Los Angeles Orange County Head-Fi Meet 8/19/07

[Jon L]

[align=center][size=large]Los Angeles Orange County Head-Fi Meet 8/19/07[/size][/align]

A big thanks to everyone for a great meet, including: LA OC Audio Society, especially President Levi, Headroom and Tyll, Head-Fi'ers who donated their time and gear, Ultimate Ears, and everybody who attended! Pics to start for now, and comments to come later.

Edwood's Grace 902+K1000 setup. Ed brought his lovely baby, but I have no pictures.

ASR's table. This was a great table for comparisons b/c 3 amps were hooked up to one source, playing simultaneously. Arcam FMJ 33->Lehman Black cube, Gilmore Lite w/ PS, and Earmax Anniversary.

Grado 325i, AT AD2000, which sounded extraordinarily rich and warm, yet plenty detailed.

909's rig with Moth amp and AT L3000, which sounded glorious with very texturally detailed, rich, involving presentation with improved treble extension over AD2000. With the right amp, the bass was deep, taught, rich, and hard-hitting. I liked it...

909's Reimyo CDP. We were all very envious of this beauty, which sounded great driving the moth amp->L3000. There were generous amounts of top-treble and low-bass extension and control, which is a sure sign of great sources.

AC1's Omega II+KGSS rig, sounding as transparent and refined as ever. This time the Bidat was doing DAC duties.

I believe this is DigiPete's setup. Dynamight amp with various balanced 'phones. Unfortunately, I didn't even get to listen to this setup due to time constraints.

Empirical Audio's Offramp Turbo II doing USB-spdif conversion in the Omega II rig.

Tomahawk amp with ALO dock.

Ultimate Ears table.

Yes, it's THE Ultimate Ears UE 11 Pro with 4-driver/3-way crossover in that tiny thing. Awesome sound with awesome price to match at $1150.

UE11 sounded great to my ears via changeable tips. I heard some horrifyingly deep, solid, hard-hitting bass out of these as well as VERY crystal-clear mid/highs.

Tyll's tower of power with Wadia 861SE CDP.

Headroom's new product, the adjustable speaker stand for computer desks!

 

[Jon L]

Singlepower Extreme amp.

Rudistor NX-33 amp

Earmax Anniversary amp

Lehman Black Cube, Gilmore Lite with PS, and Earmax. Pretty interesting comparisons of 'phone/amp combo's. Tonally, Lehman SS amp and Earmax tube amp sounded more alike each other than Gilmore, which had a bit brighter, clearer sound. All three amps had own charms and strengths and synergy with 'phones. For example, darker/creamier AD2000 mated well with the clearer Gilmore, while Earmax amp's harmonic beauty really shone through via the resolution of L3000. Earmax, however, could not drive K701 to satisfying levels without clipping.

On left, that's Irondreamer holding his new baby L3000. I say hooray and good choice!

Not to neglect the usual stand-by's, AKG K701 sounded especially nice with Lehman Black Cube, which synergized very well with K701's flavor. I was very surprised to find Senn HD6xx mated pretty well with the small Gilmore Lite, though. It must be the separate PS methinks.

Anyways, it was a nice laid-back event, not a hard-core 2-day Head-Fi marathon meet. The main purpose was to introduce (proper) headphone listening to the average speaker audiophile, and I think it went quite well. See you all next time

 

[909]

nice pics, Jon.

 

[Edwood]

I'll post them here as well.

-Ed

 

[TreAdidas]

This was my first time to any sort of audio event and I had a great time.

Tyll had a really awesome spiel. I particularly enjoyed his explanation of balanced headphones and how Headroom's crossfeed circuit works. My girlfriend, who came along with me, even commented on how well he broke it down to a level anyone could grasp.

The most striking listen of the day for me were the IEM's form Ultimate Ears. I had not given IEM's a proper chance merely writing them off as fancy ear buds. Man was that a mistake! So I threw in one of the rock CD's I was toting around and said ok thrill me. And wouldn't you know, I heard bass! At that point I give up and asked how is the heck does that work? The UE fellow (forgot his name already

) explained that UE uses an armature as opposed to a voice coil driving a diaphragm. Now I won't pretend to know the ins and outs of armatures in an IEM vs traditional dynamic drivers in a headphone but the result is a rather intriguing sound that is supposedly less harmful to your ears. Regardless I was pleasantly surprised at how good they sounded.

My favorite setup I heard was the Millet Hybrid though Senn HD600's/Cardas cable sourced by Slim Device's Transporter. Favorite because I could not believe how relatively inexpensive that setup is. I could see being very happy with such a device in my own listening area.

All in all it was a great time. I had a camera and realized after I left that I snapped no pics! Grr. Dah well there's always next time.

 

[purk]

More impressions please.....

 

[Icarium]

Transporter is pretty expensive imo ;p Though it is a great and handy source.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TreAdidas /img/forum/go_quote.gif This was my first time to any sort of audio event and I had a great time. Tyll had a really awesome spiel. I particularly enjoyed his explanation of balanced headphones and how Headroom's crossfeed circuit works. My girlfriend, who came along with me, even commented on how well he broke it down to a level anyone could grasp. The most striking listen of the day for me were the IEM's form Ultimate Ears. I had not given IEM's a proper chance merely writing them off as fancy ear buds. Man was that a mistake! So I threw in one of the rock CD's I was toting around and said ok thrill me. And wouldn't you know, I heard bass! At that point I give up and asked how is the heck does that work? The UE fellow (forgot his name already ) explained that UE uses an armature as opposed to a voice coil driving a diaphragm. Now I won't pretend to know the ins and outs of armatures in an IEM vs traditional dynamic drivers in a headphone but the result is a rather intriguing sound that is supposedly less harmful to your ears. Regardless I was pleasantly surprised at how good they sounded. My favorite setup I heard was the Millet Hybrid though Senn HD600's/Cardas cable sourced by Slim Device's Transporter. Favorite because I could not believe how relatively inexpensive that setup is. I could see being very happy with such a device in my own listening area. All in all it was a great time, but wouldn't you know. I had a camera and realized after I left that I snapped no pics! Grr. Dah well there's always next time.

 

[holland]

Any feedback from the society or members? What did they think about the head gear? Were most impressed or unimpressed?

 

[J-Pak]

How many L3000s were in attendance? I think I can make out 909 holding his set.

 

[TreAdidas]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Icarium /img/forum/go_quote.gif Transporter is pretty expensive imo ;p Though it is a great and handy source.

Oh yeah I was begin unclear there. I was speaking more of the Millet Hybrid Amp itself. It was a nice little demonstration rig because you could switch from Headroom's Desktop Balanced to the Millet.

 

[velogreg]

Quote:

Originally Posted by J-Pak /img/forum/go_quote.gif How many L3000s were in attendance? I think I can make out 909 holding his set.

Two I believe. IronDreamer's new addition and of course 909's. At times the the talking noise level got a bit high but the L3000 sound is oh so sweet!

 

[909]

Quote:

Originally Posted by J-Pak /img/forum/go_quote.gif How many L3000s were in attendance? I think I can make out 909 holding his set.

Yes, there were two pairs of L3000s. In fact, in that photo not only can you see me holding my L3000s, but Iron_Dreamer holding his as well.

 

[Iron_Dreamer]

Well it was definitely a fun, if a bit unusual, Head-fi event. Nothing like hot dogs and headphones eh? (BTW AC1, please check in so that we know you survived

)

I didn't really listen to much, spent most of the time talking with old buddies, and schooling the n00b's on all manner of head-fidom. I heard just enough of 909's monster CD player to know that I need to hear more of it. I heard just enough of digipete's dynahi from my miniDAC to know that I should find a better amp for the L3000.

I had a fun time helping Tyll set up his massive array of gear (and frantically tossing it all back into the boxes upon go time!

) I did do some comparison of his Wadia 861 with the Max's built-in DAC while waiting for the balance of the crowd to arrive. That Max DAC is no slouch, keeping up very well with the 861, which sounded smoother (but no less detailed) as I've come to expect from TOTL sources. The 861 sounded a bit more relaxed and spacious, whereas the Max DAC had a more upfront, punchy presentation.

 

[AC1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Iron_Dreamer /img/forum/go_quote.gif Well it was definitely a fun, if a bit unusual, Head-fi event. Nothing like hot dogs and headphones eh? (BTW AC1, please check in so that we know you survived )

I am still here! No problems whatsoever.

I balanced it out with eating quite a few slices of pineapple to.

Had a great time, talking to all the old and new Socal headfiers. Also meeting some of the Society folk. Thanks to Tyll for putting it all together in a very well ACed room.

Really the highlight of the meet was Phoebe. So cute! She survived her first meet albeit in her mothers arms most of the time, aww. Well ok, second was 909s system. It had a drive and musicality that was pretty special. I mean ya I've heard the high end headphone systems that have tons of detail, technical perfection, smoothness etc, but sometimes they are disconnected from the nuance of the music where the flow of the music doesn't seem complete even though the detail is there. That system had no such problems, it even gave my trance music a pace and drive that gave it more soul than electronic music should have. Even with such bad listening conditions, it was easy to tell that stood out compared to most other systems and really most systems I have listened to including my own.

Wish I had a bit more time to sample the other things, didn't get to try the UE11s but no big deal. Dinner was fun to though it had some people wondering when we first go there.

But it turned out well.

 

[ldj325]

Hey us SoCal guys might want to take a look at the NorCal thread of next Saturdays meet. There is going to be some serious gear there and I think worth the trip.

As far as the restraunt goes it was great in everyway except for those fortune cookies.