Headroom Balanced Ultra Desktop Amp (tm)

[Born2bwire]

Fine. I guess I'll have to order my own BUDA/UDAC stack with DPS and balanced cables for my HD650 and find out for myself how they sound. I'll get my own BUDA... with blackjack... and hookers....

/me gets off the phone with Headroom.

There! Ordered... in fact forget the BUDA and the blackjack!

 

[tnili]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Born2bwire /img/forum/go_quote.gif Fine. I guess I'll have to order my own BUDA/UDAC stack with DPS and balanced cables for my HD650 and find out for myself how they sound. I'll get my own BUDA... with blackjack... and hookers.... /me gets off the phone with Headroom. There! Ordered... in fact forget the BUDA and the blackjack!

Looking forward to hearing your impressions on the BUDA since I am planning to get it in the not too distant future.

 

[Born2bwire]

Quote:

Originally Posted by tnili /img/forum/go_quote.gif Looking forward to hearing your impressions on the BUDA since I am planning to get it in the not too distant future.

They are waiting on the enclosures they said. 4 weeks until shipped out from the States to Hong Kong, then customs, then delivery. Going to be a long wait.

Well at least Hong Kong is a free port, no duty or taxes on it and the shipping quote I got was pretty cheap all considering.

 

[pedalhead]

Yes, Headroom shipping appears to be priced really cheaply, I was amazed at how little the UDAC/BUDA/DPS stack cost to ship to the UK. Customs charges on the other hand were less pleasant, though of course that's nothing to do with Headroom!

 

[Born2bwire]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pedalhead /img/forum/go_quote.gif Yes, Headroom shipping appears to be priced really cheaply, I was amazed at how little the UDAC/BUDA/DPS stack cost to ship to the UK. Customs charges on the other hand were less pleasant, though of course that's nothing to do with Headroom!

Yeah, with the low shipping, no customs (at least that is what I read on the Fed Ex website) and 15% discount I felt like I made out like a bandit... until I realized how much I still spent.

Alas, poor Wallet! I knew him, Head-fi, a fellow of infinite
jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath bore me on his back a
thousand times, and now how abhorr'd in my imagination it is!
My gorge rises at it.

 

[pedalhead]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Born2bwire /img/forum/go_quote.gif Yeah, with the low shipping, no customs (at least that is what I read on the Fed Ex website) and 15% discount I felt like I made out like a bandit... until I realized how much I still spent. Alas, poor Wallet! I knew him, Head-fi, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath bore me on his back a thousand times, and now how abhorr'd in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it.

haha, you speak the truth

 

[nigeljames]

Quote:

Originally Posted by indydieselnut /img/forum/go_quote.gif That's the conclusion I'm coming to...unfortunately for my wallet! I really didn't know how the BUDA w/DPS would hang with my WA6SE (with parts upgrade and Sophia). So far, it's easily hanging with that amp. My impressions of the WA6SE is that it's a very neutral tube amp. My impressions of the BUDA is that it is an incredibly smooth, liquid solid-state amp. What I'm getting at is that, so far, the two amps seem more similar than different to me. The balanced drive has been a bit of a revelation for me. I've had DT880 600-ohm phones in single-ended version (to be fair, it was the original cable) and loved them. My balanced pair with the Silver Dragon v.2 recable (split-mod, dual entry) is a significant improvement when paired with the BUDA. I was listening through Dead Can Dance "Into the Labyrinth" last night. It wasn't a "wow, I've never heard that detail before" kind of session, it was just very organic, the timbre was correct, the transient speed was there...it was just very communicative. It was in no way any kind of controlled test, but I was going back and forth between the Beyer/BUDA and the Woo/AH-D7000 and having a fantastic time! They were different for sure, but they were both doing so much right...it was wonderful! The journey to "get there" with my setup has had several twists and turns but I feel like I'm finally at a point where I know I'm going to enjoy every single listening experience. I'm not sure if there are any further steps to be taken, but I'm getting less curious about them...

indydieselnut what are the strengths and weaknesses of the Woo and Headroom amps. I will be purchasing a new amp soon,probably W6se or Sonett, and then I will be looking for a balanced SS amp and the BUDA is on my list. How is the speed of the Woo6se compared to the BUDA. Thanks

 

[Omega17TheTrue]

Quote:

Originally Posted by nigeljames /img/forum/go_quote.gif indydieselnut what are the strengths and weaknesses of the Woo and Headroom amps. I will be purchasing a new amp soon,probably W6se or Sonett, and then I will be looking for a balanced SS amp and the BUDA is on my list. How is the speed of the Woo6se compared to the BUDA. Thanks

Just in the previous page :

Quote:

Originally Posted by indydieselnut /img/forum/go_quote.gif 840C => Signal Cable Silver Resolution balanced ics => BUDA => Beyer DT880 Manufaktur 600-ohm Initial impression is VERY favorable. I'm comparing it to a Woo WA6SE (with parts upgrade and Sophia). The BUDA is fast with amazing transient response. Listening to Patricia Barber, the sense of space and instrument location is excellent. I'll stop there because I have a total of 1.5 hours on it right now. Build, fit and finish, and overall ergonomics seem excellent. I've had Headroom gear in the past, so I'm used to the mini-switches and other things that might bother some users. Cheers!

Is by any chance someone made a BUDA/UDAC and Isabellina HPA comparison ? These two have their strengths and their weaknesses in their respective conception, but what about their sounds differences ?

 

[indydieselnut]

Sorry for the absence from this thread...alas the BUDA is back with Headroom. For family considerations I took an overall step back from my investment in headphone audio.

I will tell you one thing - I miss the BUDA more than the WA6SE. That might fly in the face of a lot of things written around here but the BUDA was just more my speed.

I'm looking forward to attending CanJam next year and visiting the Headroom booth. Maybe I'll have some loose change in my pocket by then...

 

[Born2bwire]

Alas, tragedy!

I missed the original delivery last Saturday morning as I was at work. Pretty astounding, Headroom shipped it around Thursday morning my time and it was delivered that Saturday morning, from Montana to Hong Kong. I got the big ole package this morning and the first thing that happened after I had it all setup was that there was a painfully loud blast of white noise in the left channel of the BUDA. It's produced by the BUDA and is unaffected by inputs, settings, or the outputs (balanced and unbalanced). It finally went away while I was playing with it. I am beginning to think that it dissappears after the amp has warmed up. Maybe a solder connection is bad or damaged and the expansion from the heat reconnects it. Either way, now I'm debating whether to suffer with it or to send it back. The return shipping is probably rather astronomical. I remembered a while back pricing and timing out the shipment from Headroom to see how long it would take. For a regular Joe-schmoe like me it would cost 5x as much as what I paid Headroom for shipping.

On a side note, I ended up buying a balanced Cardas cable for my HD650. So I have both a balanced and unbalanced Cardas cable so I can do direct comparison between balanced and unbalanced. The single-ended cable is the smurf blue and is a bit thicker than the grey balanced cable. A bit nicer to have the slightly thinner cable.

 

[twsmith]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Born2bwire /img/forum/go_quote.gif .... the first thing that happened after I had it all setup was that there was a painfully loud blast of white noise in the left channel of the BUDA. It's produced by the BUDA and is unaffected by inputs, settings, or the outputs (balanced and unbalanced). It finally went away while I was playing with it. I am beginning to think that it dissappears after the amp has warmed up. Maybe a solder connection is bad or damaged and the expansion from the heat reconnects it.

That's a bummer! The BUDA should be dead-quiet when you turn it on, which does suggest that yours definitely has a problem. Even if it seems to go away after warm-up, you never know when it may not go away or blossom into something even worse. The bottom line is that your BUDA will most likely have to go back to Headroom. Before doing anything, though, you need to contact HR to see what they say - even though it sounds like they'll probably need to take a look at it themselves, they may suggest a few other things to try. Seeing that you may have received a defective unit to begin with, you may be able to negotiate an arrangement with HR to pay for at least some (if not all) of the return shipping cost. I've always found HR to have excellent customer service, so I suspect you will be in good hands.

Good luck!

 

[Born2bwire]

Yeah, I'm still waiting for the clock to roll over for their offices to open. They open at midnight my time so it's always annoying to call back to the States.

 

[Born2bwire]

Well, just got off the phone with them and they'll send the first BUDA off the line overnight to me with a return UPS mailing sticker. Huzzah! I don't even have to worry about being without the amp which was my main concern (because of course now it is a life essential).

 

[Born2bwire]

Huzzah! The replacement amp arrived today with an included return shipping sticker. It powers up just fine and I left the rig on to try and heat the flat this morning when I schlepped on out to work. Sounds great so far and no problems.

Now I need to start playing with switching components around to see what benefit they give. Just need power cords for the Astrodynes to try them out...

 

[Vaipec]

Hello,
I do have a hd800, but my sorce will be ipod

does the buda/dac work well with ipod/hd800 ?

thanks