[chrisnyc75]

So, I've been experimenting and analyzing.... my head knows that DNA Stellaris (2A3 tubes, rated 1.8W max, but likely more like 3W max) should not drive Susvara very well. But for the life of me my ears can't hear any failing. Sus gets QUITE loud enough for even what most would call "loud listening" with plenty of headroom to spare, and even with bass-heavy modern electronic music which should theoretically be where it fails, Susvara never falters and sounds only minimally less precise & impactful than on solid state (which I would attribute to the character of the amp, not the power supplied to Susvara). I would be really interested to hear from any other DNA amp owners who also own Susvara? Donald confessed when I was in the inquiry phase that his amps would drive "just about anything short of Susvara", but I'm here to tell you I think they drive Susvara EXCELLENTLY.

And not just that, combining the class leading staging & holography of Stellaris with the class leading resolution & imaging of Susvara is nothing short of jaw-dropping. I'm genuinely shocked - I went in to this accepting that Sus would probably not work with my tube amp, but I am very pleasantly surprised.

 

[jlbrach]

Find the word "equals" in my post. In fact, find me a word that starts with "e" other than "EQ". If buddy is waiting for the Susvara to fall to $2k, he should get the LCD-4 at $2k, EQ it, and enjoy possibly one of the best setups you an get at the price.

I also said that anyone who enjoys that headphone without EQ is one of three people. I did not say those people do not exist. If they did not exist, I would not have listed them.

The stock tuning of the LCD-4 is its own worst enemy. People too cool to EQ are its second worst.

ok,whatever

 

[Sand Dan Glokta]

Do it , you won't regret it. I think it's still on sale for under $900usd. By accident, I went into this Tokyo audio shop and was introduced by the shop owner to the hs-90a. Earlier that same day I took a listen to the Yamaha yh5000se at a nearby headphone store and was super displeased with their sound quality. Note the hs-90a comes with detachable wooden ear cups. It sounds better with them off as I don't think the headphones were designed to be closed. Shop owner told me the stock dual 3.5mm aren't good and to use aftermarket ones instead. Think about acuhorn or abbas dacs in how good they are at rendering instruments so real and natural , the hs-90a does something similar to that effect.

Ok, so they are open back. Nice. I would like to hear those cans. Further info will be welcome. Im curious because how their diaphragm works.

 

[paradoxper]

Do it , you won't regret it. I think it's still on sale for under $900usd. By accident, I went into this Tokyo audio shop and was introduced by the shop owner to the hs-90a. Earlier that same day I took a listen to the Yamaha yh5000se at a nearby headphone store and was super displeased with their sound quality. Note the hs-90a comes with detachable wooden ear cups. It sounds better with them off as I don't think the headphones were designed to be closed. Shop owner told me the stock dual 3.5mm aren't good and to use aftermarket ones instead. Think about acuhorn or abbas dacs in how good they are at rendering instruments so real and natural , the hs-90a does something similar to that effect.

@arnaud have you heard of Rogers?

 

[Polygonhell]

I would be really interested to hear from any other DNA amp owners who also own Susvara?

I had a V3 Stratus (one of the last ones made. I've since moved on from it, but my impression of the Susvara on it, was it was OK, got it plenty loud even with a lot of quieter DSD material, but always felt constrained. FWIW the Eddie Current Studio T has a similar issue though not as bad, despite putting out closer the 6W into 8 Ohms.

Now I've been working on a 2A3 amp for the last couple of months, just finished moving the PSU into it's final resting place, and when I designed and built it, I intended to swap to a transformer designed to drive a 64 Ohm load, assuming the Susvara would be constrained in the same way without that.
But it simply isn't the case running with a transformer designed to drive an 8 Ohm load, it keeps surprising me how good the Susvara sounds on it, none of the light bass constrained stage I heard on the Stratus. Now my design is quite different to Donalds with both stages directly coupled (no capacitors), but I doubt that is the reason.
My Amp does have an absolutely MASSIVELY over sized and engineered PSU, and the output transformers are also very oversized.

My suspicion is it's the oversized output transformers being able to store more energy in the primary, and I suspect it might be true of the big AN transformers Donald uses in the Stellaris. I haven't heard a V4 Stratus or a Stellaris with the Susvara.

FWIW as configured right now, my amp puts out a bit over 3W into 8 Ohms , and probably closer to 1W into 60 Ohms, output power doesn't scale linearly because increasing the impedance on the output increases the gain of the amp.
I have some Lundahl transformers I will eventually try, here designed to put those 3W into 64 Ohms, but it's sounded so good to this point I've been reluctant to arse around to make the change.

 

[jjshin23]

So, I've been experimenting and analyzing.... my head knows that DNA Stellaris (2A3 tubes, rated 1.8W max, but likely more like 3W max) should not drive Susvara very well. But for the life of me my ears can't hear any failing. Sus gets QUITE loud enough for even what most would call "loud listening" with plenty of headroom to spare, and even with bass-heavy modern electronic music which should theoretically be where it fails, Susvara never falters and sounds only minimally less precise & impactful than on solid state (which I would attribute to the character of the amp, not the power supplied to Susvara). I would be really interested to hear from any other DNA amp owners who also own Susvara? Donald confessed when I was in the inquiry phase that his amps would drive "just about anything short of Susvara", but I'm here to tell you I think they drive Susvara EXCELLENTLY.

And not just that, combining the class leading staging & holography of Stellaris with the class leading resolution & imaging of Susvara is nothing short of jaw-dropping. I'm genuinely shocked - I went in to this accepting that Sus would probably not work with my tube amp, but I am very pleasantly surprised.

Have a Stratus and it sounds very good off of it as well. I have put the volume up to around 5 and around 7 it starts to distort but I wouldn't listen to it that loud. On a Stellaris I'm sure it is even better in all aspects with the step up.

The Red October sounds a little better but it is with better tubes. Elrog and WE300 tubes are a step up from the EML 2a3 in the Stratus. The Stratus is mainly for the JAR800 which is amazing off of it. The regular HD800 is very good as well but the JAR800 takes it further.

The Sus usually is played off the Red October or CFA3 for most of the listening. The DNA amps can hold their own against most amps out there.

 

[skhan007]

One of my buddies told me he heard the Susvara with the Woo WA22 at a meet, and he said it drove them nicely to average listening levels. Curious if any of you could confirm? I have this amp and would love to know how it pairs. Since I’m a low volume listener, I’m curious if the WA22 would be sufficient.

 

[chrisnyc75]

I had a V3 Stratus (one of the last ones made. I've since moved on from it, but my impression of the Susvara on it, was it was OK, got it plenty loud even with a lot of quieter DSD material, but always felt constrained. FWIW the Eddie Current Studio T has a similar issue though not as bad, despite putting out closer the 6W into 8 Ohms.

Now I've been working on a 2A3 amp for the last couple of months, just finished moving the PSU into it's final resting place, and when I designed and built it, I intended to swap to a transformer designed to drive a 64 Ohm load, assuming the Susvara would be constrained in the same way without that.
But it simply isn't the case running with a transformer designed to drive an 8 Ohm load, it keeps surprising me how good the Susvara sounds on it, none of the light bass constrained stage I heard on the Stratus. Now my design is quite different to Donalds with both stages directly coupled (no capacitors), but I doubt that is the reason.
My Amp does have an absolutely MASSIVELY over sized and engineered PSU, and the output transformers are also very oversized.

My suspicion is it's the oversized output transformers being able to store more energy in the primary, and I suspect it might be true of the big AN transformers Donald uses in the Stellaris. I haven't heard a V4 Stratus or a Stellaris with the Susvara.

FWIW as configured right now, my amp puts out a bit over 3W into 8 Ohms , and probably closer to 1W into 60 Ohms, output power doesn't scale linearly because increasing the impedance on the output increases the gain of the amp.
I have some Lundahl transformers I will eventually try, here designed to put those 3W into 64 Ohms, but it's sounded so good to this point I've been reluctant to arse around to make the change.

The output transformers....interesting. I don't understand nearly enough of the electrical engineering bits to truly appreciate what this means, but it sounds like a solid theory to me. Really interesting insights, thanks for sharing.

Have a Stratus and it sounds very good off of it as well. I have put the volume up to around 5 and around 7 it starts to distort but I wouldn't listen to it that loud. On a Stellaris I'm sure it is even better in all aspects with the step up.

The Red October sounds a little better but it is with better tubes. Elrog and WE300 tubes are a step up from the EML 2a3 in the Stratus. The Stratus is mainly for the JAR800 which is amazing off of it. The regular HD800 is very good as well but the JAR800 takes it further.

The Sus usually is played off the Red October or CFA3 for most of the listening. The DNA amps can hold their own against most amps out there.

I have no doubt Red October drives it better - 300B is basically a double powered 2A3. On Stellaris, I can listen at optimal volume & dynamics at 8 on the volume pot. At 9 it's uncomfortable, and at 10 it's deafening.

 

[jlemaster1957]

One of my buddies told me he heard the Susvara with the Woo WA22 at a meet, and he said it drove them nicely to average listening levels. Curious if any of you could confirm? I have this amp and would love to know how it pairs. Since I’m a low volume listener, I’m curious if the WA22 would be sufficient.

This has in fact been extensively discussed in this thread, if you ‘search this thread’ for ‘WA22’ you can read many user impressions. There may be more recent ones among those more recently joining the thread.

 

[MilitaryHifi]

It finally arrived!!!

Been waiting for this for a while, back in February I contacted hifiman to purchase a refurbished 3.5mm Susvara. After dealing with the wonderful Bob of hifiman service department, it arrived at my mail box. Bob assured me it would arrive this week while Im on Spring leave, right before we have to do some overseas training next month. Now I get to enjoy the glorious, legendary, need no introductions Susvara.

I've never heard the Susvara before, read hundreds of articles, watched all the video reviews, and enjoyed all the entertaining post on this headphone. I do have to say reading the different post of the forum, made me stop short from getting this headphone a long time ago. I told myself, once I feel my chain is ready, then I will purchase one. I finally felt my chain was ready and now I'm going to listen to the heavens open up before me.

I have 5 more days off, so its going to be one memorable 5 days.
I thank everyone here. This thread guided me and got me to this point.

Time for that moment I've been waiting for since I started this journey.

 

[Mystel]

So, I've been experimenting and analyzing.... my head knows that DNA Stellaris (2A3 tubes, rated 1.8W max, but likely more like 3W max) should not drive Susvara very well. But for the life of me my ears can't hear any failing. Sus gets QUITE loud enough for even what most would call "loud listening" with plenty of headroom to spare, and even with bass-heavy modern electronic music which should theoretically be where it fails, Susvara never falters and sounds only minimally less precise & impactful than on solid state (which I would attribute to the character of the amp, not the power supplied to Susvara). I would be really interested to hear from any other DNA amp owners who also own Susvara? Donald confessed when I was in the inquiry phase that his amps would drive "just about anything short of Susvara", but I'm here to tell you I think they drive Susvara EXCELLENTLY.

And not just that, combining the class leading staging & holography of Stellaris with the class leading resolution & imaging of Susvara is nothing short of jaw-dropping. I'm genuinely shocked - I went in to this accepting that Sus would probably not work with my tube amp, but I am very pleasantly surprised.

Intersting , considering we use the same HP amps (Bliss/Stellaris) .
I find that the Stellaris lacks the control that a higher current/more powerful amp like the Bliss/Pass Speaker amps can provide .
For the Susvara, everything just sounds a little too bloated and relatively distorted at higher volumes with the Stellaris. Could be a chain/tube synergy thing perhaps?

 

[theveterans]

Intersting , considering we use the same HP amps (Bliss/Stellaris) .
I find that the Stellaris lacks the control that a higher current/more powerful amp like the Bliss/Pass Speaker amps can provide .
For the Susvara, everything just sounds a little too bloated and relatively distorted at higher volumes with the Stellaris. Could be a chain/tube synergy thing perhaps?

Not the right tube amp for it. It needs current for that control and Stellaris isn't able to provide that. You can make Susvara loud since tubes have high gain and high voltage, but not enough current for that iron grip in the control department. You'd have a better tube experience with 300B amps like the Envy or WA33 Elite or hybrid amps like Riviera AIC-10 and to a lesser extent the Kallyste Amethyst

 

[walterboss]

Took delivery of a DHC Chimera this morning. The thing is an absolute beast.

Biggest improvement is surely the midrange. Drums more resonant and analogue sounding. Natural.
Guitar tones much nicer (yeah, I don't have the vocab for this, sorry!), more space between instruments. When you stop analysing the constituent parts and take in the whole, you realise how big a difference it makes.

The stock cable was very decent, but for me, this was a great upgrade.

Shoutout to @orrman for the Classifieds sale

 

[IanB52]

Took delivery of a DHC Chimera this morning. The thing is an absolute beast.

Biggest improvement is surely the midrange. Drums more resonant and analogue sounding. Natural.
Guitar tones much nicer (yeah, I don't have the vocab for this, sorry!), more space between instruments. When you stop analysing the constituent parts and take in the whole, you realise how big a difference it makes.

The stock cable was very decent, but for me, this was a great upgrade.

Shoutout to @orrman for the Classifieds sale

Amazing find! I can't believe anybody would sell a Chimera.

 

[number1sixerfan]

The Sus usually is played off the Red October or CFA3 for most of the listening. The DNA amps can hold their own against most amps out there.

The Red October is an amp I'd love to hear. Do you find it to be more of a different flavor w/various tradeoffs in favor of each vs. the CFA3 w/the Susvara, or do you find it a solid, clear step ahead? Not looking for too much detail or to derail the thread, just curious as it's rare people have heard it.