[PUGSTUB]

Newbee needs help selecting OTL tube headphone amp. Would like best bang for the buck selection and also best for cost no object selections and relative difference between them for use with Sennheiser 600's. Thanks for the help. This is a great forum.

 

[markjia]

MG Head OTL. It's exceptional for something at its price.

Melos SHA-1 is also good, but like twice as much (but I doubt you could say the sound is twice as good).

 

[Nick Dangerous]

The MG Head OTL is the best tubed headphone amp for the money. Remember, for the money.

The Melos SHA-1 doesn't scale as high along the price/performance ratio line as the MG Head OTL... assuming you are only using high-impedance headphones and do not need preamp functions. Otherwise, the Melos holds its own. Its ability to drive low and high-impedance headphones, with two outputs, and function as a preamp make it a price/performance leader in its class.

Remember, in its class.

Darn it, I REALLY need to hear the RKV, EMP, and ZOTL!

 

[Skipperrik]

I've owned the Wheatfield HA-2 and the Berning micro ZOTL. The HA-2 was an extremely revealing amp with plenty of power to drive the HD600s, but I found the circuitry to be a little noisy. By contrast, the ZOTL is dead quiet. When you upgrade the tubes to Ken Rad VT-231s and Telefunken ECC81s, you get tremendous dynamics, crystal clear sound at every frequency, and exceptionally fast and detailed bass. Even with the tube upgrades, you will have less than $1000 invested.

 

[Tuberoller]

When I used the Micro ZOTL I only experienced dead silence when used with the battery.When used with AC power it was as noisey as any other tube staged circuit.I also found the low level detail to be lacking and the bass to be a bit exagerated.The Wheatfield HA2 does have a slightly noisey circuit but it is the sweetest sounding tube amp I have yet heard to drive the Senns.It is the only SET OTL amp that I know of specifically designed to drive headphones.Pete Millet (Wheatfield's designer)says that the HA2 was "voiced" using the HD600.I think that a single-ended OTL amp specifically designed to drive a particualar set of phones could not be a more perfect match.