[TMRaven]

Ok.  Just making sure we're on the same page as for what we're trying to listen for, especially with the minimum THD thing.  It plays a huge role.  As for amping the HE-400, I don't know what your plans are for the xcan v2, but I'd personally just get something with lots of power output and lowest impedance possible.  Planar Magnetics aren't really known for being picky about what type of amp they sound great out of, as long as it's low impedance with lots of power.  Good tube amps have really low output impedance too, but those can get really expensive.

 

[jmsaxon69]

Quote:

Ok.  Just making sure we're on the same page as for what we're trying to listen for, especially with the minimum THD thing.  It plays a huge role.  As for amping the HE-400, I don't know what your plans are for the xcan v2, but I'd personally just get something with lots of power output and lowest impedance possible.  Planar Magnetics aren't really known for being picky about what type of amp they sound great out of, as long as it's low impedance with lots of power.  Good tube amps have really low output impedance too, but those can get really expensive.

I had no idea what the output impedance on the X-Can was when I bought it(bought it on the spot without listening or anything), I just found out a few minutes ago!  It does sounds really nice with the AKG, so it may stick with the AKG, so my plan is kind of blown as far as that goes.  I may get an Asgard 2 for the HE-400 and then the plan has been to get a pair of HD600 or HD650 for the Valhalla.  But as I said earlier I am enjoying the AKG on the Valhalla quite a bit, what I thought wasn't a good match has proven to be very musically satisfying, especially with 50's jazz and EDM.
 
I have owned and sold panel speakers before so I know the characteristics of the sound and the bass performance/purity
Not sure the HE-400 are for me yet.....

 

[haejuk]

As there is a lot of talk about output impedance I think I should point out that HE-400 has a totally flat impedance curve accross the entire spectrum at 50 ohms (Innerfidelity measured one at 50 ohms, but I see the spec sheet says 35.  Not sure which one is more up to date).  This means that the output impedance of the amp doesn't really have any effect on the electrical damping of the drivers like we usually see in dynamic driver headphones.  As another example, a lot of Grado headphones have a flat impedance curve making impedance matching with an amplifier less of a problem.  The HD-800 on the other hand has a 300 ohm impedance swing and this is the reason why they are so hard to drive.
 
Here is an excerpt of a post by songmic on the Denon DX000 amp thread:
 
"The formula for calculating this variation in dB is as follows: 20 * log[(Zmin+Zamp)*Zmax/(Zmax+Zamp)*Zmin], where Zmin is minimum impedance of headphone, Zmax is maximum impedance of headphone, and Zamp is the output impedance of the amp.
 
This result of this formula should be 1 or less to ensure there is no audible distortion caused by improper matching of impedance between headphone and amp. Due to the nature of this formula, the result becomes close to zero when 1. there is a large gap between Zmin (or Zmax) and Zamp, 2. there is a little gap between Zmin and Zmax, 3. the Zamp (output impedance of amp) is close to zero. Theoretically, if the impedance curve were ideally flay, meaning Zmin=Zmax, there would be completely zero distortion no matter how high the output impedance of the amp is. In other words, if the D7000 (or in this case the HE-400) had a constant resistance of 25 ohms throughout all frequency range, you could connect it to a 100 ohm-output impedance OTL amp and still have no distortion whatsoever."
 
So the only real thing to pay attention to is that there is enough power output at 50 ohms to drive the HE-400 to the levels that you want to listen at.

 

[ferday]

Quote:

As there is a lot of talk about output impedance I think I should point out that HE-400 has a totally flat impedance curve accross the entire spectrum at 50 ohms.  This means that the output impedance of the amp doesn't really have any effect on the electrical damping of the drivers like we usually see in dynamic driver headphones.  As another example, a lot of Grado headphones have a flat impedance curve making impedance matching with an amplifier less of a problem.  The HD-800 on the other hand has a 300 ohm impedance swing and this is the reason why they are so hard to drive.
 
 
 
 
 
So the only real thing to pay attention to is that there is enough power output at 50 ohms to drive the HE-400 to the levels that you want to listen at.

 
which is way less power requirements than most think (or so it seems).  my little fiio e17 would cause bleeding if i turned it up much past 70% (high gain) when hooked to the pc
but that's based on source too, netflix on my ipad requires almost 80% just to be loud enough
 
my magni/modi is supposed to arrive on monday, i'm excited LOL

 

[TMRaven]

Impedance mismatching not affecting the response curve of the he-400 isn't the problem here anyways.  You can still have less than ideal control of the driver if there's not that much of a ratio between output impedance of the amp and impedance of the headphone.

 

[jmsaxon69]

That X-Can v2 puts out 1 watt of Class A power
 
If there is a better reason for the lack of bass extension and weight I'd like to hear it, I'm all ears....
 
One other thing, I don't listen very loud, at least that's the impression I get after reading people talk about "concert levels"
 
I've been in the HiFi  biz for 25 years and still can hear pretty well for a reason, I know when too loud is too loud....

 

[haejuk]

The ratio of amp output impedence / headphone impedance is generally just a rule of thumb but does not take into account the whole picture.  The long winded stuff I posted above is the whole picture about amp/headphone impedance mismatching.  It should be impossible for impedance mismatch when using HE-400 because there is no difference between Z(min) and Z(max) of the headphone.  Of course this is also with dynamic driver headphones, there may be different rules all together with planars.  Someone in the Audeze thread posed this question straight to the manufacturer and they said output impedance doesn't matter at all due to the flat impedance curve of LCD2.  I assume the same rules can apply here.
 
Now about the Xcan V2, I have no experience with it, but do your other headphones sound good on it?  I am pretty sure that it shouldn't lack in power, but the official specs only say "Output power Typically 1W."  This doesn't say at what load they deliver 1W, but you would have to assume that a lower impedance load would deliver more power.  Then we get to the subject of the tubes being the culprit, possibly rolling off the bass on this amp.  Usually an impedance mismatch would just give you kind of a muddy sound, it wouldn't roll off the lows.

 

[jmsaxon69]

Quote:

The ratio of amp output impedance / headphone impedance is generally just a rule of thumb but does not take into account the whole picture.  The long winded stuff I posted above is the whole picture about amp/headphone impedance mismatching.  It should be impossible for impedance mismatch when using HE-400 because there is no difference between Z(min) and Z(max) of the headphone.  Of course this is also with dynamic driver headphones, there may be different rules all together with planars.  Someone in the Audeze thread posed this question straight to the manufacturer and they said output impedance doesn't matter at all due to the flat impedance curve of LCD2.  I assume the same rules can apply here.
 
Now about the Xcan V2, I have no experience with it, but do your other headphones sound good on it?  I am pretty sure that it shouldn't lack in power, but the official specs only say "Output power Typically 1W."  This doesn't say at what load they deliver 1W, but you would have to assume that a lower impedance load would deliver more power.  Then we get to the subject of the tubes being the culprit, possibly rolling off the bass on this amp.  Usually an impedance mismatch would just give you kind of a muddy sound, it wouldn't roll off the lows.

From an earlier post, maybe you didn't read that far back:
 
Ah, maybe the X-Can v2 is NOT such a great match for the HE-400.  I've been a little underwhelmed by the sub bass in the HE-400 after reading so much about how great it is. So, I plugged the K702-65 into the X-Can after listening to the HE-400 all morning (must have about 6 or so hours on the HE-400 already) and the Annies SMOKED 'em on the low bass.  I was using the Daft Punk track "Doin' it Right" off of random Access Memories and the AKG won easily as far as extension and weight goes. 
 
So, I was like "how can this be?".  I looked up the impedance specs for the X-Can and the HE-400 and it looks like a bad match maybe?
 
HE-400 - 35 ohm impedance, 92.5 db efficiency
K702 65th Anniv - 62 ohm impedance, 105 db efficiency
 
X-Can V2 reported output impedance - 33 ohm
 
Listening right now to DragonFly only and getting some good articulate bass with extension when necessary, very tuneful and accurate, no bloat or exaggeration.

 

[haejuk]

I did miss the part about the Annies smoking the HE-400 on the Xcan, despite reading it twice..  oops.  Maybe He-400 and Xcan V2 are a bad match.  Numbers can't explain everything.

 

[jmsaxon69]

Quote:

I did miss the part about the Annies smoking the HE-400 on the Xcan, despite reading it twice..  oops.  Maybe He-400 and Xcan V2 are a bad match.  Numbers can't explain everything.

True dat...Everything else is pretty great and I haven't been unhappy about the harshness every one talks about, I was scarred I was going to hate.  I've only heard one or two very small instances of it so far.

 

[jmsaxon69]

Also, for anyone wondering if the HE-400 can be run off an MP3 player, iPod, iPad or iPhone, yes it can and it sounds pretty good.  I just tried every i'Device I have plugged straight in and it sounds great! Will an amp sound better? Yes, but it is not mandatory by any means.  Volume has to be at 70% - 80% for good output, but I could live with it if I had to....

 

[jmsaxon69]

So I have been doing some experimentation and have figured out that the X-Can/HE-400 setup is producing a fizzy sound when the low bass hits, it's like it's fizzling out, iPod doesn't do it, DragonFly alone doesn't do it either, they just play the bass. Annies sound fine plugged into the X-can...Going to put the stock tubes back in the X-Can and see if that has any effect at all.  I think it's an impedance miss match though.

 

[davidsh]

Onl

That X-Can v2 puts out 1 watt of Class A power

If there is a better reason for the lack of bass extension and weight I'd like to hear it, I'm all ears....

One other thing, I don't listen very loud, at least that's the impression I get after reading people talk about "concert levels"

I've been in the HiFi  biz for 25 years and still can hear pretty well for a reason, I know when too loud is too loud....

I thought we were talking 100mW. I have the x-can v8 for the 500's btw.

 

[leicaboss]

I tried these headphones on today, and I loved them! Just wondering if y'all could check out this thread:
 
http://www.head-fi.org/t/673281/please-critique-budget-hi-fi-desktop-setup-5-700
 
Thanks!

 

[Omark12]

Sorry to bug about pads again, but has anyone done a comparison of all the possible pads for the HE-400. Like HM5s, pleather, velour, jerg, and this http://www.amazon.com/Sennheiser-Momentum-Black-Headphone/dp/B00AYT62FO/ref=sr_1_2?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1374394640&sr=1-2&keywords=momentum, etc.