[wilky61]

Hey all, I realize these sort of threads crop up all the time, so I appreciate your patience in educating a newbie.

 
A little bit about me, my music collection is mostly 320 kbs MP3 (with a few albums like 256 or even 192), but recently I have been considering going back and ripping to lossless... I listen to a lot of different styles of music including jazz, blues, jazz rock, blues rock, folk rock, R&B, funk, prog rock, psychedelic rock, post punk, 90s hip-hop, electronic, etc. I have about $125 credit at Amazon, so I'm willing to make a decently hefty purchase (maybe as much as $225) that will suit me for a long time to come. Also, portability isn't important to me; this is for home listening.
 
I guess one of the first things I don't understand is the difference between the Fiio E6 and the Fiio E10 and which one would be better suited for my purposes. Portability isn't important to me, but price is. Can someone explain/justify to me why the E10 would or wouldn't be worth the ~$50 price upgrade for me? Is the fact that the E10 is a DAC/amp important to me?
 
Then, I've perused around the forums a bunch and two of the most popularly recommended headphones in the <$100 range seem to be the CAL!s and the Shure SRH440s. Beyond that price range, I've of course seen the Audio Technica ATH-M50s mentioned frequently (~$150). Beyond that, I think the next model I've seen frequently mentioned is the Sennheiser HD 558 (~$180).
 
So I guess I don't exactly know how much money I want to drop on my first audiophile purchase here, and where my money would be best spent?
For example, one option I have is to purchase the ATH-M50s + FIIO E6 bundled from Amazon for $170; that's only $45 out of my wallet.
Or is the sound quality of the CAL!s favorable enough that I should opt for them + the more expensive FIIO E10; that'd be ~$150 total.
Or do you recommend me to splurge on a more expensive model headphone closer to $200?
 
Thanks for any explanations and recommendations!

 

[Papander]

Fiio E6 is just an amplifier, whereas the E10 is Amp/DAC. As for the is the E10 worth it question. If you are plugging your headphones to your PC's motherboard then I'd say it is worth it to get the E10 because of the DAC.
 
DAC stands for digital to analog converter.
 
Check this out if you already haven't. www.head-fi.org/a/headphone-buying-guide
 
EDIT; Also I'd like to add that CAL and M50 headphones don't really need amplification.

 

[wilky61]

Quote:

Fiio E6 is just an amplifier, whereas the E10 is Amp/DAC. As for the is the E10 worth it question. I'd say It depends on where you are plugging your headphones into. For example the iphone 4 has pretty decent DAC in it already so you would not benefit that much from the E10 DAC. But if you are plugging your headphones to your PC's motherboard then I'd say it is worth it to get the E10 because of the DAC.
 
DAC stands for digital to analog converter.
 
Check this out if you already haven't. www.head-fi.org/a/headphone-buying-guide
 
EDIT; Also I'd like to add that CAL and M50 headphones don't really need amplification.

 
Okay, this is all very helpful. Yeah I was wondering that about the CAL/M50s. That buying guide link is very useful, too, in categorizing the different models according to amp effectiveness/impedance I'm guessing. Looking through that guide and clicking through a few pages, I have now stumbled upon this model:
 
http://www.amazon.com/BRAINWAVZ-HM5-Studio-Monitor-Headphones/dp/B006MA9XXM/

 

[Papander]

I don't personally own those headphones nor have I heard them before, but the general opinion here in the forums is that they are really good headphones for the money.
 
More information about those can be found in this thread http://www.head-fi.org/t/585281/review-brainwavz-hm5-a-new-neutral-champ
 
Umm just like to make it clear that the E10 is for desktop/laptop use. E7 and E17 are the portable amp/dac models from Fiio. My previous post was suggesting you could use E10 with your iphone which is false. I was trying to explain that some devices like the iphone 4 have good DAC's already in them, so using something like the E7 amp/dac might not improve the sound quality that much.

 

[wilky61]

Quote:

I don't personally own those headphones nor have I heard them before, but the general opinion here in the forums is that they are really good headphones for the money.
 
More information about those can be found in this thread http://www.head-fi.org/t/585281/review-brainwavz-hm5-a-new-neutral-champ
 
Umm just like to make it clear that the E10 is for desktop/laptop use. E7 and E17 are the portable amp/dac models from Fiio. My previous post was suggesting you could use E10 with your iphone which is false. I was trying to explain that some devices like the iphone 4 have good DAC's already in them, so using something like the E7 amp/dac might not improve the sound quality that much.

For use with my laptop, would I want the enhanced DAC found in the FIIO E10 model? (as compared to the E7 and my laptop's sound card)
(I went to Device Manager on my laptop and found that I have an IDT High Definition Audio card, if that means anything to you.)

 

[Papander]

Yes for laptop/desktop use the E10 is better choice. The E7 offers portability, but isn't as good as the E10.

 

[wilky61]

Quote:

Yes for laptop/desktop use the E10 is better choice. The E7 offers portability, but isn't as good as the E10.

Er sorry, I meant the E6 vs. the E10, meaning the E10's DAC vs. the cheaper E6+my laptop's default sound card.

 

[Papander]

The onboard sound in most laptops isn't that great. So you should have noticeable improvement with the Fiio E10.
 
Here is a review of E10 http://www.headfonia.com/the-latest-must-have-the-fiio-e10-usb-dacamp/
 
I'd like to point out that there are 3 versions of E10 out there.
Quote:

1, The original with old silk screen, had been sold out in 2 months ago .
2, The 2st with new silk screen and the gold-plated RCA coaxial output. current version
3, The 3st with new headphone socket , will be shipped to our agent from Feb, 2012.

 
So the 3rd one should have all the issues fixed.