JDS Labs ATOM Amp

[nlowran]

Could this drive the Aeon's?

 

[BobG55]

My JDS Labs lineup is as follows :

O2 &/ or Atom Amp > OL DAC > Subjective 3 and I really like the sound considering the overall price. All of my headphones sound very good w/ this lineup : HD600, HD650, Q701/ Austria, HE500, RS1 w/ buttons & GS1000i.

Personally I prefer these affordable JDS Labs products to the Schiit affordable products which, I have also owned but never really liked.

 

[ckhirnigs113]

@BobG55 Have you developed a preference between the Atom and O2 yet or does it depend on the headphones being used?

 

[bequietjk]

I am super satisfied with the high gain and powering my HD600's. When it comes to high gain I'm always skeptical and have this weird feeling that it isn't good, or that I'm sacrificing somewhere for more power. But the 600's sound clean and slightly warm on the Atom. If I didn't invest so much into my Project Horizon I would be just fine and more than content with my Atom. Easy power driving the 58X. Such a good value amp.

 

[BobG55]

@BobG55 Have you developed a preference between the Atom and O2 yet or does it depend on the headphones being used?

I find the Atom to be an overall warmer sounding amp & the O2 to be a more dynamic sounding amp. Both are pretty good with it comes to detail. They also both do well with all of my headphones. I haven't truly focused on how which headphone sounds with which amp since I've only had the Atom for about a week.

What I would say though is that both amps sound quite good with well produced music regardless of the headphone I'm using. As I stated at the beginning of my answer the Atom is definitely a warmer sounding amp, to my ears. I'll need more time and focus on which headphones I'm listening to to give a better & more accurate answer to your question ckhirnings113.

 

[Emmett]

Would this be a good combination with a DAP (Pioneer XPD-30R)? It looks like I could just run a 3.5 cable from the dap to the 3.5 input of the Atom.

Aldo would this be a good way to connect to my PC with the same connection?

 

[Bmxant]

I got my JDS Atom the other day as an amp replacement for my Xonar STX. Was on a budget, so I'm still using the Xonar as a dac using RCA cables. My problem is that I'm experiencing clipping and there's pretty much no bass unless I'm at a REALLY loud volume.

Can the Xonar's DAC not handle the Atom? The volume fluctuations are really friggin annoying.

TR-X00 Ebony / Xonar STX / JDS Atom

 

[bequietjk]

I wonder if it has to do with settings in the Xonar software?

 

[Bmxant]

I wonder if it has to do with settings in the Xonar software?

Not sure to be honest, I've tried a lot of different combinations of settings. Google is telling me nothing too, I think I've searched every possible word combination for the issue.

This Xonar card is also around 9 years old, maybe it can't handle load anymore?

 

[HoHGamer]

I got my JDS Atom the other day as an amp replacement for my Xonar STX. Was on a budget, so I'm still using the Xonar as a dac using RCA cables. My problem is that I'm experiencing clipping and there's pretty much no bass unless I'm at a REALLY loud volume.

Can the Xonar's DAC not handle the Atom? The volume fluctuations are really friggin annoying.

TR-X00 Ebony / Xonar STX / JDS Atom

I was able to solve the clipping issues by using Equalizer APO, (Peace version) and ticking the prevent clipping option.
I was also able to eliminate clipping using low gain and increasing the preamplification till i was able to achieve a comfortable volume on the Atom.
Both options work well, however the aforementioned one has a better amplification.

I am using the Quincy Jones AKG's so bass is a tiny bit better than your other AKG 700 series options from my understanding of other reviews of the entire series, but i was also able to achieve a better bass using this equalizer by running my preferred bass and high boost preset option.

 

[Bmxant]

I was able to solve the clipping issues by using Equalizer APO, (Peace version) and ticking the prevent clipping option.
I was also able to eliminate clipping using low gain and increasing the preamplification till i was able to achieve a comfortable volume on the Atom.
Both options work well, however the aforementioned one has a better amplification.

I am using the Quincy Jones AKG's so bass is a tiny bit better than your other AKG 700 series options from my understanding of other reviews of the entire series, but i was also able to achieve a better bass using this equalizer by running my preferred bass and high boost preset option.

It keeps pushing pre-amplification down to where it's defeating the purpose of trying to get acceptable bass. The bass was cut in half coming from the Xonar's amp with the same EQ, maybe even less than half to be honest. My Ultrasone 2500 Pro's have more bass than my X00's do at the moment. The odd thing is that there's no clipping using my Xonar card without the Atom.

I'll play with the pre-amp setting again and try to increase it instead of letting it automatically decrease.

Thanks for the reply!

 

[HoHGamer]

It keeps pushing pre-amplification down to where it's defeating the purpose of trying to get acceptable bass. The bass was cut in half coming from the Xonar's amp with the same EQ, maybe even less than half to be honest. My Ultrasone 2500 Pro's have more bass than my X00's do at the moment. The odd thing is that there's no clipping using my Xonar card without the Atom.

I'll play with the pre-amp setting again and try to increase it instead of letting it automatically decrease.

Thanks for the reply!

You'll have to use the EQ to add bass as you prefer, i just use the preset Bass+High Boost.
One of the downsides to that particular software is it wont show you exactly what frequency bands are clipping so you can adjust it without making it a guessing game.
If anyone knows of a EQ software capable of that and doesn't cost a ton lmk.

 

[Bmxant]

You'll have to use the EQ to add bass as you prefer, i just use the preset Bass+High Boost.
One of the downsides to that particular software is it wont show you exactly what frequency bands are clipping so you can adjust it without making it a guessing game.
If anyone knows of a EQ software capable of that and doesn't cost a ton lmk.

The only way to get it to stop clipping is to remove EQ, and without EQ there's almost no bass at all, it actually sounds like a cheap K-mart headset when using the amp, so I'm not sure what's wrong. When I had the CTH I experienced the same clipping issue too, but there's never any clipping when plugged directly into the Xonar.

Edit: It sounds a bit better with a 5+db 140hz Low shelf filter, but it's still...erm.."off"

 

[waynes world]

I have the Massdrop Grace SDAC and I'm looking for an amp to pair with it.

Anyone using the SDAC + Atom?

 

[corgifall]

Been using the atom with my smsl su-8 the past few days. Brightest amp I’ve heard compared to the liquid spark, fiio q5 and p20 amp I have. While I’m not a huge fan of bright sounding audio equipment I do like the detail I hear through it. I do have a complaint about how crappy the knob is and how bad the channel imbalance is. I have to have the right channel +2 dB and it’s irritating. My other amps don’t exhibit this problem. Easy fix though via the windows driver though.