Klipsch HP-3
Apr 12, 2020 at 6:29 AM Post #31 of 616
I have the Klipsch amp and have tried to use hp-3 with balanced xlr. I get so much more volume out of xlr even with low gain and unbearable high volumes high gain. With xlr i can turn the knob only to a max 11 o'clock. Also to me seems that heritage amp seems to make listening fatiguing. I much prefer to use my hp-3 with my portable xdsd with burrbrown dac. Is there anytjing reasonable to exlplain this? How can you use high gain with balanced?
If you are perceiving becoming fatigued that is entirely possible. Our hearing brain is a complex system, and very personal so there is always difference between individuals. This means that even if a majority of people do not have the same physiological response when listening to the Heritage amp your experience of some fatigue is clearly your brain telling you that something isn't quite the way it would like it to be. If the engineers intentionally designed a signature, lets say for arguments sake that they pushed a frequency zone a little forward to give a slightly euphoric or lush quality to the sound, that might be the region that only one person in two hundred is sensitive too in a way that over time they become fatigued. This can be made more pronounced for the listener if the headphone they pair with the amp is also a little forward in the same region.

It can be too much of a good thing so to speak. Many people might experience the emphasized region as very pleasant and really enjoy that sound. Think about how for some people the pleasant harmonic distortion that you get with a very tube like sound signature (I'm simplifying with that statement I know, but the point is valid) is what they most enjoy. Others may experience this as lacking some of the micro-edges that they need to hear to have their hearing brain excited about what it is taking in. So all of that long winded response is to say that yes, your brain and your gear might be having an interaction effect. If you are sure about what you prefer that is great, it tells you that your hearing brain is responding more favourably to the xDSD's signature. No problem, your brain knows what it wants. Listening fatigue is a real thing, sometimes it is a minor issue and sometimes it rises to the level where you aren't really able to enjoy the listening experience. Trust your brain, if you are consistently getting the signal that when you use the Klipsch amp it is fatiguing, it probably is fatiguing to you.

That doesn't make the Klipsch a bad amp, or your hearing brain wrong, it is simply an interaction effect happening inside a very complex hearing brain. That is why this hobby is so amazing to be in now, there are so many amazing companies all producing meaningful products, and there can and are sonic differences so experimentation is both really fun and to a point necessary. We have to try gear combinations until we find one we really love, and even then, no reason not to try other signatures out if you are so inclined. I have owned a few nice iFi products (iDSD Nano and iOne) and also responded very favourably to the signatures.
 
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Apr 12, 2020 at 6:36 AM Post #32 of 616
Just picked up a pair of HP 3 in Ebony .... awesome combo with my RNHP amp.....
I had a RHHP amp on hand for sometime and while I didn't use it much when I did get time with it I really liked it as well. I do remember using it with the HP-3 and finding it quite a nice combination.
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 6:43 AM Post #33 of 616
Just for a trip down memory lane, here is a picture of my HP-3 bonding with my KEF R300 speaker. I loved the R300 but as I always do, eventually I want to try a new signature so I went back again to using floor-standing tower speakers.


Klipsch HP-3 on Speaker.jpg
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 7:03 AM Post #34 of 616
Ya, what he said. Since sound perception is so very very subjective I can only speak to my own experience and for me the HP-3 in the heritage amp needs high gain with volume knob at about 1:00. I also expect that source matters. I always use line in fed from one of my daps. So this morning I tried this: source Cowan PL single ended out to Heritage, played Alvin Youngblood Hart doing his cover of Heartbreaker, and the HP-3 on XLR. Awesome sound but seemed a little shy on the highs with the gain/volume as described.
I then played the same track from the same device from the balanced output to the HP-3 and the sound was, well, better. Better highs and all the base I like this track and these headphones for. So was that from the difference in balanced source vs. single ended? Probably. As always, your mileage may vary.
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 7:23 AM Post #35 of 616
If you are perceiving becoming fatigued that is entirely possible. Our hearing brain is a complex system, and very personal so there is always difference between individuals. This means that even if a majority of people do not have the same physiological response when listening to the Heritage amp your experience of some fatigue is clearly your brain telling you that something isn't quite the way it would like it to be. If the engineers intentionally designed a signature, lets say for arguments sake that they pushed a frequency zone a little forward to give a slightly euphoric or lush quality to the sound, that might be the region that only one person in two hundred is sensitive too in a way that over time they become fatigued. This can be made more pronounced for the listener if the headphone they pair with the amp is also a little forward in the same region.

It can be too much of a good thing so to speak. Many people might experience the emphasized region as very pleasant and really enjoy that sound. Think about how for some people the pleasant harmonic distortion that you get with a very tube like sound signature (I'm simplifying with that statement I know, but the point is valid) is what they most enjoy. Others may experience this as lacking some of the micro-edges that they need to hear to have their hearing brain excited about what it is taking in. So all of that long winded response is to say that yes, your brain and your gear might be having an interaction effect. If you are sure about what you prefer that is great, it tells you that your hearing brain is responding more favourably to the xDSD's signature. No problem, your brain knows what it wants. Listening fatigue is a real thing, sometimes it is a minor issue and sometimes it rises to the level where you aren't really able to enjoy the listening experience. Trust your brain, if you are consistently getting the signal that when you use the Klipsch amp it is fatiguing, it probably is fatiguing to you.

That doesn't make the Klipsch a bad amp, or your hearing brain wrong, it is simply an interaction effect happening inside a very complex hearing brain. That is why this hobby is so amazing to be in now, there are so many amazing companies all producing meaningful products, and there can and are sonic differences so experimentation is both really fun and to a point necessary. We have to try gear combinations until we find one we really love, and even then, no reason not to try other signatures out if you are so inclined. I have owned a few nice iFi products (iDSD Nano and iOne) and also responded very favourably to the signatures.

Thanks this was very good explanation and analysation!

Ya, what he said. Since sound perception is so very very subjective I can only speak to my own experience and for me the HP-3 in the heritage amp needs high gain with volume knob at about 1:00. I also expect that source matters. I always use line in fed from one of my daps. So this morning I tried this: source Cowan PL single ended out to Heritage, played Alvin Youngblood Hart doing his cover of Heartbreaker, and the HP-3 on XLR. Awesome sound but seemed a little shy on the highs with the gain/volume as described.
I then played the same track from the same device from the balanced output to the HP-3 and the sound was, well, better. Better highs and all the base I like this track and these headphones for. So was that from the difference in balanced source vs. single ended? Probably. As always, your mileage may vary.

I am doubting my sanity, now tested again with klipsch amp using XLR cable and it seems that soundstage and separation is bit better with it than iFi xdsd. But in general seems to me that my brain likes more laid back presentation that iFi hits spot on. Might be justification bias for both of my devices. But I really like portability of iFi as I can go on couch lying and listening some tunes and with Heritage I am forced to be in not so relaxed seating position as its connected to my workstation.

But not go to off rails on this topic. I really, really do love these HP-3's. I would not never let these go off from my hands. Sometimes I try something else but always come back and just get stunned how good everything sounds from these. I have HD660s for general listening and for multimedia purposes (running from heritage amp btw, great match), when I am switching to hp-3 at somepoint for music enjoyment I can instantly justify the price difference. HP-3 just makes them look bad in every way.

Sonic defender, I really hope that you get to keep your own headphones. These are well considered investment that will make our ears happy for the years to come.
Do you guys know about replacement pads in future? I think there needs to be done pad swap at some point.

31tc3cj8qmq41.jpg

Edit: I put this photo here as well. My setup.
 
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Apr 12, 2020 at 2:09 PM Post #36 of 616
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Apr 12, 2020 at 2:13 PM Post #37 of 616
Now that I have new speakers to pose the HP-3 with ….

20200412_140353.jpg
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 2:21 PM Post #38 of 616
And finally, but really none of these are artistic pictures, but still. The little sub that the HP-3 is sitting on here is a diminutive REL T-Zero. I have two T-Zero subs so one with each tower speaker. I have a small room so no need for big subs and once you integrate a pair it is really lovely. Hope all of this survives the financial fallout of the pandemic.
20200412_140542.jpg
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 3:13 PM Post #39 of 616
And finally, but really none of these are artistic pictures, but still. The little sub that the HP-3 is sitting on here is a diminutive REL T-Zero. I have two T-Zero subs so one with each tower speaker. I have a small room so no need for big subs and once you integrate a pair it is really lovely. Hope all of this survives the financial fallout of the pandemic.
20200412_140542.jpg
Nice setup!
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 3:23 PM Post #40 of 616
And finally, but really none of these are artistic pictures, but still. The little sub that the HP-3 is sitting on here is a diminutive REL T-Zero. I have two T-Zero subs so one with each tower speaker. I have a small room so no need for big subs and once you integrate a pair it is really lovely. Hope all of this survives the financial fallout of the pandemic.
20200412_140542.jpg
Spectacular setup!
 
Apr 12, 2020 at 9:28 PM Post #41 of 616
Thanks people, I have built towards this slowly. The speakers while new to me were second hand, but virtually unused as they were the bedroom system of a well to do condo developer and he hadn't even used them in 3 years so literally as new. And the price I paid, well just to say it was easily the best value in my lifetime of audio purchases. A stupendous deal to be sure. And they sound spectacular, even in a small 12'x13' room. What is nice is that while my M3 integrated doesn't have a headphone input that doesn't matter at all. I had Trevor from Norne Audio make me a lovely speaker tap cable so I drive my headphones right from a dual mono amp with 180watts stable down to 4ohms so one box for headphones and speakers.
 
Apr 14, 2020 at 9:07 AM Post #42 of 616
I've used them with the Poly/Mojo but find the single ended use not all that exceptional.

Having obtained a nice single ended cable for the Utopia I was surprised to prefer the HP-3 to the Utopia from the Poly/Mojo. I was a little tickled to discover the usefulness of having two h/p ports though. The real conclusion for me, neither of the phones did everything really well. Both lacked something. I just preferred the Klipsch more.
 
Apr 16, 2020 at 1:29 PM Post #43 of 616
Were these discontinued?
 
Apr 16, 2020 at 2:01 PM Post #44 of 616
Apr 16, 2020 at 2:34 PM Post #45 of 616
That's too bad, they are great phones and I love them .... but are they worth almost $1400? Not sure. I paid $850 new for mine about 2 months ago. At that price they were a good deal in my opinion. They are going to price themselves out of the game.
 

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