Brendo09
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- Jun 5, 2013
- Posts
- 41
- Likes
- 12
Hi there. I'm new here, and have a bit to say on a few things, but I do get the feeling I'm in over my head on the technical stuff.
I bought some 'phones to play my guitar through, via a Line 6 UX1. I'll list how things have progressed....
1. Koss UR-10. I paid $70 for these (I'm in Australia, so that's about $12.50 for a US set). I thought I was in heaven, coming from the stupid little plastic buds you get from the newsagents. The guitar sounded fine, but because the little Kossies were supra-aural (I've learned that term since being here. Cheers) they leaked a little bit of sound, and I didn't want that. So I ponied up and went to...
2. Sennheiser HD-202. Again, I paid $80 for them, and they did me proud for about 12 months. Circum-aural (technical as, hey) and they had a pretty good sound to them.
After this my wife and I had a bunch of little kids, so the time to play guitar wasn't there any more. I started using the Sennheisers for music, mainly through my Galaxy-S. I liked them, but I was thinking, there must be something else, yeah? Years of amp churning, pickup churning, and guitar churning meant that turning over things to find something better was in my nature. I started using MP3's at work, then converted my CD collection to FLAC and played them via Foobar, and used the audio out for the phone plug. It was better than the MP3, but there had to be something else.
3. Aune X1 Mini DAC. This thing blew the sound right up, and threw all the individual parts into my head. Lovely, and it lifted the quality of the sound through the Senn's to a new level. If this thing made them sound that good, then what would it do to better cans?
4. Blaupunkt CN112. My first semi decent phones. I didn't particularly want the noise cancelling feature, but given where I lived, there was these and some ****ty Sony's. So I went with these. Luckily for me, they also work as passive phones. Circum-aural, they killed off the background noise at work, and they sounded great. I thought this was it. But I wanted something to sit in the car to listen to during lunch breaks, so I went back to the same little shop and bought ....
5. Yoga CD-680. These were really cheap phones, and a step down from the Blaupunkt (and the Senn's) but they were the best circum-aural phones in the shop under $30.
6. Koss TBSE-1. On a whim I went searching for something worth some dollars, looking for open backed cans, but I couldn't find anything in the regional town I live near. I was trying some phones in a HiFi store, and these caught my eye. I tried a few songs through my Galaxy S3 (Painter Song - Nora Jones, Hyper-Ballad - Bjork, Immigrant Song - Led Zep, A New England - Billy Bragg) and these opened up my eyes. The bass was low, the mids were great, there was enough highs to lick the deliciousness off the tunes. I grabbed them quickly, but I still hadn't satiated my open can urges. So...
7. Allesandro MS-1. Mmmmm. Tasty goodness. In fact, even my wife, who is a country Alan Jackson, Kasey Chambers, Zac Brown Band kind of gal, went quiet for three tracks just listening. She thought they were worth every cent. I love these things. I bought the bowl pads as well. Now, in my quest to get things good at home and at work, I've gone and got...
8. Aune T-1 DAC full of tubey goodness. It hasn't arrived yet, but when it does, I'll switch the X1 Mini from work. That can take over the home duties (TV and Foobar tunes) with the Allesandro MS-1's and the tubey goodness of the T-1 will have the Koss TBSE-1's at work.
So that's the journey so far. I'm now looking at ATH-AD900x's, and Grado 225i's, and Beyerdynamic DT-440's and I'm concerned that my kids will have to miss out on meals soon.
Thanks for all the info I've gathered from here. Have fun, kids.
I bought some 'phones to play my guitar through, via a Line 6 UX1. I'll list how things have progressed....
1. Koss UR-10. I paid $70 for these (I'm in Australia, so that's about $12.50 for a US set). I thought I was in heaven, coming from the stupid little plastic buds you get from the newsagents. The guitar sounded fine, but because the little Kossies were supra-aural (I've learned that term since being here. Cheers) they leaked a little bit of sound, and I didn't want that. So I ponied up and went to...
2. Sennheiser HD-202. Again, I paid $80 for them, and they did me proud for about 12 months. Circum-aural (technical as, hey) and they had a pretty good sound to them.
After this my wife and I had a bunch of little kids, so the time to play guitar wasn't there any more. I started using the Sennheisers for music, mainly through my Galaxy-S. I liked them, but I was thinking, there must be something else, yeah? Years of amp churning, pickup churning, and guitar churning meant that turning over things to find something better was in my nature. I started using MP3's at work, then converted my CD collection to FLAC and played them via Foobar, and used the audio out for the phone plug. It was better than the MP3, but there had to be something else.
3. Aune X1 Mini DAC. This thing blew the sound right up, and threw all the individual parts into my head. Lovely, and it lifted the quality of the sound through the Senn's to a new level. If this thing made them sound that good, then what would it do to better cans?
4. Blaupunkt CN112. My first semi decent phones. I didn't particularly want the noise cancelling feature, but given where I lived, there was these and some ****ty Sony's. So I went with these. Luckily for me, they also work as passive phones. Circum-aural, they killed off the background noise at work, and they sounded great. I thought this was it. But I wanted something to sit in the car to listen to during lunch breaks, so I went back to the same little shop and bought ....
5. Yoga CD-680. These were really cheap phones, and a step down from the Blaupunkt (and the Senn's) but they were the best circum-aural phones in the shop under $30.
6. Koss TBSE-1. On a whim I went searching for something worth some dollars, looking for open backed cans, but I couldn't find anything in the regional town I live near. I was trying some phones in a HiFi store, and these caught my eye. I tried a few songs through my Galaxy S3 (Painter Song - Nora Jones, Hyper-Ballad - Bjork, Immigrant Song - Led Zep, A New England - Billy Bragg) and these opened up my eyes. The bass was low, the mids were great, there was enough highs to lick the deliciousness off the tunes. I grabbed them quickly, but I still hadn't satiated my open can urges. So...
7. Allesandro MS-1. Mmmmm. Tasty goodness. In fact, even my wife, who is a country Alan Jackson, Kasey Chambers, Zac Brown Band kind of gal, went quiet for three tracks just listening. She thought they were worth every cent. I love these things. I bought the bowl pads as well. Now, in my quest to get things good at home and at work, I've gone and got...
8. Aune T-1 DAC full of tubey goodness. It hasn't arrived yet, but when it does, I'll switch the X1 Mini from work. That can take over the home duties (TV and Foobar tunes) with the Allesandro MS-1's and the tubey goodness of the T-1 will have the Koss TBSE-1's at work.
So that's the journey so far. I'm now looking at ATH-AD900x's, and Grado 225i's, and Beyerdynamic DT-440's and I'm concerned that my kids will have to miss out on meals soon.
Thanks for all the info I've gathered from here. Have fun, kids.
