Schiit Happened: The Story of the World's Most Improbable Start-Up
- Thread starter Jason Stoddard
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Nice camera and lens you got there. Bokeh looks creamy-licious
ArmchairPhilosopher
Headphoneus Supremus
Agreed. But it's not mine. It's an official Schiit product shot for either Gungnir or Mjolnir 1, can't remember which.
sixergixer
500+ Head-Fier
'Doing it Right' is so good! Featuring Panda Bear, one of the standout members of Animal Collective. His albums are great listens as well.
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sixergixer
500+ Head-Fier
As much of a chance as any of us would have with Lauren Holly.
That is a great track for speaker positioning indeed, but so is
Way Down Deep
Lights of Lousianne
The Hunter
all by Jennifer Warnes.
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classfolkphile
100+ Head-Fier
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Yes, I know, I've been in the same situation recently.
Been there, done that, although I did have assistance the last few years of her life. I empathize.Mom is 98 with dementia. I've been her caregiver for the last five years. Spotify plays in the background all day, but all my headphone gear is collecting dust.
I'm 73 myself and getting old is no fun. But it sure beats the alternative.
The most beautiful version of Joan of Arc I've heard is this acapella one in four part harmony:
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rkw
Headphoneus Supremus
I'm wondering if the Mjolnir 3 still runs hot while running only as a preamp. I don't see anything in the manual that suggests the headphone amp would turn off, and I'm thinking that it might not be the best choice for a preamp if you do a lot of speaker listening.
MikeW1
New Head-Fier
It definitely still works as a space heater when the pre-amp is enabled. Headphone output is still putting out sound so you need to unplug it if you don't want the extra sound source.
MikeW1
New Head-Fier
For those who are still interested in some Skoll findings, here’s some quick thoughts after using it for a couple weeks.
My turntable is a Fluance RT-85 with the stock 2M Blue and I was previously using a Mani 2 and listening primarily with my old HD598s and swapping in the Skoll “felt” better but I couldn’t exactly explain why. Whenever I thought I heard something better than before, I’d throw the Mani back in the chain and couldn’t really pick up the difference. Both sound relatively good and similar to each other in my chain at the time.
I got tricked into thinking my 2M Blue stylus was one foot in the grave so I did an upgrade to the 2M Bronze rather than just replace the Blue stylus and wow, that was a big upgrade. Much more dramatic of a change than the Mani -> Skoll switch. I lack the vocab to elegantly explain the difference, but I’d say it was smoother overall with tighter low end and cleaner highs. Less incisive treble than the Blue was for sure. Some harder to track inner groves showed some improvement as well due to the micro line stylus. That said, it was still tricky to put my finger on what was different between the pre-amps but I kept finding myself wanting the Skoll back in whenever I tried living on the Mani for a while.
My LCD5 pair finally showed up this week and that was the final piece of the puzzle. Now when I sit the two amps side by side I can hear the low end being a touch tighter, more controlled and maybe even fuller than on Mani. The HD598s just didn’t go that deep so it was tough to notice with them. The treble on some songs was just a bit off with the Mani, but nothing obscene. With Skoll that appears to have been cleaned up as well.
As for connections, I’ve been using balanced all the time but initially I had both SE and XLR hooked up to the Mjolnir 3 and they were pretty close in sound quality. It was hard to truly A-B test them due to the volume difference but after trying both for a while I ended up just going with the balanced output.
Outside of sonics, the Skoll definitely has a great look to it as I’m going for an all black finish Schiit setup going forward. The remote is very handy for tinkering with settings versus flicking dip switches on the Mani.
In summary, I think folks with a Fluance table should definitely consider a cartridge upgrade first and foremost if you haven’t already as it’s the biggest bang for your buck. If you already have good cans or speakers then the pre-amp upgrade is probably a good idea, but it’s very much a 5-10% improvement at most. Think refinement vs major audible sonic improvements. I figure the folks who are gonna really want to consider the Skoll are living on higher end tables with MC carts.
Sorry for the delay in giving this feedback and hopefully it's helpful to some folks!
My turntable is a Fluance RT-85 with the stock 2M Blue and I was previously using a Mani 2 and listening primarily with my old HD598s and swapping in the Skoll “felt” better but I couldn’t exactly explain why. Whenever I thought I heard something better than before, I’d throw the Mani back in the chain and couldn’t really pick up the difference. Both sound relatively good and similar to each other in my chain at the time.
I got tricked into thinking my 2M Blue stylus was one foot in the grave so I did an upgrade to the 2M Bronze rather than just replace the Blue stylus and wow, that was a big upgrade. Much more dramatic of a change than the Mani -> Skoll switch. I lack the vocab to elegantly explain the difference, but I’d say it was smoother overall with tighter low end and cleaner highs. Less incisive treble than the Blue was for sure. Some harder to track inner groves showed some improvement as well due to the micro line stylus. That said, it was still tricky to put my finger on what was different between the pre-amps but I kept finding myself wanting the Skoll back in whenever I tried living on the Mani for a while.
My LCD5 pair finally showed up this week and that was the final piece of the puzzle. Now when I sit the two amps side by side I can hear the low end being a touch tighter, more controlled and maybe even fuller than on Mani. The HD598s just didn’t go that deep so it was tough to notice with them. The treble on some songs was just a bit off with the Mani, but nothing obscene. With Skoll that appears to have been cleaned up as well.
As for connections, I’ve been using balanced all the time but initially I had both SE and XLR hooked up to the Mjolnir 3 and they were pretty close in sound quality. It was hard to truly A-B test them due to the volume difference but after trying both for a while I ended up just going with the balanced output.
Outside of sonics, the Skoll definitely has a great look to it as I’m going for an all black finish Schiit setup going forward. The remote is very handy for tinkering with settings versus flicking dip switches on the Mani.
In summary, I think folks with a Fluance table should definitely consider a cartridge upgrade first and foremost if you haven’t already as it’s the biggest bang for your buck. If you already have good cans or speakers then the pre-amp upgrade is probably a good idea, but it’s very much a 5-10% improvement at most. Think refinement vs major audible sonic improvements. I figure the folks who are gonna really want to consider the Skoll are living on higher end tables with MC carts.
Sorry for the delay in giving this feedback and hopefully it's helpful to some folks!
sixergixer
500+ Head-Fier
Indeed, my Project Debut Carbon DC benefited immensely from the upgrade from the stock Ortofon 2M Red (a shouty uncouth cart) to a Sumiko Moonstone (smooth and refined but still very detailed).
Whoopknacker
New Head-Fier
100 hours in with Yggy MIB. After a handful of hours the dac became real shouty. Figured it was burn in pains. Installed the resistors on my Maggies, but that didn’t exactly calm it down. Went into Roon, turned on -3db headroom adjustment. Now that’s satisfaction. Entirely different beast altogether. Can somebody explain why this is different, because I turned up the volume to match, and it sounds WAY better.
Whoopknacker
New Head-Fier
Nailed it. Synergy was off. Preamp is unity gain. So Mytek Brooklyn at -12db was gelling with Parasound JC5 at max input sensitivity. Turned down amp sensitivity, eargasm. Synergy is a cruel mistress. Now just need to fine tune.
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