[Maxx134]

One observation that stood out to me here...( Airist Audio )

I used my modded HD800 headphones as a "measuring tool" to judge equipment, and I found absoulute lack of any dac chip signature, such as "sabre" or AKM or even similar to my Yggy..

The trebles had solid resolution without any distinguishable harshness/glare or signature that I could find.

That was initial impression only as it was not ideal environment, but the room was not loud either so I could here it well.

Although I have no comment on the amp,
I could still make out above average depth of field that is not very common amoung solid state gear.
This is why I always prefer tubes.
So bottom line I was impressed



I was also impress and pleasantly surprised by the tiny wooo portable (WA8)tube amp, what a sweet achievement!

Hifiman HE-X was excellent but he needed to have extra to try on setup other than tiny portable.

And ZMF latest offerings where so good they were a bit shocking and hard to put down.

I must admit love the Ethers though, they have a fleshyness that I had to have.

Every table had something quite amazing gear setups to learn from, so I was not around my setup again to answer anything but internals of my "bling" amp are posted here in a "SuperMod" thread for mk6&8.

There was a special Total piece that I would have to vote for most definitely:

that "orange" one on bottom.

 

[olegausany]

First of all thanks to Scott for organizing the meet and to Telecia for the brownies.
Thanks to Kris for bringing his LIO and Jimmy for Yggy so was able to compare Yggdrasil to LIO dac. Zach's new Omni are really sound great for the money and should be on the short list for those who looking for less than $1000 headphones and can't afford Mr. Speakers ETHER .
Two surprises for me were the dac prototype by Airist Audio ,which uses discreet ladder components for the conversion and the only IC chip for input stage controller so will be very interesting to compare to Yggdrasil, and Ether C with new pads mod .
I did try Dharma and they didn't impress me but still I want to try them with other setups

Sent from my Nexus 6 using Tapatalk

 

[bikerboy94]

A few pictures.

 

 


 


 

 

 

 


 

 


 



 



 

 

 

More to come.

 

[Mullet]

Hey guys...
 
I'll do my best to get out a full review of the meet, but before I do that I want to thank everyone for coming - especially the community. Also just as important I want to thank all the vendors, the ones who were present and the ones that weren't present for their gracious donations. They were awesome this year! Also thanks to the members that donated their gear. Finally, thanks to the peeps who bid and won. We raised enough for the room and had a few bucks extra.
 
I see a few pics of people who won, if anyone else has pics they took during the auction that show the peeps with their prize PM me. I know specifically Ultimate Ears and Sennheiser wanted a pic for Twitter, etc. If we can't get something together no worries.
 
By the way just in case you didn't know... I'm the big dude with the red What.cd Tee.
 
Let's do this again next year!
 
...And please post in this thread with more impressions... they are extremely helpful for vendors e.g. Airist Audio

 

[jinxy245]

Big thanks to the big guy (Mullet) for being a great host and organizing this event...Kudos, a job well done!
 
I'd also be sorely remiss if thanks weren't give to Telecia for the brownies & cupcakes...delicious and much appreciated.
 
This was my 1st meet, and I had a blast. The members of the community are really great (and oddly approachable for a bunch of folks who hand around listening to headphones all day...)
I truly enjoyed meeting everyone.
 
The vendors were wonderfully patient and informative. What a treat! Dan (MrSpeakers) is some sort of sorcerer...both iterations of the Ether were the highlight of the show for me...they really are stunning...especially when paired with Woo Audio magic.. a sublime pairing if there ever was one.
 
HiFiMan always impresses me...the HE1000 probably would have been the highlight if I hadn't already heard it...those are incredible, but I'll be damned if the Edition X wasn't a really a fantastic sounding set of cans. exciting times for the Head-Fi community, for sure.
 
I thought the Linear Tube Audio  MicroZOTL2.0 was a great sounding amp, and Arist will definitely be a company to watch (or listen to). We really do have a lot of great sounding options.
 
The donations were fantastic as well..an incredible selection. Maybe it should be renamed the Not So Silent Burglary...some of those deals really were steals!  I'm certainly bummed about being out bid for the Alpha Primes (by a vendor, no less!) but I'll live (& my wallet appreciates it). I probably should have bid on the ZMFs...the sound really is addicting. No matter, my audio journey continues, and I have lots more options to consider, thanks to everyone's generosity...where else in the world can you listen to so much quality audio in one place?
 
Yes, this was my 1st meet, but I have a sneaking suspicion it won't be my last. Damn if this hobby isn't addictive...
 
my sincerest thanks, again.
 
 
Paste

 

[Mullet]

  Big thanks to the big guy (Mullet) for being a great host and organizing this event...Kudos, a job well done!
 
I'd also be sorely remiss if thanks weren't give to Telecia for the brownies & cupcakes...delicious and much appreciated.
 
This was my 1st meet, and I had a blast. The members of the community are really great (and oddly approachable for a bunch of folks who hand around listening to headphones all day...)
I truly enjoyed meeting everyone.

It was great to meet up with you as well!
 
Telecia's brownies are the bomb. I don't think I had lunch.... errrrr.
 
You're welcome! My pleasure.
 
Try to make it to Babylon this Spring!

 

[hitman1]

Hello:
 
         I had a great time first meet ever. I got great help from MrBucket and Skyyyeman on how to get th eMOJO working on my NOTE 4. Very nice guys. Enjoyed meeting Mr Speaker, very nice and engaging guy. His Ether C was everything the claimed it was and you could even modiy the sound. I listened to the Hifiman HE1000 and TH900. I was loving the HD800 until I heard the Dharma's. I thought thta was the surprise of the show for those who got to hear it. I also loved the Pandora VI. I had a great time

 

[goodyfresh]

  Hello:
 
         I had a great time first meet ever. I got great help from MrBucket and Skyyyeman on how to get th eMOJO working on my NOTE 4. Very nice guys. Enjoyed meeting Mr Speaker, very nice and engaging guy. His Ether C was everything the claimed it was and you could even modiy the sound. I listened to the Hifiman HE1000 and TH900. I was loving the HD800 until I heard the Dharma's. I thought thta was the surprise of the show for those who got to hear it. I also loved the Pandora VI. I had a great time

The Pandora VI sounded a tad-bit "veiled" to me, kinda weird.  I'd certainly classify them as "unique"-sounding, to say the least.  Soundstage and imaging from them is very good for closed-back dynamics which is probably due to the additional balanced-armature drivers.  But to my ears at least, the upper-mids seemed a bit recessed and distant, thus the "veil."  They are very, very musical in their tonality, though.
 
That being said, I could not STAND their ergonomics.  I have NO IDEA what Final Audio Design was thinking designing a headband that slides smoothly without clicking or locking into place in any real way.  And they are obnoxiously heavy for dynamic-driver headphones.

 

[doctorjazz]

FAD stuff seems to generally cause extreme reactions, people either love or hate them (I had my pair there, not sure if there was another).
Fun to demo my stuff, though it does cut in to your time checking out stuff (last meet I went to I didn't have a table). Got to hear some great stuff anyway, though. Had lots of fun! I'll try to make the next one (the rest of my life sometimes gets in the way). Hope to see you all then.

 

[goodyfresh]

FAD stuff seems to generally cause extreme reactions, people either love or hate them (I had my pair there, not sure if there was another).
Fun to demo my stuff, though it does cut in to your time checking out stuff (last meet I went to I didn't have a table). Got to hear some great stuff anyway, though. Had lots of fun! I'll try to make the next one (the rest of my life sometimes gets in the way). Hope to see you all then.

The sound was. . .strange.  I'm not sure if I'd love it or hate it in the long-run, really.  Seems like too much of a gamble in that regard for me to be willing to shell-out the asking price of it, especially given my gripes about the ergonomics.
 
Seriously, what is up with that smoothly-sliding headband?  Have those people never actually used another company's headphones before?  Lol.

 

[doctorjazz]

Don't understand the fit/design myself, but I'm generally a hard fit. do like the sound, though. My wife, who has no interest in headphones aside from listening and talking on her phone, actually took a shine to these. Interestingly, I had a good number of cans, including the HE-1000, but these seemed to be the ones most people wanted to hear (probably because there were other tables to hear the HE-1000 at). Seemed people were split, half sad they really liked the sound, others reacted like you did. The in ear Heaven V and others seem to get a similar polarized response. Look over at the Pandora VI thread some time, people there are really passionate about these cans. Me, since the HE-1000, hardly listen to other over ear cans (which is why I was selling them off...just collecting dust).

 

[bikerboy94]

I am the so happy winning bidder on the ZMF x VIBRO MK II headphones. I ALMOST feel guilty about what I paid. Almost. I would have gone to full retail on them. They were going home with me. Zach thank you much. 
 

First of may trips to ZMF table.

I'm pretty sure Zack's big smile is because I can now stop bothering him. Zach you are the man.


I must also thank Paula for giving me all the cash we had except $4. She was not happy about the $4 ATM fee on the way out of the hotel.

Love you.
My journey for a closed headphone has come to an end. For now anyway LOL

 

[bozebuttons]

Scott Thanks for organizing the meet ,it was a good turnout.You are getting good at this.
 
 Telicas brownies are always a treat & greatly appreciated,missed the cupcakes.
 
I came in late as I worked in the am.got in a little after 1pm,some great donations in the not so silent auction,bidders got some sweet deals.
 
I liked Cradons end game setup EC2a3MKIV Lampi 7 lite Dac,no matter what headphone that was plugged into sounded top notch.
 
I tried the LCD4 out of the Wa8 bass was a little boomy but had great soundstage.
 
He1000 sounded really good out of the heron5 amp,only complaint the amp had to be turned up to the 3oclock position.I felt the amp could use a little more gain,it could have been
something in the signal path causing the issue.
 
 Missed the Darma. Great hanging with everyone.
 
 I liked the MisterSPeakers Ether Cs ,& Dans replacement filters really worked.

 

[goodyfresh]

Don't understand the fit/design myself, but I'm generally a hard fit. do like the sound, though. My wife, who has no interest in headphones aside from listening and talking on her phone, actually took a shine to these. Interestingly, I had a good number of cans, including the HE-1000, but these seemed to be the ones most people wanted to hear (probably because there were other tables to hear the HE-1000 at). Seemed people were split, half sad they really liked the sound, others reacted like you did. The in ear Heaven V and others seem to get a similar polarized response. Look over at the Pandora VI thread some time, people there are really passionate about these cans. Me, since the HE-1000, hardly listen to other over ear cans (which is why I was selling them off...just collecting dust).

Final Audio Design themselves are aware of how polarizing their sound-signatures are.

 

[bamboo5354]

My first NY meet it was an amazing experience and a real ear opener. Biggest surprise to me was the ether-c I like it more than the ether in terms of build quality, comfort, and looks. I also much prefer the ether-c over the ether out of the woo wa5le. To me it sounds sweeter, less bright, has better bass, and to my surprise a bigger sound stage!(even dan agrees on this)
The fact that the ether-c's performance is up there with the much more expensive models speaks real value to me, and with the meet special price I just have to order a pair on the spot! Can't wait to get it!