[Greed]

  The TH600s sound quite good just straight out of my Samsung GS4. There's not a huge improvement going from the phone to the Audio Gd 15.32 DAC/AMP. Any tips on improving the sound? I noticed that all my other mid-tier cans HE500, HD600, Mad dogs respond really well with the desktop amp and speaker amps.  

 
From my experience, I had better results upgrading my source than amperage. Overall it doesn't take much to drive these Fostex headphones. 

 

[jibzilla]

  The TH600s sound quite good just straight out of my Samsung GS4. There's not a huge improvement going from the phone to the Audio Gd 15.32 DAC/AMP. Any tips on improving the sound? I noticed that all my other mid-tier cans HE500, HD600, Mad dogs respond really well with the desktop amp and speaker amps.  

 

[Clemmaster]

 
Commercially speaking, just imo and what I have noticed over the last two years is that there are not allot of amp makers catering to low impedance high end headphones. D.I.Y is a different story imo. but allot of consumers seem to want to have the power to drive cans like the audeze, he-6, and hd-800 along with there low impedance options. Problem is too much power and you have very little head room with your volume knob and it's hard to get things tuned just so. Honestly commercially speaking I think you have the fosgate signature and the rudistor rpx-35 and that's about it so I think greed has a point in going the dac route.
 
A mid-centric dac would fit the bill imo since that's kind of where the th-600 needs some help. While I think the tranquility basic and SE models are a bit pricey retail I scored the SE model used for $800 and sold it like a week later to a friend who liked it for a hundo more than I paid. The next day I found the tranquility basic for $425 so I know there's deals out there and I think you will find that they do wonders for the th-600 at those prices. Both dacs are mid centric imo.

 
You're confusing gain with power here. They are not the same thing.
Find an amp (or a DAC) with gain control or with a lower gain -> problem solved.
 
Another limit here is the amps output impedance. The TH-600 has low impedance and is sensitive to high output impedance (dynamic drivers are more sensitive because their impedance curve is uneven across the frequency range, unlike planars). The HP-A3 didn't work that well with the TH-600 because it has a fairly high output impedance (10R in a typical application, IIRC) that screw up the FR with low impedance dynamic headphones. The HE-500 was much better because it has a purely resistive impedance.
The HP-A3 has too much gain, which is another issue for pretty much every application (even as a DAC/preamp for power monitors). It was already too much for the HE-500, so the TH-600 had a very low range on the dial...

 

[spurxiii]

Looks like a DAC upgrade is on the cards. Is my Audio Gd 15.32 a decent enough DAC? What would I need to really notice an improvement?

 

[spurxiii]

Oh and thank you guys for the great advice

 

[spurxiii]

I think I've been greedy. I might sit back and enjoy these cans for a little while before I do any modding, recabling or upgrading of amps or sources.

 

[designbykai]

I think I've been greedy. I might sit back and enjoy these cans for a little while before I do any modding, recabling or upgrading of amps or sources.

Yeah let them burn in and enjoy them as they are for a while I reckon. They are special. Especially as you're listening to a lot of electronic, you won't miss the slightly reduced mids compared to your other cans. They're perfectly tuned for edm IMO and not too coloured either really, and damn good for rock and most other genres too

 

[jibzilla]

   
You're confusing gain with power here. They are not the same thing.
Find an amp (or a DAC) with gain control or with a lower gain -> problem solved.
 
Another limit here is the amps output impedance. The TH-600 has low impedance and is sensitive to high output impedance (dynamic drivers are more sensitive because their impedance curve is uneven across the frequency range, unlike planars). The HP-A3 didn't work that well with the TH-600 because it has a fairly high output impedance (10R in a typical application, IIRC) that screw up the FR with low impedance dynamic headphones. The HE-500 was much better because it has a purely resistive impedance.
The HP-A3 has too much gain, which is another issue for pretty much every application (even as a DAC/preamp for power monitors). It was already too much for the HE-500, so the TH-600 had a very low range on the dial...

 

[designbykai]

Waiting for someone to get a hp-a4 And post impressions with th600

 

[spurxiii]

The audio Gd 15.32 has a dac with gain control. It allows me to run the HD600s via a 50W per channel into 8 Ohms speaker amp without any resistors. I'll be doing the same to the TH600 once I burn them in a bit on SE

 

[Saren]

With my funds I actually went ahead on a WA7 and TH600 instead of the HD800 and TH600. I just wanted a bit of the tube sound in my life, without the hassle of constantly tube rolling. The WA7 was a revelation with the T1 and TH600 for the treble which is smoother than ever. The bass feels to bit ever so slightly less ~ could be hearing things.

 

[spurxiii]

Has anyone had good results bumping up the equalizer to bring the mids up a bit? If so which frequencies and by how much. Thanks

 

[ethan7000]

Has anyone had good results bumping up the equalizer to bring the mids up a bit? If so which frequencies and by how much. Thanks

I think you'll have better luck reducing the mid bass. This will actually bring the mids out more.

 

[ahhui90]

Waiting for someone to get a hp-a4 And post impressions with th600

second this

 

[spurxiii]

I think you'll have better luck reducing the mid bass. This will actually bring the mids out more.

 

  second this

Thanks guys I'll try this tonight. How much of a bump and what requency range do you guys reckon?