[DJ-Banana]

Hi there ladies and gents of Head-Fi !
So I've been browsing the forums for a few weeks, should get my summer pay soon (yes it's summer in the pacific, right at the same time as Christmas !) and have been planning a new gaming rig for a few months, I'm looking to be able to do two things :
- Play games with a great soundstage
- Listen to lossless audio with a great quality
I settled my eyes on the Sennheiser headsets which I knew of reputation (but am open to any other brand / recommendation), especially between the HD600 and the PC360, both have slashed prices right now, but I heard that to get a good sound of HD600 / 650 you need to drive them correctly, which is where I'm coming with my second question : right now a friend is willing to sell me an Onkyo TX-NR818 for roughly 500$, it has an onboard 192 kHz/24-bit DAC which has me extremely interested because I would have needed to buy an external DAC/Amp combo anyway. 
 
If anyone has had experience with the TX-NR818 would you recommend that I buy it along with these cans, and if I am looking for detailed music and very accurate positioning while playing games on PC (and on a soon to be bought PS4) which headset should I get out of the Sennheisers, or maybe should I get another pair of cans such as Audio Technica ATH-AD700, would they work well with the NR818 and would they be great for gaming AND music ?

 

[KG Jag]

I love my Onkyo A/V receiver (not your model) except when it comes to driving headphones.  At that it is weak sister, like many modern A/V receivers.  Unless you get specific confirmation to the contrary from Onkyo or an owner of your exact model, don't count on it properly driving the HD 600 or 650.
 
BTW--these Senns do not have great sound stages.  They aren't bad but they are no Q 701.

 

[DJ-Banana]

Sadly the thing is I could get the Q701 but it'd cost me an additional 100$, I've read a bit more and am thinking of first off going for a combo of Mixamp Pro 2013 and an HD598 for just my PS3 after reading extensively Mad Lust Envy's guide and for my budget, if I go with this combo would I need to amp the 598 with something like a FiiO E17 ?

And yeah if the Onkyo isn't adequate to drive a pair of cans correctly I'll pass, I sadly don't have the money to put out on the speakers to go with the AVR

 

[PurpleAngel]

   right now a friend is willing to sell me an Onkyo TX-NR818 for roughly 500$, it has an on-board 192 kHz/24-bit DAC which has me extremely interested because I would have needed to buy an external DAC/Amp combo anyway. 
 
If anyone has had experience with the TX-NR818 would you recommend that I buy it along with these cans, and if I am looking for detailed music and very accurate positioning while playing games on PC (and on a soon to be bought PS4) which headset should I get out of the Sennheisers, or maybe should I get another pair of cans such as Audio Technica ATH-AD700, would they work well with the NR818 and would they be great for gaming AND music ?

I'm guessing you could spend less cash for an A/V receiver and still get something that will do the job.
A used Yamaha RX-V667 (& V671) or RX-A700 (& A710) will come with decent speaker amplifiers and also have Yamaha's Silent Cinema, Yamaha's own headphone surround sound technology.
You might find these A/V receiver used for around $300.
ATH-AD700s are good gaming headphones, but low impedance headphones like the AD700, are not the best choice for plugging into receivers (impedance issue).

 

[kraken2109]

I can't comment on Onkyo but my Denon 1912 drove HD650s perfectly. They didn't need any more volume than my HD429 did.

 

[KG Jag]

Sadly the thing is I could get the Q701 but it'd cost me an additional 100$, I've read a bit more and am thinking of first off going for a combo of Mixamp Pro 2013 and an HD598 for just my PS3 after reading extensively Mad Lust Envy's guide and for my budget, if I go with this combo would I need to amp the 598 with something like a FiiO E17 ?

And yeah if the Onkyo isn't adequate to drive a pair of cans correctly I'll pass, I sadly don't have the money to put out on the speakers to go with the AVR

The 598 is fairly easy to drive and the Onkyo should have no  problem doing so.  As PurpleAngel mentioned, many of the Yamaha receivers are better than the average bear at driving headphones.  My older RX-A800 does a decent or better job on most.  Can't speak with personal experience about the Denon, but can report that others have mentioned them in the past as doing a good job with cans.

 

[Arq0s]

My question is similar to the one in this thread... I am gaming with an Xbox 1 and am trying to get the best surround sound possible for picking up enemies , behind / below / above  me... I have an Onkyo TX-NR 905 and was testing it out today to try and see what kind of surround sound processing it did when headphones are plugged in. Using Audio Technica AD700 headphones.
 
Xbox 1  was going HDMI out and set to 7.1 uncompressed and also tried Bitstream / DTS . While the Receiver picked the source signal out perfect and told me when i was going from 7.1 to DTS to DD  it didnt seem like the surround sound was all there. it felt like stereo. On the front display, the only 3 options were Stereo, Mono, Direct. I tried messing around with some other settings and selecting Neural THX 5.1 for analog audio settings on that input i was using but it didnt seem to help.
 
Does the Onkyo 905 not do surround sound virtualization like the Yamaha does with Silent Cinema ? isnt Neural THX 5.1 sort of similar? if it is, does the Onkyo just have a limitation on using this virtualization for headphones?
 
Any help would be appreciated, it is sad that this very expensive Receiver cant seem to give me the surround sound stage or come close at the moment to my MixAmp Pro which is taking an Optical input from the Xbox and only using Dolby Digital.

 

[PurpleAngel]

  My question is similar to the one in this thread... I am gaming with an Xbox 1 and am trying to get the best surround sound possible for picking up enemies , behind / below / above  me... I have an Onkyo TX-NR 905 and was testing it out today to try and see what kind of surround sound processing it did when headphones are plugged in. Using Audio Technica AD700 headphones.
Does the Onkyo 905 not do surround sound virtualization like the Yamaha does with Silent Cinema ? isnt Neural THX 5.1 sort of similar? if it is, does the Onkyo just have a limitation on using this virtualization for headphones?
Any help would be appreciated, it is sad that this very expensive Receiver cant seem to give me the surround sound stage or come close at the moment to my MixAmp Pro which is taking an Optical input from the Xbox and only using Dolby Digital.

My personal opinion is most receivers do not support "true" headphone surround sound.
Yamaha do have their own headphone surround sound, Silent Cinema, which is why I replaced my Onkyo TX-SR701 receiver with a Yamaha.
As a long shot, try setting your xBox One's audio output to PCM (LPCM) 5.1 or 7.1 (but it's a long shot).
I believe Xbox One does not come with DDL (Dolby Digital Live) so the Astro Mix-amp is not much use.
 
I would guess having "true" headphone surround sound is not a feature that a lot of people look for in modern A/V receiver.
So the receiver manufacturers save a few dollars by not including it.

 

[Arq0s]

i have a beta update that just came out on xbox 1 which allows dolby digital over optical now. so i can sound whore again with my mixamp. i was just trying to do an experiment however and find something even better than the mixamp. i ran across the Beyerdynamics Headzone but that just seems too expensive for this one particular use.