[chris_ah1]

I've heard a fair bit about MisterX and the pimeta - does anyone know where you can actually get one? i saw the tangentsoft website, but don't fancy building one myself considering I have absolutely no tools or clue...

 

[n_maher]

The first issue that you're going to have to address is which PIMETA are you looking for. Think about it this way, the PIMETA is like coffee, it comes in many flavors and some you might find great others you might not like at all. It can be configured to be both a portable or desktop amp, use any number of opamps, be Class A biased, and so on and so forth. Your best bet is to do some serious reading and try to narrow your search before contacting someone like Marshall. It'll save a ton of time if you know what you're looking for first

. All that said the PIMETA is an amazingly capable amp that can be tailored to just about any type of headphone.

Best of luck,

Nate

P.s. If you'd like specific advice try posting what you'll be using it for, what headphones you have and what you're looking to spend

.

 

[chris_ah1]

Thanks. Yes, I was basically thinking of something along the lines of a go vibe 5, but with the option for more opamp choices, especially AD8620+8610 chips and some national ones I want to try out along with the usual LM6171/2 setup. Very portable, but very nice sound. That would be my first interest.

Generally it would be low gain for UM2s on the go, but would appreciate some sort of ability to increase the gain for HD595s or an option to add impedance. Charging wouldn't go amiss either.
And of course because of the headphones very low distortion and noise would be necessary...and whilst low power consumption is nice, I would think that 5ma per opamp channel would be as power hungry as I would go given that I might consider adding buffers. Ideally i would also like the opportunity to enable/disable class A biasing and High-C like on the portaphile type amps.

Unfortunately I don't have much cash so $100 including delivery would be the limit for a rollable govibe5 and $110 for that plus some way to change impedence or gain etc.. $120 to add battery charging. For all that plus the portaphile type options (class A etc.) and USB, $200.

It's probably impossible, but I would like to marry the opamp+buffer rolling of the supermacro, with the impedance/gain, High-C and class a switches of the portaphile along with at least a three channel 'topography' in a form factor that is still portable. battery charging is nice but not ultra necessary.

My ultimate pimeta would be one that was a supermacro+USB dac

but that wouldn't be for portable anymore.

Perhaps I'm asking too much? There can never be a silver bullet of an amp.

 

[n_maher]

Quote:

Originally Posted by chris_ah1 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Perhaps I'm asking too much? There can never be a silver bullet of an amp.

That is a very long wish list with a very short budget. I would think that you'd perfectly fine if you eliminated features like the adjustable gain (even a gain of 1 would work in most cases) and also the variable impedance. You could leave out the class A bias as most argue that it doesn't do much for this amp but then again it's not really using much power here either. Basically, after hearing all that you're looking for I doubt a DIY amp is for you. If you're looking for an amp now I'd try to find a way to squeeze $200 out of your pocket and pick up the Headroom Bithead. It has nearly everything that you're looking for, including USB DAC, wrapped in a very small package. I've almost bought one a couple of times myself and I don't say that about very many products.

Hope that helps,

Nate

 

[chris_ah1]

Yep, I realise that - it was all really more about curiosity more than anything.

I've pretty much decided to go with the govibe5 and wait until i can afford a supermacro or something similar and try all the stuff I want to. Maybe if I save $90 a month I can make it by summer

Yeah, I'm just going to go with a USB dongle for now.

What an irony - spend all my money on sensitive IEMs that require an amp or buy an amp without the IEMs