[Jan Meier]

Dear Kwkwarth

" I noticed that the amp is no longer in their product listing. I hope they don't stop producing it. "

They discontinued production quite a while ago. For a few months I bought the very last series and made a Headwize/Headfi sales-special out of it in combination with the K1000 headphone. By now I have only one amp left. It probably is the very last on the market!

" I wonder how many they would need orders for to produce a special model with dual sockets? One for the K1000 and a standard 1/4" phone socket for conventional headphones. "

Actually, they're developing a new amp right now that also has a 1/4" socket. However, this amp will be in a price range far beyond that of the present amp.

Cheers,

Jan

 

[kwkarth]

Interesting. Well, I am sure that if this SAC-K1000 amp is any indication, their follow on product should be quite good!
Thanks for the info. If I find the money laying around anywhere I would not mind buying that last amp that you have to keep as a spare!

 

[kwkarth]

Hi Nick,
Honestly, the Creek does sound great with the 501's and I have it for sale here:--> Sold

But it does not have enough gas for certain pieces of music to blow your brains out without distorting. That doesn't make it a bad amp, but I do feel that the SAC is a better amp, then it should be, it's a lot more money. Further, you can't just plug the 501's into it. You will have to determine (you can do this using a voltmeter) which output pins are left and right hot and which pins are ground, then build your adapter cable accordingly. You have to be careful so you don't burn up the amp. That would be a real shame. I would also recommend that you take the amp apart and treat all the connections, sockets, etc with ProGold. Doing so WILL make a difference in the sound. I would not recommend any of this to anybody but a confident DIY'er because it's really easy to accidentally mangle some of the transistor leads as you slide the case back together. It didn't happen to me, but I was holding my breath each time as I slid all the transistors back into place. This all belongs in the DIY section so I'm going to refrain from any more such talk here, but we can pick this up in the other thread if you want.

 

[nick danger]

kwkarth

I'm slowly going down the list of amps that may be good with the AKG 501s and after the headroom fest, I heard some that were candidates. Darn, no SAC...well maybe some other time. I was wondering if you or anyone else who's listening has heard the 501s with a Melos SHA-1? It seems like many people like 'em and may be worth an audition.

nick

 

[kwkarth]

Sorry, I haven't heard the Melos.

 

[greenhorn]

So I have this SAC amp for K1000 with two identical XLR outputs... and I would like to be able to connect regular phones (6,5 mm jack-terminated) to it.

Should I try to replace one of the XLR 4 pins outputs with a jack output (if so, how, because there are 4 cables going in the XLR and the 6,5 mm jack output only has 3 contacts) or should I try to build an XLR male -> 6,5 mm female adaptor (if so, how, because the 4 wires -> 3 contacts persists)?

Thanks for any advice!

 

[kwkarth]

See post #9 in this thread. Proceed at your own risk.
Happy Listening!

 

[Edwood]

When making an adapter cable, remember that the grounds are common, so just wire the two grounds to the ground on the 1/4" ground socket. And solder the shield (if your cable you are using has one) to the ground on the 4 pin XLR end. (pick whichever one).

A star quad cable works perfectly. It has four wires in it.

I couldn't find an four pin XLR socket that would fit properly, so I found that using an adapter was far easier.

-Ed

 

[ginetto61]

Hi please excuse me if i resurrect this old thread. I have one of this amp the version with the unbalanced HP out. I am trying to gather opinion about its quality.
Is there a way to reduce bias ? it gets very very hot to the touch. I do not want to cook the internals.
I will post some pics in the weekend ... i am far from home nor for my job.
Any information/advice would be very much appreciated.
Thanks a lot.