I decided to use high gain, 12 o clock, and now dynamic is far far better, its funny how Flux amp can work because I’m high gain at 1 oclock with HE6se so I was quite surprised…

More A/B comparison with HEK and HE6se (high gain) show me that HEK is not a slow or laid back headphone, a bit behind HE6se but not that far from what I expected. Timbre are great on both : HE6se a bit more robust, HEK a bit more diffuse. I have great hope after burn-in (it really changed my Sundara, far more cleaner).

Last, HEK is very open and airy, you can hear them like small speaker when they play music. Compared to HE6se it is definitely more spacious and open but HE6se is good in term of soundstage, not an intimate headphone.

HEK is a very good headphone, I was worried about timbre and dynamic but it is there. Very spacious and more coherent than HD800s (but not as wide) : however far more musical than 800s. Confort is top notch and it is an eye catching headphone, my HE6se look cheap by comparison.

 

[cangle]

The Volot was released today. I know there's a separate thread for the Volot but thought I'd post the link here too in case some of you have not seen it yet. https://fluxlab-acoustics.com/product/volot-dual-mono-class-a-headphone-amplifier/

 

[Jimmyblues1959]

The Volot was released today. I know there's a separate thread for the Volot but thought I'd post the link here too in case some of you have not seen it yet. https://fluxlab-acoustics.com/product/volot-dual-mono-class-a-headphone-amplifier/

Been waiting for this for awhile. Thanks for the heads up! The Volot looks like a beauty!

 

[cfranchi]

I wonder what coud be the difference of volot vs fa10 : same watt provided, same voltage provided.
Hope to get comparison quickly.

 

[manishex]

They said the Volot has 2.5x more current or some type of current, maybe less voltage as a result. There's 4 gain modes now, the lowest being lower and the highest being higher than the fa-10

 

[Rebel Chris]

Hmmm a nice colored face plate is soo tempting

 

[cfranchi]

They said the Volot has 2.5x more current or some type of current, maybe less voltage as a result. There's 4 gain modes now, the lowest being lower and the highest being higher than the fa-10

2.5x more current… that will be impressive with planars!