[paulpaul]

The Interface box sizes are: body- 124mm wide, 170mm long, 40mm tall and the face plate is 134mm wide, 50mm tall and 10mm thick.

With carbon shells/cages, fit is superb, as that part is all about exact dimensions and holding the innards firmly and precisely.
Finish...the best we could muster out from Carbon Fiber board with exposed edges and pouring the epoxy resin that holds it together. The dosage of epoxy turned out to be a non-trivial matter, so not as good looking as we wished for, but it is not a crime for a ruggedized product that is all about pro-gear toughness.

The Interface box is a regular electronics box with a good fit and a fair finish, but nothing fancy. It does the job and it looks appropriate for the context in which it is in (pro gear).

All in all, SR1a are not the prettiest thing you'll see but it doesn't aspire to be. There's a stripped down, bare bones tech, vibe to them. Visual design for the sake of beauty is almost non-existent in them...all that is there, serves a purpose.

Anyhow, they are very impressive in their own right. A young couple at Denver Canjam joked that they are the Darth Vader's evil brother's headphones

Our next model(s) will be a circumaural pads, open and closed backs which will look much neater. It is much easier to make them such, as like with other headphones, they will have bezel rings that cover grille edges and the structure will be hidden. But, I give no promises! Maybe they will also be anti-fashion statements, as well!

Hi
I am about to hit the button. You mention the upcoming model and I would like to reconfirm that you are not talking about weeks or a few months down the road.

 

[Jerseyboy]

Our next model(s) will be a circumaural pads, open and closed backs which will look much neater. It is much easier to make them such, as like with other headphones, they will have bezel rings that cover grille edges and the structure will be hidden. But, I give no promises! Maybe they will also be anti-fashion statements, as well!

Pleased to see that the SR1-A is only the start of an evolutionary process ! Looking forward to experiencing future incarnations !!

 

[Aleksandar R.]

About the new models, I must clarify.

These are just ideas now, thinking in which direction we will go.
It will be at least a year from now to get to the prototype phase and then refining....maybe 18 before we have anything solid and a bit more to run-in the manufactiring...

 

[jwbrent]

The Interface box sizes are: body- 124mm wide, 170mm long, 40mm tall and the face plate is 134mm wide, 50mm tall and 10mm thick.

With carbon shells/cages, fit is superb, as that part is all about exact dimensions and holding the innards firmly and precisely.
Finish...the best we could muster out from Carbon Fiber board with exposed edges and pouring the epoxy resin that holds it together. The dosage of epoxy turned out to be a non-trivial matter, so not as good looking as we wished for, but it is not a crime for a ruggedized product that is all about pro-gear toughness.

The Interface box is a regular electronics box with a good fit and a fair finish, but nothing fancy. It does the job and it looks appropriate for the context in which it is in (pro gear).

All in all, SR1a are not the prettiest thing you'll see but it doesn't aspire to be. There's a stripped down, bare bones tech, vibe to them. Visual design for the sake of beauty is almost non-existent in them...all that is there, serves a purpose.

Anyhow, they are very impressive in their own right. A young couple at Denver Canjam joked that they are the Darth Vader's evil brother's headphones

Our next model(s) will be a circumaural pads, open and closed backs which will look much neater. It is much easier to make them such, as like with other headphones, they will have bezel rings that cover grille edges and the structure will be hidden. But, I give no promises! Maybe they will also be anti-fashion statements, as well!

Thank you for your reply. I look forward to listening to the SR1a in the near future. I’m a big fan of ribbon drivers having owned Apogee speakers, and currently Raidho speakers.

 

[Zhanming057]

Thank you for your reply. I look forward to listening to the SR1a in the near future. I’m a big fan of ribbon drivers having owned Apogee speakers, and currently Raidho speakers.

Danny lives in Ventura so if you're in the greater LA area for some reason, I'm sure he would be happy to give you a tour of the workshop.

@RAAL requisite Alex While I appreciate the professional-feeling durability of the SR1a's, I do feel that the overall presentation can be improved a bit. Hopefully as production ramps up the components can improve in terms cosmetic finish. I come from using a lot of Japanese and more modern Chinese equipment where a lot of effort goes into finer polish and details. But I understand that 1st gen products are hard to get right!

 

[Aleksandar R.]

Danny lives in Ventura so if you're in the greater LA area for some reason, I'm sure he would be happy to give you a tour of the workshop.

@RAAL requisite Alex While I appreciate the professional-feeling durability of the SR1a's, I do feel that the overall presentation can be improved a bit. Hopefully as production ramps up the components can improve in terms cosmetic finish. I come from using a lot of Japanese and more modern Chinese equipment where a lot of effort goes into finer polish and details. But I understand that 1st gen products are hard to get right!

Very unlikely that the quality of CF machining can be improved. What you see now is done by CF machining specialists and we manually polish the edges after them...
Sure, many modern products are looking very nice, but there are no exposed edges of the structure, as those designs have been perfected for decades to cover the structure and edges with rings and bezels and grilles, made of different materials that are easy to make look good, or are simply painted.
Even then, on a popular $6k product I saw casting burrs that are not removed from the inside of the grille casting...

We have a conceptual difference in the design where all those exposed edges and interlocking grooves of the CF structure are in plain sight and Carbon Fiber, being a composite, is not a material that allows itself to be beautifully machined. Also, since there's no painting to cover the mistakes, we must care for it during the machining as if you scratch the surface, there's no method to polish out the scratch...

We will definitely try to improve the epoxy pouring, but I still maintain that this kind of exposed CF structure can not be made prettier by anyone and cost the same.
For example, we can do laser cutting of CF boards in California, but for about $1500 per side...If we cast the cage out of magnesium, it would be much heavier...

In any case, we'll do our best to improve! I'm just saying that this kind of structure is tricky to deal with and we don't expect great leaps in that regard.

But, the design of our future models will be in line with what everyone else does to beautify their product and I'm loving the challenge already!

 

[Zhanming057]

Very unlikely that the quality of CF machining can be improved. What you see now is done by CF machining specialists and we manually polish the edges after them...
Sure, many modern products are looking very nice, but there are no exposed edges of the structure, as those designs have been perfected for decades to cover the structure and edges with rings and bezels and grilles, made of different materials that are easy to make look good, or are simply painted.
Even then, on a popular $6k product I saw casting burrs that are not removed from the inside of the grille casting...

We have a conceptual difference in the design where all those exposed edges and interlocking grooves of the SF structure are in plain sight and Carbon Fiber, being a composite, is not a material that allows itself to be beautifully machined. Also, since there's no painting to cover the mistakes, we must care for it during the machining as if you scratch the surface, there's no method to polish out the scratch...

We will definitely try to improve the epoxy pouring, but I still maintain that this kind of exposed CF structure can not be made prettier by anyone and cost the same.
For example, we can do laser cutting of CF boards in California, but for about $1500 per side...If we cast the cage out of magnesium, it would be much heavier...

In any case, we'll do our best to improve! I'm just saying that this kind of structure is tricky to deal with and we don't expect great leaps in that regard.

But, the design of our future models will be in line with what everyone else does to beautify their product and I'm loving the challenge already!

Thanks! Assuming that I take the proper safety precautions (face mask, filter), I can polish the carbon fiber plates on my own right?

They look absolutely fine in person, but the way I use lightning rigs often exaggerate polish marks and small surface scratches, and then they have to be photoshopped out.

 

[llamaluv]

This isn't a direct response to anyone in particular. Just wanted to say I love the functional aesthetics of the SR1a. Makes me feel like I'm not being condescended to as a user, which is saying a lot.

Conversely, I so frequently resent the questionable aesthetic design decisions made by headphone manufacturers who are looking for superficial (and potentially expensive) ways to present the appearance of quality in order to justify questionable sticker prices. But let that be a rant for another thread...

 

[erik701]

I would like to see these headphones offered as system as well. SR1a Earfield Monitorsm or it's successor plus all in one box solution (Ribbon/Amp Interface + amp), something like Sonoma Acoustics did with Sonoma Model One. I think that many headphone enthusiasts would have no problem to spend let's say $6.000 for such a good headphone system, without need for additional speaker amp, which they do not own and wouldn't have any use for it anyway, because they do not own any speakers (room limitations or whatever any other reason).
Just my 2 cents....

 

[Zhanming057]

I would like to see these headphones offered as system as well. SR1a Earfield Monitorsm or it's successor plus all in one box solution (Ribbon/Amp Interface + amp), something like Sonoma Acoustics did with Sonoma Model One. I think that many headphone enthusiasts would have no problem to spend let's say $6.000 for such a good headphone system, without need for additional speaker amp, which they do not own and wouldn't have any use for it anyway, because they do not own any speakers (room limitations or whatever any other reason).
Just my 2 cents....

They (sort of) have a $6,000 system in the AHB2. Without solving a bunch of tricky engineering challenges, any system for the Sr1a is basically just the cans plus a speaker amp. A big advantage of the standard speaker amp over a direct current drive system is that the speaker amp can pull double duty as a great headphone amp.

At some point I realized that the speaker amp world is at least as competent and far more interesting than the headphone amp world, and never quite looked back. If we're talking about the $3,000 price point, I would choose a power amp to drive just about every pair of TOTL cans outside of a few really sensitive ones.

 

[protoss]

About the new models, I must clarify.

These are just ideas

Can you somehow please figure out how to make them more efficient! Like seriously. You will have a bigger and wider market and maybe even a more dominating force if you can somehow use them with a normal headphone amp.

I want a someday project to be using a ribbon tech through a headphone jack on my cellphone!

If not, I see Hifiman or Audeze might beat you to this first!

And please, for other stop justifying nonsense speaker amps. I want normal headphone amps. Don't care about speaker amps are better debate.....

 

[Aleksandar R.]

Thanks! Assuming that I take the proper safety precautions (face mask, filter), I can polish the carbon fiber plates on my own right?

They look absolutely fine in person, but the way I use lightning rigs often exaggerate polish marks and small surface scratches, and then they have to be photoshopped out.

If you do the "wet" method and use some polishing paste on a cloth, you can do it without the mask.

 

[Zhanming057]

If you do the "wet" method and use some polishing paste on a cloth, you can do it without the mask.

Thanks! I was told to always use a mask regardless of wet or dry polishing because some of the powder might get into the air regardless of method...this is for carbon fiber tubes for custom PC watercooling.

Either way, this is good to know and something that I'd like to try soon

 

[Aleksandar R.]

I would like to see these headphones offered as system as well. SR1a Earfield Monitorsm or it's successor plus all in one box solution (Ribbon/Amp Interface + amp), something like Sonoma Acoustics did with Sonoma Model One. I think that many headphone enthusiasts would have no problem to spend let's say $6.000 for such a good headphone system, without need for additional speaker amp, which they do not own and wouldn't have any use for it anyway, because they do not own any speakers (room limitations or whatever any other reason).
Just my 2 cents....

Yup, that's the idea!
We're kinda' reluctant to do so just yet, as our taste in amp sound is probably going to be different...
maybe offering a few different options, but then without listening, how does the buyer make the choice...
there are things to work out with this idea before we commit.

 

[HoloSpice]

Yup, that's the idea!
We're kinda' reluctant to do so just yet, as our taste in amp sound is probably going to be different...
maybe offering a few different options, but then without listening, how does the buyer make the choice...
there are things to work out with this idea before we commit.

Exactly, keep it seperate.