[sebna]

I don't know HD800S so well, just tried HD800 many times.
I like the detail and instrument seperation.
...but the room impression they give to me sounded quite wrong because it is always the same.
It didn't matter if I played AC/DC or a Louis Armstrong or some classical music with HD800.
They played in the same big HD800 room. HD800 room sounds kind of arificial to me.
T1 differantiates much better. Concert hall or Studio.

As to sound stage and the way HD800 generate space I had exactly same feeling when I heard them. The space sound very much artificial to me.

 

[frogmeat69]

Got in on the Buydig deal, playing different types of music and files through my TEAC NT503 into my iCan Pro set to tube+ and 9db gain sounds pretty much amazing, about the most spacious sounding pair of cans I have, gotta get my Little Dot MkIII hooked back up again soon and try it with these.

 

[Slim1970]

Anyone have Beyerdynamic's balanced cable? I wonder if there are any sonic improvements that can be had besides getting more power to them, which could be a benefit in itself.

 

[nordkapp]

Anyone have Beyerdynamic's balanced cable? I wonder if there are any sonic improvements that can be had besides getting more power to them, which could be a benefit in itself.

I own it. Save your money......a bit more dynamic but not worth it in the end.

 

[ardilla]

Anyone have Beyerdynamic's balanced cable? I wonder if there are any sonic improvements that can be had besides getting more power to them, which could be a benefit in itself.

What amp? If you experience any difference will depend on your amp. Many balanced amps perform much better with the balanced output. It's not only about power. A fully balanced amp is a dual mono amp. Further, the way they make the unbalanced output on a fully balanced varies and might make it quite different in quality. Remember the first Schiit Mjolnir? It didn't have the option of unbalanced output to keep costs down.

 

[Slim1970]

What amp? If you experience any difference will depend on your amp. Many balanced amps perform much better with the balanced output. It's not only about power. A fully balanced amp is a dual mono amp. Further, the way they make the unbalanced output on a fully balanced varies and might make it quite different in quality. Remember the first Schiit Mjolnir? It didn't have the option of unbalanced output to keep costs down.

I have the Pro iCan. It's fully balanced and drives all my headphones

 

[ardilla]

I have the Pro iCan. It's fully balanced and drives all my headphones

Then I'd give the balanced output a try.

 

[Cobold]

I use V281 balanced with T1.
Never did a real comparision.
Original cable for T1.2 has a fine quality.
After T1.1. had this big heavy cable.
I like that it is just plug and play on the headphone side with T1.2 now.
I got the balanced output at the amp. So why not use it.

 

[sebna]

My T1.2 black edition should be with me tomorrow. Once I have them I will give them 100 - 150h of hard burn-in and I will start listening

What is your experience guys with those drivers, how long do they need before they settle?

Cheers

 

[sebna]

Also I must admit coming from speaker system and using all balanced system I do not really understand the purpose of balanced HP cable. I have to read about it.

In speaker systems it is balanced all the way up to amp but speaker cables, which one would think would be equivalent of HP cable are no longer balanced as there is no electronics on speaker side that would be required to have use for balanced signal. Does this mean that in HPs there is still some processing of signal happening at driver level?

As I said I have to read about it.

 

[Sonic Defender]

Also I must admit coming from speaker system and using all balanced system I do not really understand the purpose of balanced HP cable. I have to read about it.

In speaker systems it is balanced all the way up to amp but speaker cables, which one would think would be equivalent of HP cable are no longer balanced as there is no electronics on speaker side that would be required to have use for balanced signal. Does this mean that in HPs there is still some processing of signal happening at driver level?

As I said I have to read about it.

Get ready for a world of varying opinions. One side presents the idea that really, tiny amounts of distortion is eliminated, the other side insists there is no advantage at all, that balanced is meant for longer cable run environments, and in fact some people theorize that a balanced setup can actually degrade sound quality.

 

[Sonic Defender]

What amp? If you experience any difference will depend on your amp. Many balanced amps perform much better with the balanced output. It's not only about power. A fully balanced amp is a dual mono amp. Further, the way they make the unbalanced output on a fully balanced varies and might make it quite different in quality. Remember the first Schiit Mjolnir? It didn't have the option of unbalanced output to keep costs down.

That depends, my NAD M3 is a dual mono design, but it isn't truly balanced as it uses a common ground.

 

[sebna]

Get ready for a world of varying opinions. One side presents the idea that really, tiny amounts of distortion is eliminated, the other side insists there is no advantage at all, that balanced is meant for longer cable run environments, and in fact some people theorize that a balanced setup can actually degrade sound quality.

If we talk about components with true balanced topology and also present at each step of audio chain (from dac -> pre -> amp) so from start to finish then there is no doubt of sonic benefits coming from it. Yes it was designed to battle signal degradation trough electrical noise pickup on longer cable runs but it does not mean it is not doing same excellent job (albeit on the lower scale depending on the environment) on shorter runs. This technology applies to any length of cables.

The way balanced signal works is that it rejects electrical noise from the audio signal by comparing signals from two different signal paths in balanced cable. But in order for technology to work there must be a comparison mechanism which rejects the noise. So for balanced HP cables to work, HPs themselves would have to have this mechanism incorporated in their housing. So my question is: is this the case? Because if not balanced HP cables do absolutely nothing (I am talking now only about this last piece of cable from Head Amp to HPs).

Now it is highly possible some HPs would have this mechanism built in (maybe it can be passive - I do not know) but if they would be able to fit it into HP then I guess they would also fit it into multi thousand speaker systems and they do not... so as I said I have to do a bit of reading about balanced HP cables

 

[Sonic Defender]

In true balanced topology from start to finish there is no doubt of its benefits. ....

I'm sorry mate, but that isn't true, there are plenty of people who doubt the proposed technical advantages of balanced beyond the longer cable run environment. I spent many hours reading myself and determined that for every well written technical rationale presented why balanced should matter, I could find an equally well done piece stating the opposite. I really myself have never been able to hear a difference, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there isn't a difference, just that I didn't hear it. I remain mostly on the fence and hopeful, but when I think about it I come to the following issue. The amounts of distortion that are rejected are in absolute values, very, very, very small. How likely are we to hear these very, very, very small amounts of distortion through the music? That seems like the real question to me, not is there a difference in distortion, but whether we can hear miniscule differences in distortion in any real sense of the word hear. Measure and hear are very different things. Anyway, the only opinion on a subject that matters is your own so I'm sure one way or another you will find your answer. Cheers.

 

[sebna]

I'm sorry mate, but that isn't true, there are plenty of people who doubt the proposed technical advantages of balanced beyond the longer cable run environment. I spent many hours reading myself and determined that for every well written technical rationale presented why balanced should matter, I could find an equally well done piece stating the opposite. I really myself have never been able to hear a difference, but that doesn't necessarily mean that there isn't a difference, just that I didn't hear it. I remain mostly on the fence and hopeful, but when I think about it I come to the following issue. The amounts of distortion that are rejected are in absolute values, very, very, very small. How likely are we to hear these very, very, very small amounts of distortion through the music? That seems like the real question to me, not is there a difference in distortion, but whether we can hear miniscule differences in distortion in any real sense of the word hear. Measure and hear are very different things. Anyway, the only opinion on a subject that matters is your own so I'm sure one way or another you will find your answer. Cheers.

It is not about distortion but about electrical noise (unless you mean distortion caused by electrical noise but my understanding of word distortion would be reserved for different group of problems in the signal path).

Such shame you just cannot pop-in to me and have a listen for yourself. The difference is very apparent and of high caliber. I am talking about my speaker system. If you would be trying to achieve same increase in quality in purely SE system it would cost you thousands of dollars in upgrades in compare to simply switching from SE path to balanced on my system. But then it also depends on quality of the system, acoustics of the room, and so on (not so much on hearing as differences are very apparent in the right setup).