As regards the amp, I found these comments on other posts that perfectly conform to what I experience:
SP Wild writes: "Just make sure the dip switches at the bottom are all set to the maximum gain. This setting is the most transparent - I leave it on max gain even to drive my 27 ohm cans or 300 ohm cans and anywhere in between - regardless of what the manual says.
With the dip switches at the max setting the BCL is transparent enough for me to use as a pre-amp stage going into my tube-amps - The BCL is able to tighten up the midbass - the bass in my tube amps are less taught without the BCL active stage."
KiwiNZ writes: "Mine's also set on max 20db for the best sound."
Both are at:
http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/438859/lehmann-black-cube-user-manual-english-version#post_5914894
Then Kees writes: "I don't own one, but I had one on trial for some time.
Not to say anything bad about the SQ of the BCL, but I didn't like it and didn't keep it.
For me it had three disqualifying properties:
- Rather disappointing dynamics. It sounds very polite and far away. It does not give me the feeling I am realy there. I contributed it to rather poor dynamics (I may be wrong, but that is what I thought to be the cause).
- It does wonderful with Senn (HD650) but less so with other brands. Specifically my ATHs (W100) and Victor DX1000 did not do well with it. They sounded rather flat and uninvolving.
- It did not have the ability to drive my (headphile) K340 to even a remotely acceptable level."
Kees:
"What annoyed me most was that I found that I inadvertedly kept turning the volume up, but that didn't help any. I even checked the back to see if there was maybe a gain switch..... And I don't usually play my music loud."
And Kees again:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Elephas
Turning the volume up to help...what?
The Lehmann BCL's gain switches are on the bottom.
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"If I do something inadvertedly, I don't know why I do it the moment I do it. My wild guess now would be: To compensate for the perceived lack of *dynamics?*. I know it doesn't help, that is why it annoyed me that I found myself doing it.
I must say I never found the gain switches on the bottom. I don't think it would have made a lot of difference, considering I had the same experience with widely varying impedances (30, 65, 300 ohm), don't you think? Maybe for the K340, a bit.
This is how I experienced it. It may very well be different for other people."
The above is copied from:
http://www.head-fi.org/forum/thread/190769/lehmann-black-cube-linear/15
~ So when I read Kees's comment that the BCL sounds "polite and far away" and that turning up the volume didn't help any, I knew exactly what he was talking about and immediately thought he probably had the gain switch at 10dB. I kept reading and bam he didn't even know the amp had gain switches, so never corrected for it. By contrast, SP Wild knew about the gain switches and found that maximum gain gives the most *transparency,* which is exactly what I find (although I prefer the sound at 18dB rather than 20dB). I found no comments anywhere on this forum of people who actually own and have heard the BCL who have said that changing the gain setting doesn't
improve the sound. Kees -- the guy who didn't know about the gain switches -- conjuctures that switching the gain wouldn't have made any difference, but of course he never heard the amp at higher gain. What he did hear at lower gain matches what I heard, and his disappointment with the amp mirrors my initial disappointment witih it before I switched to 18dB.