[Chickn]

So I've recently become the owner of a set of Sennheiser HD-650s.  Although I already have an e7/e9 combo which certainly can drive them along with my Grado 80is and Sony mdr-7506's.  I was wondering just how much am I missing out on without a nicer amp/DAC?
 
 
 
After much delving through the forums I can't really find a great answer.  Obviously higher quality components are going to be better, but is there a drastic difference from a mid range amp/dac to a high class balanced amp/dac.
 
Should I be looking for a mid-range amp like the DarkVoice 332/337, or Woo wa6, or a Grahm Slee Solo, or Bada PH-12
 
Or should I be going a bit higher end like a Corda Opera, or a Maple Tree Ear+HD, or Lehmann BCL, Audio Gd NFB-10, or if I find a stack of money a Zana Deux.
 
Also how much does the DAC affect the sound (some of these have built in dacs,) will the e7 suffice?
Or do I look into getting a Cambridge DAC Magic, some sort of Schitt dac, or something else? (Really don't know much at all about DACs.)
Also compatibility between DACs and amps seems to be somewhat of a concern; is there anyway to figure out what will work well with what?  Or is it all based on reviews/word of mouth etc.
 
 
 
Then there's the question of how much balanced audio really reveals with these cans.  I've heard many people say the difference is quite substantial, and some the exact opposite. 
 
As I understand it for the whole setup to be balanced I need a balanced source (assuming this is achieved through connecting my computer with digital out or usb into a DAC and I don't need a new soundcard.)  Then I need a balanced vs single ended amp?  As well as all my cables have to be TRS or XLR?
 
 
I've heard so many conflicting opinions on the impact of going truly balanced, but most people seem to emphasize its importance with the Sennheisers, and I wondered if anyone could explain that reasoning to me.
 
 
Any help greatly appreciated as this is my next big purchase in upgrading my rig. 

 
 
 

 

[sregor]

 
I may still be a bit of a neophyte but I will give my experience with my HD650s.
 
Here is how my current set up is.
 
FLAC > MediaMonkey 4 > AudioQuest Cinnamon USB Cable > HRT Music Streamer II > Blue Jeans Cable LC-1 > Darkvoice 336i > Sennheiser HD650.
 
I thoroughly enjoy that set up and going from an E7/E9 combo to that myself was very nice. The bass is very dark and punchy while maintaining the renown  Sennheiser sound profile. Simply put, I love the sound. I am still playing around with some different tubes for my Darkvoice. I hope this helps. That is just my opinion. Hopefully some other more knowledgeable head-fiers can give you more guidance. 
 

 

[lucaskers]

I'm in the exact same boat as the OP. I have the 650s and e9/e7 combo and am looking to upgrade in the near future. I've also done a lot of lurking and reading on here and am left with the same questions. This must be a gap in the knowledge base on this website that would be nice to fill, as I am sure there are others with the same question. I could go on, but it looks like the OP summed it up pretty well. Any insight would be greatly appreciated.
 
Thanks All,
Lucas
 
 

 

[greggie]

I've been listening with the Sennheiser HD-590 for a number of years, from PC and various DAPs including a Sansa Clip+.  Recently I upgraded to the E7/E9 and HD-650.  Although the combination sounds really good, there were some recordings that I know well where I found myself wondering "where are the details?"  This must be the Sennheiser veil I keep reading about, lack of detail in the mids and highs, as if the bass is overpowering the higher frequencies.  Plugging the 590s back into the Fiio, I can hear what is missing with the 650s.
 
edit:  Just found one of Malveaux's posts where he says, "The veil doesn't refer to details. It refers to brightness."  It's possible I may not be using the correct term.  However, it was obvious to me that some aspect of the music I was expecting to hear was missing. 
 
I have since built the Bottlehead Crack kit, and the 650s sound glorious with it.  I have seen a couple of other posts to the effect that "there is no veil with the 650s when properly amped", and that is my experience as well.
 
This is not saying that the E7/E9 are not good, I enjoy them quite a bit and am using them with my PC and the 590s.  But the 650s just don't do justice to some recordings when driven by the Fiio, so they are now dedicated to the Crack.  The source I am using is a Squeezebox Touch.
 
My recommendation is to look into amps that are designed for driving high-impedance headphones.  The Bottlehead is one (superb) choice, and since it is a DIY amp, the price of entry is low.  I can't speak to balanced versus unbalanced.

 

[Chickn]

Is the crackhead only DIY?  and how hard is this to actually put together.
 
Don't wanna mess up some simple soldering and half the lifetime of my amp.
 
 

 

[oshia86]

I plan on going with the Nuforce HDP myself. I figured I would skip some of the lower end stuff and get a pretty decent setup right from the start. It should hold me over for a while, considering a nice jump up from that will be pretty costly.

 

[greggie]

Quote:

Is the crackhead only DIY?  and how hard is this to actually put together.
 
Don't wanna mess up some simple soldering and half the lifetime of my amp.
 
 

You can order it pre-built, see the Bottlehead web site.  I thought it was fairly easy.  If you don't have any soldering tools or experience, and don't have the inclination to obtain either, the pre-built option might be the way to go.

 

[captouch]

Quote:

I've been listening with the Sennheiser HD-590 for a number of years, from PC and various DAPs including a Sansa Clip+.  Recently I upgraded to the E7/E9 and HD-650.  Although the combination sounds really good, there were some recordings that I know well where I found myself wondering "where are the details?"  This must be the Sennheiser veil I keep reading about, lack of detail in the mids and highs, as if the bass is overpowering the higher frequencies.  Plugging the 590s back into the Fiio, I can hear what is missing with the 650s.
 
edit:  Just found one of Malveaux's posts where he says, "The veil doesn't refer to details. It refers to brightness."  It's possible I may not be using the correct term.  However, it was obvious to me that some aspect of the music I was expecting to hear was missing. 
 
I have since built the Bottlehead Crack kit, and the 650s sound glorious with it.  I have seen a couple of other posts to the effect that "there is no veil with the 650s when properly amped", and that is my experience as well.
 
This is not saying that the E7/E9 are not good, I enjoy them quite a bit and am using them with my PC and the 590s.  But the 650s just don't do justice to some recordings when driven by the Fiio, so they are now dedicated to the Crack.  The source I am using is a Squeezebox Touch.
 
My recommendation is to look into amps that are designed for driving high-impedance headphones.  The Bottlehead is one (superb) choice, and since it is a DIY amp, the price of entry is low.  I can't speak to balanced versus unbalanced.

 
+1 on the Crack and I thought it took things up by a definitive notch after the Speedball upgrade.
 
 

 

[Jojomite]

i don't think the e7/e9 combo does the hd650 justice. of course, if u have a lot of money, spend on the high end amps/dacs. perhaps u should look at the bifrost, i had a brief listen to it the other day and thought it was almost as good as my dacmini. for amps if u don't want to spend too much money an asgard would pair very well with the sennheisers as they were tuned for it. 
 
hope this helps!

 

[Chickn]

Well I spent a long time looking for high end audio shops in the SF Bay Area.  All I could come up with that met my needs was Audiovision in San Fransisco.  (Well there's another one in Mountain View that's well respected apparently it has lcd-2's that I can't wait to audition, but haven't gone there yet.)  I was disappointed there's not more places to sample/buy this kind of equipment.
 
Audiovision was a great experience though.  I was able to audition a variety of amps/dacs. They also have a large selection of Denon, Grado, and Ultrasone cans.  They let me audition the cans as well even though that wasn't the reason I was there, which was a fun experience and made me even more comfortable with my selection of the HD-650s.  As for the amps/dacs though the two owners were very helpful and informative while setting up whichever source needed be it into their arcam cd-player (although I forgot to bring discs they had a decent variety of cd's there,) or through a cambridge or nuforce dac into my amp of choice (brought my iPod.)
 
Down to the amps though.  Unfortunately they only had one tube amp for headphones at the moment, the hifiman ef5.  Although I haven't heard all that much about this amp, I think its regarded decently.  It really just didn't cut it for me though.  With bad bass response instantly noticeable, and the warmth of grados.  Maybe its the single tube, or I just don't like the warm fuzzy tube amps, but I knew quickly it wasn't for me.  Then came the PS-Audio gcha.  As soon as I listened to this thing, I realized the FiiO was really quite sub par.  At the price point of ~$500 this was almost a done deal for me, but just for kicks, I thought I'd give the Burson  ha-160d a spin.  I thought there was no way the price difference would be warranted, especially considering the ha-160ds is so much cheaper.
 
However all I can say is wow.  The Burson made songs I thought were good through the gcha, absolutely amazing.  The frequency reproduction and bass accuracy and punch is absolutely phenomenal.  It made the gcha sound flat out bad in comparison.  The ever dangerous mantra of this hobby/addiction came in to play instantly, what has been heard, cannot be unheard.
 
Although I must say the ha-160ds is quite close in quality and much less expensive, it comes with no pre amp i believe being almost the only difference, oh and a stepped volume attenuator.  The bass reproduction and accurate frequency imaging on the 160d is to my ears at least, amazing.  The 160ds sounds much more blended I suppose instead of the articulation of the 160d.  As well as the ds just not quite being able to get under those 50hz punches.  It is a costly upgrade, but how can I settle for the inferior at this point.  This is an evil hobby.
 
So long story short it looks like the Burson ha-160d is going to be the cure for the itch.
 
Now comes the more extreme purchases to complete this rig.  The cabling.
 
So I can easily see the difference in a power cable, and already purchased the Cardas sennheiser cables, which hopefully are as good as they're made out to be.
 
The big sticking point is the digital cabling.  Being somewhat of a computer person, its very hard for me to wrap my head around how much better you can reproduce 1's and 0's.  I'd understand if normal usb cables are losing data or something, but that's not the case.  I don't really see how the metallurgy or some other factor can have an impact on digital recreation.  Yet not only do the owners of Audiovision say they can hear a difference (although admit to not being able to explain it,) but I've seen accounts of respected online members saying the same thing (of course amid the 15 replies apiece about people joking to by their "hand crafted with snakeskin oil usb cable"
 
Also in line with this is it better to get a coaxial cable anyways, or is that only useful if I will always be using 24bit, high sample rate audio.
 
Thanks for anymore responses.   

 
 

 

[PlasmaChroma]

Quote:

The big sticking point is the digital cabling.  Being somewhat of a computer person, its very hard for me to wrap my head around how much better you can reproduce 1's and 0's.  I'd understand if normal usb cables are losing data or something, but that's not the case.  I don't really see how the metallurgy or some other factor can have an impact on digital recreation.  Yet not only do the owners of Audiovision say they can hear a difference (although admit to not being able to explain it,) but I've seen accounts of respected online members saying the same thing (of course amid the 15 replies apiece about people joking to by their "hand crafted with snakeskin oil usb cable"
 
Also in line with this is it better to get a coaxial cable anyways, or is that only useful if I will always be using 24bit, high sample rate audio.
 
Thanks for anymore responses.   

 
Your point on digital transmission is mostly valid I think.  Either the data arrives or it doesn't, and even if there was some voltage in between it is going to get rounded up or down.  So either you get the data transferred and it works or your cable sucks and you get nothing out.  Or in a sufficiently advanced system things like CRCs are added and re-transmission is possible, although in the case of audio this would be unacceptable because you are talking about adding latency to something which needs to be real time.
 
However, all this said, I am currently having a problem with trying to use the coaxial out on my sound card (its a real POS motherboard sound) so currently I am forced to use USB on my setup.  Seems like the problem is probably some kind of group loop when using the coax, but basically what is happening is I get an overall low "hiss" immediately when the coax is plugged in but before coax is selected as source.  Not sure what that could be other than some offset from bad grounding / lack of isolation?  I've got a toslink cable on order now to see if perhaps optical does not suffer from the same issues.  In my case, unfortunately the USB on my DAC only supports 16bit, but the other digital connections will support 24bit, which is my main motivation to get something else working.
 
So yeah, more or less as long as you have a cable good enough to transmit, you are probably safe with using whatever on the digital side.  It's when the signal goes analogue that you really need to start being concerned with it.  All other oddities aside at least.

 

[Edoardo]

http://www.head-fi.org/t/583671/onix-dac-25a-review-a-few-impressions-and-considerations

 

[TheForce]

The Burson 160D and the HD650, go hand in hand. It's such a lovely unison.

 

[goridenow]

The Woo 6 with the right rectifier and the 650s are wonderful and not radically far off in sound quality from the 650s with my current set up of the maxxed Woo 5. I have not heard the Burson other than all the raves here. Good luck.

 

[coolguyalex]

Quote:

I plan on going with the Nuforce HDP myself. I figured I would skip some of the lower end stuff and get a pretty decent setup right from the start. It should hold me over for a while, considering a nice jump up from that will be pretty costly.

I've just bought a pair of HD650s and also plan on getting the HDP to go with them