[BrownBear]

Big +1 on not having the cans plugged in on power on or off. I always do that with all my units.

 

[Mcberto]

Quote:

My experience with the Lyr has been frustrating at best... Had bad stock tubes that dropped one channel or the other, then got replacement tubes and it still hasn't fixed the channel problem.
 
I've been having popping and crackle problems when plugging in my headphones. I bought the Lyr in hopes to pair them up with my HE-500's, but now I wonder if the problems I've been having and the price is worth the trouble.
 
I have powered on before I plugged my hp's in and took them out before I power down.
 
Please tell me any possible way to fix this or make the amp less of a hassle to deal with. 
 
I am fairly new to tube/hybrid amp's so please take it easy on me.
 
Was thinking about moving to the Asgard instead to have a decent amp without such a hassle. for me. 
 
Thanks, 
 
Andy

I have done exactly what the manual said. and what you guys said.

 

[eddiek997]

Quote:

My experience with the Lyr has been frustrating at best... Had bad stock tubes that dropped one channel or the other, then got replacement tubes and it still hasn't fixed the channel problem.
 
I've been having popping and crackle problems when plugging in my headphones. I bought the Lyr in hopes to pair them up with my HE-500's, but now I wonder if the problems I've been having and the price is worth the trouble.
 
I have powered on before I plugged my hp's in and took them out before I power down.
 
Please tell me any possible way to fix this or make the amp less of a hassle to deal with. 
 
I am fairly new to tube/hybrid amp's so please take it easy on me.
 
Was thinking about moving to the Asgard instead to have a decent amp without such a hassle. for me. 
 
Thanks, 
 
Andy

Did you check the interconnects to the amp from your source? Check both cables, both ends. If its secure, listen, deduce which channel is problematic.. swap the cables from L to R, see if the problem follows. I've seen cables go bad before. Make sure the tubes are properly seated and not slightly loose - you may have to put a fair amount of pressure on once you have the pins aligned properly (obviously not too much pressure). Again, swap tubes from one to the other and listen to see if the problem follows the tube.
Make sure your volume pot is all the way down before turning on/off amp and connecting cans - Also, make sure the headphone jack is ALL the way in. (some of this might sound stupid but have to ask).
 
If you have done all of the above and the problem persists, call Schiit. Their support has a very good reputation (one of the reasons why I bought mine).
Also, hang in there, the Lyr pairs very well with the HE500's and decent tubes. The result is worth any temporary issues.

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

My experience with the Lyr has been frustrating at best... Had bad stock tubes that dropped one channel or the other, then got replacement tubes and it still hasn't fixed the channel problem.
 
I've been having popping and crackle problems when plugging in my headphones. I bought the Lyr in hopes to pair them up with my HE-500's, but now I wonder if the problems I've been having and the price is worth the trouble.
 
I have powered on before I plugged my hp's in and took them out before I power down.
 
Please tell me any possible way to fix this or make the amp less of a hassle to deal with. 
 
I am fairly new to tube/hybrid amp's so please take it easy on me.
 
Was thinking about moving to the Asgard instead to have a decent amp without such a hassle. for me. 
 
Thanks, 
 
Andy

 
As for the tubes, examine the tubes themselves if you can.  Is the word "Japan" stamped beneath the GE logo on them?  There were a few cases of Japanese made tubes that snuck into Schiit's shipments they were unaware of.  Jason was unaware there even was a Japanese made version, after I pointed it out, he removed all the remaining ones from inventory, but that was only a few weeks ago.  The fault lies with GE who made a completely different tube to a different spec in the Japanese factory and didn't feel the need to change the model number.  GE screwing up?  Who'd have guessed?   If you visually inspect the Japanese and USA made tubes, they're entirely different with a completely different heater system and everything.  The Japanese ones barely even glow, the US ones glow quite bright.  Why GE marked them as the same product is something I'll never understand, however we do know that mostly anything made in Japan in the 50's and 60's can be assumed to be garbage in the purest form (in contrast to today when anything made in Japan can be assumed equal-or-better to anything US-made!)   So that may explain your tube issue if they're the Japanese ones.  In my experience they're horribly, horribly microphonic, and fail within 300 hours. The US tubes, of the 5 I've installed, I have one that tends to make some crackle/hiss for the first 20 min or so during warmup but is generally fine after that, I had one that had a bit of a whine sound periodically, some people may not mind but I'm sensitive to UHF so it drove me nuts.  The other 3 are flawless.   Of course tubes are tubes, there's a bit of trial and error to find a perfect one when buying NOS stuff that's been sitting on a shelf in a warehouse since the Eisenhower administration.    However, the reward is worth the effort.  Hearing my HE-400 on a very well measuring SS amp versus on the hybrid lyr....I'll mess with the tubes any day for that sound...

  Don't judge the Lyr by a batch of bad $20 tubes, it'll give a poor impression of a great amp.
 
 
Can you please describe your crackle problems when plugging in?  You say you plug in after power-on...how long do you wait before plugging in?  If you wait a long time (10, 20, 30 minutes) do you still get this "crackle"?  Is this crackle just a little noise in the cans if you plug in while they're on your head, or is it a loud "snap" from the drivers that you can hear from a few feet away from the headphones?  Those are the keys to if it's just normal plug-in noise, or if it's an actual problem. 
 
 
Don't give up on Lyr.  From what I've heard, HE-500 is much like my HE-400 (better, by a bit but too similar to warrant owning both), and if so, the HE-400 is magical on Lyr compared to my O2 (which I bought instead of Agard since I really bought it only for my Denons which Lyr is too high gain for, and Asgard can't be stacked under Lyr.) The tubes do some nice things for the planars...
 
Quote:

It tells you this in the manual...why do people not read the manual.

Quote:

Big +1 on not having the cans plugged in on power on or off. I always do that with all my units.

 
WhiteCrow: Some people may not read the manual, but others don't read posts

  Most of us here are talking about plugging in AFTER power-on.  In my case, I can wait 30+ minutes after power-on, that snap is still there.  Meaning it's something different from the power-on thump, but rather a stored charge somewhere.  yes, the day the headphones got blown I mistakenly plugged in at power-on and the combination of the normal thump and the stored charge were what created the final problem, however the behavior of the post-power-on snap is an actual defect unrelated to power-on that needs to be serviced to resolve.  I happen to be the bottleneck in getting it serviced for the moment. 
 
Also, on a properly functioning Lyr, other than the first batches without relays, there is no real need aside from paranoia to not plug in at startup.  My other one for example would have no problem doing so.  My bad one was different because the normal safe power-on with the relay combined with the defect to create a more severe problem.  But this is not about power-on thumps, but rather a specific broken amplifier component that seems to have affected a handful of units in either the January batch or a few batches since then. And I can confirm personally it didn't affect all of them from that batch.  The symptoms are obvious and absolute, and my second one has no such symptoms, from the same batch.

 

[Kremer930]

Relax. People just reinforced the need to not power on or off with cans plugged in. There is no need to go to town....

There are likely a lot of headfi noobies that are unaware of the risks, regardless of brand or model of amp.

Cheers

 

[WhiteCrow]

Yea, I would always turn my little dot MKII on and off with out phones...but it is OTL so that can potentially damage the amp from what i have read, no problems thus far with it however.

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

Yea, I would always turn my little dot MKII on and off with out phones...but it is OTL so that can potentially damage the amp from what i have read, no problems thus far with it however.

 
One of the most ironic events in hifidom is the certain former H-F member who is not to be named who was banished from the forums, primarily resulting from his arguing with Jason over the lack of a relay mute on Asgard originally who ended up designing his own amp, mostly to prove Schiit (and others) wrong in their designs/costs.   I ended up buying a pre-assmbled version of that DIY amp recently for a set of Denons the Lyr doesn't do well with.  Decent, cute little amp it is, but the grand irony: No relay mute...maybe next version. 

 
I'm glad I trained myself to get into the habit of not powering on/off with headphones plugged in on the Lyr, where it technically shouldn't matter now

 

[hodgjy]

One of the greatest misunderstandings in headphone audio is the turn on/off bump.  While there is some transient voltage that does cause this noise, and it can damage headphones if not properly designed, many times the pop we hear is not actually transients but the power switch arcing.  I still have a pop in my Asgard, and I do have the mute relay, so I'm convinced the pop is from the power switch arcing.  FWIW, my Trafomatic arcs during power off, too.
 

 

[Penarin]

Ordered my Asgard this morning!

 

[drunkn]

Would a Schiit Lyr/Bifrost be a bad pairing for a denon d7000. I'm hearing people saying it's too "noisy". Thoughts?

 

[hodgjy]

It's my opinion that the best Schiit amp for low impedance headphones is the Asgard.  Use the Valhalla if you have high impedance headphones, and use the Lyr if you have orthos.  I think it all boils down to that.  You don't need the brute force of the Lyr for the Denons.  Many people claim the Asgard is the best sounding Schiit of the bunch, so save yourself a few bucks and get a lower noise floor by getting the Asgard.
Quote:

Would a Schiit Lyr/Bifrost be a bad pairing for a denon d7000. I'm hearing people saying it's too "noisy". Thoughts?

 

[Lee Harvey]

I don't know why folks are saying that the Lyr is not a good match for Denon headphones.  I have been using my D5000's and HD650's with the Lyr for 6 months now and I am very satisfied with the results.  With the D5000's the Lyr provides power and control to keep the D5000's from being tubby sounding.  It allows them to develop deep bass and still have an very open midrange and highs while keeping a nice warm sound that the Lyr can produce.  I have never had any issues with the D5000's being too sensitive to bring noise into the sound.  I also use my HD650's and 600's with the Lyr when I want a more open sound.  The D5000's are better at playings things like Stevie Ray Vaughan's nice fat bass lines.  I trade out what headphones I use for what type of music I am listening to at the time.  The Lyr blows my Audio GD FUN out the doors.  The FUN is veiled sounding compared to the Lyr.   I bought the Lyr for the ability to drive most headphones including Orthos for when I am able to cough up the cash for some HE500s or LCD2's.  I am using the 6N1P tubes that Schiit sells in my Lyr.  They work great with both headphones and are a improvement over the stock tubes that the Lyr ships with.  Maybe some folks are using 6922 tube which in humble opinion are crap.  I hate 6922 tubes from past experience with them.  They have no bass control and a soft, muffled high end.  As for the Lyr my first unit showed up DOA with the relay not turning the tubes on.  Jason shipped me out new unit to replace the dead unit after a few phone call and emails.  I would like to get a chance to listen to the Bifrost and the new Peachtree DACit to see which DAC would be the best match with the Lry since they are at the same price point.  

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

I don't know why folks are saying that the Lyr is not a good match for Denon headphones.  I have been using my D5000's and HD650's with the Lyr for 6 months now and I am very satisfied with the results.  With the D5000's the Lyr provides power and control to keep the D5000's from being tubby sounding.  It allows them to develop deep bass and still have an very open midrange and highs while keeping a nice warm sound that the Lyr can produce.  I have never had any issues with the D5000's being too sensitive to bring noise into the sound.  I also use my HD650's and 600's with the Lyr when I want a more open sound.  The D5000's are better at playings things like Stevie Ray Vaughan's nice fat bass lines.  I trade out what headphones I use for what type of music I am listening to at the time.  The Lyr blows my Audio GD FUN out the doors.  The FUN is veiled sounding compared to the Lyr.   I bought the Lyr for the ability to drive most headphones including Orthos for when I am able to cough up the cash for some HE500s or LCD2's.  I am using the 6N1P tubes that Schiit sells in my Lyr.  They work great with both headphones and are a improvement over the stock tubes that the Lyr ships with.  Maybe some folks are using 6922 tube which in humble opinion are crap.  I hate 6922 tubes from past experience with them.  They have no bass control and a soft, muffled high end.  As for the Lyr my first unit showed up DOA with the relay not turning the tubes on.  Jason shipped me out new unit to replace the dead unit after a few phone call and emails.  I would like to get a chance to listen to the Bifrost and the new Peachtree DACit to see which DAC would be the best match with the Lry since they are at the same price point.  

 
The tubes may indeed be the difference.  The 6N1P's supposedly run hotter and sound more tubey, but perhaps they're lower gain and less noisy as well.  I'm running the GE BZ's from Schiit and love the sound of them for everything but the Denons.  With the Denons the noise floor is just too high.  Audible hiss, periodic "static" from the tubes, periodic screech, etc.  For HD650, HE-400, and K702, it's the only amp I'll use

  For Denons, at least with these tubes, it's a non-starter unless you like noise.  I also personally prefer the sound of the Denons on an SS amp better, and is the only headphone I feel that way about. 

 

[Lee Harvey]

Quote:

 
The tubes may indeed be the difference.  The 6N1P's supposedly run hotter and sound more tubey, but perhaps they're lower gain and less noisy as well.  I'm running the GE BZ's from Schiit and love the sound of them for everything but the Denons.  With the Denons the noise floor is just too high.  Audible hiss, periodic "static" from the tubes, periodic screech, etc.  For HD650, HE-400, and K702, it's the only amp I'll use

  For Denons, at least with these tubes, it's a non-starter unless you like noise.  I also personally prefer the sound of the Denons on an SS amp better, and is the only headphone I feel that way about. 

 
The great thing about the Lyr is that is relatively cheap to switch out a couple of tubes and change its character and operating parameters.  How do you like your HE-400's compared to the HD650s?

 

[IEMCrazy]

Quote:

 
The great thing about the Lyr is that is relatively cheap to switch out a couple of tubes and change its character and operating parameters.  How do you like your HE-400's compared to the HD650s?

 
Absolutely.  I expected to do that early on, but I ended up liking what I already had with the stock tubes so much I'm loathe to try changing it

 
The HD650's and HE-400's are, to me overwhelmingly different headphones (TMRaven would disagree.)  It's hard to compare them as a direct contrast, IMO since they represent very different sound signatures beyond a few similarities.  I wouldn't sell either, and I'm delighted that yesterday I finally got my replacement drivers for the 650's that the Lyr incident damaged.  I initially bought the HE-400's as a replacement/upgrade from HD650, but eventually decided that I needed the 650's back in the mix.  HD650 has been my headphone of choice for over 5 years, but I have to say I think HE-400 has officially dethroned them as my go-to all all-rounder headphone and in the #1 slot on my stand.  They combine some of the things I like about HD650 and some of the things I like about K702 and put them on one headphone.  They're much more alive and exciting than HD650, but with a hint of being laid back and without being so linear they're fatiguing as K702.  On the other hand, they just can't replace HD650 for that laid back relaxing sound or K702 for true linearity. Nothing does smooth and relaxing like a 650.
 
Two very different things and either would have to be pried away from me (along with the Bifrost & Lyr.)  On SS, I'll say HE-400 picks up a lot of the articulation in the mids as HD650, but on Lyr the two become very different with HE-400 picking up a syrupy smooth flow.