I'd like to thank xtreme for hosting the mini-meet. It was a very interesting event but a good size to actually get in some decent listening.
It was definitely an interesting mix of people (but still headphone geeks).
The Copperheads are decent cables but they are budget cables after all but certainly better than stock and a lot of the other budget cables. For the money, I like the Kimber PBJs the most in the under $100 category.
I'm sure there are a lot of DIY cables that are better but I'm too lazy to DIY. I'd rather just listen to music (or actually have a life outside of my home).
I did find it amusing that we connected a $800 CD player to a $500 amp with $650 interconnects but it sounded pretty darn nice.
We need to find someone with Tara Labs' Zero interconnects. $13,000 interconnects sound about right for the Orpheus.
I loved the HE90s and KGSS. A hair light on the bass so there's a lot of modern music that might not have enough body. But for classical and small jazz ensembles, I don't think it gets much better than that (other than one of KG's better amps).
It still scares me to think that touching the volume knob on that KGSS removed the light hum/buzz that we could hear. How many volts is going through that thing?!?!
I was impressed by ppl's PPA. It was the first time I had ever heard the HD600 actually sound good and I've owned a pair for 7 years. Frankly, I always thought the HD600s sucked. Polite to the point of being comatose. They were always dark, distant, polite, thick, woolly and slow to my ears. Like watching molasses trying to flow at meat locker temperatures. Like seated at the back of the concert hall with socks in my ears.
But I actually heard them have life without being forward, strident or etched. It was dynamic, powerful, fast, immediate, still detailed and well balanced with the Clou cable (but a hair dark still with stock cables).
I kept taking them off to look to see that I was really listening to HD600s.
I tried the HD600s with a Headmaster before as well as the MG-Head and META42 last night and I just thought it was the headphones at fault. Now I know that the HD600s aren't as crappy as I thought they were.
I think that I could actually be happy listening to a PPA/HD600 pairing (other than the fact that I sold my HD600s to binary_digit last night but I can always get the HD650s when they show up in the US).
The MG-Head OTL and META42 were okay but well, I'm a spoiled person so they were pleasant but nothing that knocked me off my feet.
I have an Emmeline HR-2 on the way and I'm looking forward to comparing it against the PPA (and other amps if I can get my hands on any).
I want to say that binary_digit's casework is beautiful. The best that I've seen of the smaller amp manufacturers and better than some commerical manufacturers. Granted, I've not seen a lot of the other amps in person but it's not hard to figure it out from the very good photos people post. Everything else looks well utilitarian and that's it.
Now if we could only get those Singlepower amps in casework like that and someone could be making some serious money.
Eric: turn down the damn volume! You are going to go deaf.
Every time I listened to something after Eric, I had to turn the volume down half the distance from zero to his listening level and it was still a bit too loud.
I can't wait for the next meet. I should actually have some real headphone hardware. I'm also thinking that if we can arrange for another weekend afternoon/evening that I might be able to swing some really nice source hardware. (A Meridian 800 would be nice for starters.
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