[gugman]

Hi all
 
few weeks ago I became proud member of the club
 
but I am facing a hard decision now - from day one I realized that O2 amp by mayflower is just not enough for these headphones (almost in any aspect) 
 
my source is PC (95% of my music collection is in flac, plus Tidal premium) via usb to schiit wyrd after via usb again either to spitfire hd dac by firestone audio or modi dac by schiit and after via rca to O2 
 
so i am looking for a new amp (even used one is ok) in a region of 500usd, after reading a lot for more than 2 weeks still can't decide, so far have few options:
 
gustrad h10
lyr 2
meier corda classic or jazz
little dot mkiii
either project polaris or ember 
Violectric HPA V90
maybe even Matrix Audio M-Stage HPA-3U
 
any help/advise will be highly appreciated
 
thanx !!! 

 

[DavidA]

  Hi all
 
few weeks ago I became proud member of the club
 
but I am facing a hard decision now - from day one I realized that O2 amp by mayflower is just not enough for these headphones (almost in any aspect) 
 
my source is PC (95% of my music collection is in flac, plus Tidal premium) via usb to schiit wyrd after via usb again either to spitfire hd dac by firestone audio or modi dac by schiit and after via rca to O2 
 
so i am looking for a new amp (even used one is ok) in a region of 500usd, after reading a lot for more than 2 weeks still can't decide, so far have few options:
 
gustrad h10
lyr 2
meier corda classic or jazz
little dot mkiii
either project polaris or ember 
Violectric HPA V90
maybe even Matrix Audio M-Stage HPA-3U
 
any help/advise will be highly appreciated
 
thanx !!! 

I have Lyr2 and Project Ember and have heard H-10, my choice for HE-400i would be 1) Ember, 2) H-10, 3) Lyr2
 
1. Ember is the one of the most versatile amps around and will work with many different headphones and pairs well with HE-400i
 
2. H-10 is a great SS amp that has a tube sound, it has lots of power to spare, works quite well with HE-400i
 
3. Lyr2 is one of the most powerful amps, depending on tubes it can be really good but the tubes can get pricy.

 

[gugman]

 
I have Lyr2 and Project Ember and have heard H-10, my choice for HE-400i would be 1) Ember, 2) H-10, 3) Lyr2
 
1. Ember is the one of the most versatile amps around and will work with many different headphones and pairs well with HE-400i
 
2. H-10 is a great SS amp that has a tube sound, it has lots of power to spare, works quite well with HE-400i
 
3. Lyr2 is one of the most powerful amps, depending on tubes it can be really good but the tubes can get pricy.

 Thank you so much for your post !!! definitely will be considering all your advises before final decision, will wait for some more ideas from other members as well, but I think most of them will agree with you
by the way I am not limited by the list I posted, if I missed some good options please just let me know 

 

[MrMateoHead]

  Hi all
 
few weeks ago I became proud member of the club
 
but I am facing a hard decision now - from day one I realized that O2 amp by mayflower is just not enough for these headphones (almost in any aspect) 
 
my source is PC (95% of my music collection is in flac, plus Tidal premium) via usb to schiit wyrd after via usb again either to spitfire hd dac by firestone audio or modi dac by schiit and after via rca to O2 
 
so i am looking for a new amp (even used one is ok) in a region of 500usd, after reading a lot for more than 2 weeks still can't decide, so far have few options:
 
gustrad h10
lyr 2
meier corda classic or jazz
little dot mkiii
either project polaris or ember 
Violectric HPA V90
maybe even Matrix Audio M-Stage HPA-3U
 
any help/advise will be highly appreciated
 
thanx !!! 

Just wondering what about the O2 is not enough for the 400i. I have the less efficient HE-400s and the O2 has typically been more than enough to drive them.

 

[q2klepto]

 
Just wondering what about the O2 is not enough for the 400i. I have the less efficient HE-400s and the O2 has typically been more than enough to drive them.

 
Wondering that as well - the O2 should drive the 400i to ear splitting levels.  
 
In any case - Audio-gd nfb15 is what i use and its great with it. It currently drives my HD800 untill im able to get a Valhalla2 or maybe go balanced. 

 

[gugman]

 
Just wondering what about the O2 is not enough for the 400i. I have the less efficient HE-400s and the O2 has typically been more than enough to drive them.

 
 

   
Wondering that as well - the O2 should drive the 400i to ear splitting levels.  
 
In any case - Audio-gd nfb15 is what i use and its great with it. It currently drives my HD800 untill im able to get a Valhalla2 or maybe go balanced. 

 
hmm, how to explain what i mean ? it sounds "cheap" ? tiny? there is no "authority" ? lows are almost nonexistent ? there is enough of volume (if that is what you meant by drive) but the quality of it is very unsatisfactory to me
for instance when I plug 400i into my yamaha av receiver it becomes much "beefier" ? of course in this case sound stage is compromised but anyway that receiver is not for headphones but is a part of home theater system
now when I use O2 with m50x it is more or less ok, but I realized this amp is not for me 
as english is not my native language I hope you all understood what I meant  

 

[snellemin]

   
 
 
hmm, how to explain what i mean ? it sounds "cheap" ? tiny? there is no "authority" ? lows are almost nonexistent ? there is enough of volume (if that is what you meant by drive) but the quality of it is very unsatisfactory to me
for instance when I plug 400i into my yamaha av receiver it becomes much "beefier" ? of course in this case sound stage is compromised but anyway that receiver is not for headphones but is a part of home theater system
now when I use O2 with m50x it is more or less ok, but I realized this amp is not for me 
as english is not my native language I hope you all understood what I meant  

Why don't you try to hook up the 400I straight to your Yamaha receiver speaker outputs and see if you like the sound better.  I run mine of an old NAD amplifier and the headphones come alive with full "authority".  

 

[q2klepto]

   
 
 
hmm, how to explain what i mean ? it sounds "cheap" ? tiny? there is no "authority" ? lows are almost nonexistent ? there is enough of volume (if that is what you meant by drive) but the quality of it is very unsatisfactory to me
for instance when I plug 400i into my yamaha av receiver it becomes much "beefier" ? of course in this case sound stage is compromised but anyway that receiver is not for headphones but is a part of home theater system
now when I use O2 with m50x it is more or less ok, but I realized this amp is not for me 
as english is not my native language I hope you all understood what I meant  

 
Youre confident you can blind test this and its not expectation bias between your O2 & Yamaha receiever? See if you can level match it with a phone db app or something and have a friend switch them behind your back. 

400i impedance graph is a flat ruler and the O2 mayflower says it outputs 633mW@32Ohm (Tyll needed 590mW to hit 90db http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/HiFiMANHE4002014.pdf)  - not sure if thats sustained or peak so it might be underpowered for a planar..but im not sure

If i were to buy an amp for the 400i again - i would go with the audio-gd or project ember ..then maybe the gustard/lyr2

 

[MrMateoHead]

 
400i impedance graph is a flat ruler and the O2 mayflower says it outputs 633mW@32Ohm (Tyll needed 590mW to hit 90db http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/HiFiMANHE4002014.pdf)  - not sure if thats sustained or peak so it might be underpowered for a planar..but im not sure

If i were to buy an amp for the 400i again - i would go with the audio-gd or project ember ..then maybe the gustard/lyr2

633 mW is at high THD, realistically the O2 is super-clean @ around 200 mWs (I am not bothering to look up the exact values).
 
And unless I am reading the Pdf Totally wrong, to hit 90 dB Tyll needed 0.59 mWs - or just over a half a milliwatt. In other words, not even 1/1000th of a watt to drive the things to 90 dB which is LOUD. Only needed 0.33 mWs for the HE-400, so it would seem that the new 400i's do want twice the power for the same volume.
 
My guess is, like the HE-400 you would push the 400i's into distortion before you could clip the O2 into it. So the O2 has the headroom, presumably, unless you want to go deaf. But then again (I don't know the THD with velour pads which I use), the 400's clearly distort at volume in the midrange at levels that I would think can be audible.

 

[MrMateoHead]

  hmm, how to explain what i mean ? it sounds "cheap" ? tiny? there is no "authority" ? lows are almost nonexistent ? there is enough of volume (if that is what you meant by drive) but the quality of it is very unsatisfactory to me
for instance when I plug 400i into my yamaha av receiver it becomes much "beefier" ? of course in this case sound stage is compromised but anyway that receiver is not for headphones but is a part of home theater system
now when I use O2 with m50x it is more or less ok, but I realized this amp is not for me 
as english is not my native language I hope you all understood what I meant  

That's what I thought - you must not like the headphones that much. Your "beefy" Yamaha is probably inferior to the O2 but then again sometimes what we believe is more important than what we could prove.

 

[gugman]

   
Youre confident you can blind test this and its not expectation bias between your O2 & Yamaha receiever? See if you can level match it with a phone db app or something and have a friend switch them behind your back. 

400i impedance graph is a flat ruler and the O2 mayflower says it outputs 633mW@32Ohm (Tyll needed 590mW to hit 90db http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/HiFiMANHE4002014.pdf)  - not sure if thats sustained or peak so it might be underpowered for a planar..but im not sure

If i were to buy an amp for the 400i again - i would go with the audio-gd or project ember ..then maybe the gustard/lyr2

 
Yes I am ! there is a huge difference in sound stage as I already wrote, though yamaha is much "beefier" in terms of clarity and sound stage it can't stand its ground against O2, lot of details just disappear with yamaha and that you realize momentarily  
 

  633 mW is at high THD, realistically the O2 is super-clean @ around 200 mWs (I am not bothering to look up the exact values).
 
And unless I am reading the Pdf Totally wrong, to hit 90 dB Tyll needed 0.59 mWs - or just over a half a milliwatt. In other words, not even 1/1000th of a watt to drive the things to 90 dB which is LOUD. Only needed 0.33 mWs for the HE-400, so it would seem that the new 400i's do want twice the power for the same volume.
 
My guess is, like the HE-400 you would push the 400i's into distortion before you could clip the O2 into it. So the O2 has the headroom, presumably, unless you want to go deaf. But then again (I don't know the THD with velour pads which I use), the 400's clearly distort at volume in the midrange at levels that I would think can be audible.

 
 

  That's what I thought - you must not like the headphones that much. Your "beefy" Yamaha is probably inferior to the O2 but then again sometimes what we believe is more important than what we could prove.

as I already wrote I don't have problem with volume level but the quality and to be honest I like my headphones so much that I am willing to spend some more money and get new amp  
by the way I did not say that yamaha sounded better, as already mentioned many details disappear while using it as a headphone amp, but if O2 could have yamaha's "balls" then I would be happy with that amp  

 

[gugman]

  Why don't you try to hook up the 400I straight to your Yamaha receiver speaker outputs and see if you like the sound better.  I run mine of an old NAD amplifier and the headphones come alive with full "authority".  

that sounds interesting , I just never did that before, need to find out how and will try

 

[q2klepto]

From what i gather the 400i doesnt scale as well with amps as other cans.  But i do think the 400i should be paired with something better than the O2 Mayflower ..like the Ember, i wouldnt go too crazy tho

 

[richard51]

the Ember  is very good... more good with 6sn7 tubes.....very very very good with  the 7193 tubes

 

[mistersprinkles]

 
I have Lyr2 and Project Ember and have heard H-10, my choice for HE-400i would be 1) Ember, 2) H-10, 3) Lyr2
 
1. Ember is the one of the most versatile amps around and will work with many different headphones and pairs well with HE-400i
 
2. H-10 is a great SS amp that has a tube sound, it has lots of power to spare, works quite well with HE-400i
 
3. Lyr2 is one of the most powerful amps, depending on tubes it can be really good but the tubes can get pricy.

 
Hi David, I have 400i's and I am in search of an amp. Currently I use the HP output on my marantz PM5005. It is highly mediocre. I don't want the hassle of having to buy and change out tubes. How much better is the Ember than the H10? If it is more than 25% better I think I will go against my better judgement and get the Ember. Ideally though, I'd like to get the H10 and be happy with it, as it has been suggested to me many times.
 
Also, a side question, I have XLR out on my DAC and RCA out on my PM5005. Should I use the XLR on the DAC to connect to the H10, as it has XLR inputs?