[Sefelt103]

I keep trying to watch more z reviews stuff but I find his videos really painful to watch. He seems incredibly slow to get to the point and keeps saying random and incredibly strange unrelated things. For me it is hard to respect his knowledge when he presents his stuff like he does, but that is my opinion.

Z Reviews takes a novel approach to headphones. It's more artistic reviewing than technical reviewing. It's his experience of headphones and other equipment presented in an arbitrary form that can be charming and funny. His reviews are quite long and cover all sorts of things that he thinks significant from cables to value to dimensions etc. He's an enigma, a different approach to audio assessment.

 

[TrollDragon]

I find my FiiO A3 can get the 600ohm DT800s pretty much bang on the volume i want, but only if it is close to on on maximum with a lot of music and it unfortunately does distort.

My E11K (same spec as A3) will drive my 250Ω DT880s but not well, I can't picture 600Ω headphones with it... Now my E12 does a fine job at powering the DT880s but I mostly use it for the power hungry T50RPs.

 

[TrollDragon]

Z Reviews takes a novel approach to headphones. It's more artistic reviewing than technical reviewing. It's his experience of headphones and other equipment presented in an arbitrary form that can be charming and funny. His reviews are quite long and cover all sorts of things that he thinks significant from cables to value to dimensions etc. He's an enigma, a different approach to audio assessment.

I guess that's one way to put it... I really can't stand his reviews, but to each their own.

 

[Gazny]

From my experience I liked more than 300+ MW into the 880 600 ohm. Even more if you want to do any eq on them. The BasX A-100 does about twice that (600 Ohms: 0.6 watts / channel) so to me it makes a lot of sense, it is mostly about lowering the distortion by having more headroom. Class A amps work a little differently so they tend to be able to drive the 880 600 ohm differently.

 

[TJFOE]

Does anyone have experience with the newer DT880/600 and the Little Dot 1+ with gain 6.5x (so without jumpers)?

 

[TheGiantHogweed]

My E11K (same spec as A3) will drive my 250Ω DT880s but not well, I can't picture 600Ω headphones with it... Now my E12 does a fine job at powering the DT880s but I mostly use it for the power hungry T50RPs.

I had the 250ohm until the coiled cable had a fault which cut out the right channel and amazon sent me the DT 880 660ohms as a replacement. I found A3 plenty loud enough with those. Anything past 6 on the dial was just too loud. How much louder does the amplifier need to go to drive them well? Not sure who it was, but before i got the 600ohms, I did ask on this forum if the A3 would be ok and someone told me that they didn't have problems with it. In my case, with most music, it is loud enough on high gain and very close to (or at) maximum. With a very limited amount of music, it admittedly does distort and does so far more with bass boost on. About a year ago, I did even buy the A5 as I could do with more volume so I'm not pushing the amp so hard but I was really disappointed with it. Given the specifications saying it was 800mw at 32 ohms vs 270mw for the A3, even for 600ohm headphones, I was really surprised just how small the difference was. With these headphones, it only seemed slightly louder. At double the price of my A3, I was disappointed enough to return it.
I also sometimes like a bit of bass boost and the A5 had the most horrible bass boost I've ever come across. From graphs I've since noticed on this forum, it boosts it by around 6db from right at the bottom of the frequency range to 100hz, but still is at +4db at 200hz and still seems boosted above that and to me it completely ruins the midrange. The A3 peaked by around +6db at 75hz and rolled off very quickly and was close to being flat again by the time it goes up to 100hz

The only device I have that actually gets these headphones very loud is my integrated amplifier. Pioneer A-209R. Turn the dial past 10 o clock and you will seriously struggle to go any further. Why would a cheap device like this have a better output than many really expensive headphone amplifiers specifically designed to drive power hungry headphones? The reason why I don't use it is because I have so many different input devices (introduce a bit of interference) and it is is in an awkward location. Otherwise, if there was such a thing as a headphone amplifier like this, that would be ideal for me. Having bass, and treble for + and - 8db adjustments as well as a loudness and direct button is just nice to have.

Any suggestions for a better headphone amplifier would be appreciated. I would prefer it to be a portable battery powered one as I don't just use them at my desk. I'd looked into the topping NX3 which looked pretty loud from the specs, but also looks like it will have a muddy bass boost similar to the A5 from what some have said. My A3 is manageable, but I do occasionally want more volume as well as the bass boost being usable without distortion.

 

[TrollDragon]

I had the 250ohm until the coiled cable had a fault which cut out the right channel and amazon sent me the DT 880 660ohms as a replacement. I found A3 plenty loud enough with those. Anything past 6 on the dial was just too loud. How much louder does the amplifier need to go to drive them well? Not sure who it was, but before i got the 600ohms, I did ask on this forum if the A3 would be ok and someone told me that they didn't have problems with it. In my case, with most music, it is loud enough on high gain and very close to (or at) maximum. With a very limited amount of music, it admittedly does distort and does so far more with bass boost on. About a year ago, I did even buy the A5 as I could do with more volume so I'm not pushing the amp so hard but I was really disappointed with it. Given the specifications saying it was 800mw at 32 ohms vs 270mw for the A3, even for 600ohm headphones, I was really surprised just how small the difference was. With these headphones, it only seemed slightly louder. At double the price of my A3, I was disappointed enough to return it.
I also sometimes like a bit of bass boost and the A5 had the most horrible bass boost I've ever come across. From graphs I've since noticed on this forum, it boosts it by around 6db from right at the bottom of the frequency range to 100hz, but still is at +4db at 200hz and still seems boosted above that and to me it completely ruins the midrange. The A3 peaked by around +6db at 75hz and rolled off very quickly and was close to being flat again by the time it goes up to 100hz

The only device I have that actually gets these headphones very loud is my integrated amplifier. Pioneer A-209R. Turn the dial past 10 o clock and you will seriously struggle to go any further. Why would a cheap device like this have a better output than many really expensive headphone amplifiers specifically designed to drive power hungry headphones? The reason why I don't use it is because I have so many different input devices (introduce a bit of interference) and it is is in an awkward location. Otherwise, if there was such a thing as a headphone amplifier like this, that would be ideal for me. Having bass, and treble for + and - 8db adjustments as well as a loudness and direct button is just nice to have.

Any suggestions for a better headphone amplifier would be appreciated. I would prefer it to be a portable battery powered one as I don't just use them at my desk. I'd looked into the topping NX3 which looked pretty loud from the specs, but also looks like it will have a muddy bass boost similar to the A5 from what some have said. My A3 is manageable, but I do occasionally want more volume as well as the bass boost being usable without distortion.

I very seldomly run DT880s portable, they are always on the tube amp, so I don't have a lot of suggestions for portables. I do know that the next portable I'm going to pick up will be the
xDuoo XD05 Plus & BT module. It ticks all the boxes and has the power for my T50RPs, I imagine it will do a fine job with the beyer's as well.

https://www.xduoo.net/product/xduoo-xd-05-plus/

 

[TheGiantHogweed]

I very seldomly run DT880s portable, they are always on the tube amp, so I don't have a lot of suggestions for portables. I do know that the next portable I'm going to pick up will be the
xDuoo XD05 Plus & BT module. It ticks all the boxes and has the power for my T50RPs, I imagine it will do a fine job with the beyer's as well.

https://www.xduoo.net/product/xduoo-xd-05-plus/

Although I will probably just use the line out from my current DAC and use that as an analogue input with this, the xDuoo does look pretty good. I would just want to find out somewhere what frequency and by how much it boosts the bass. It does have more features than I'd need, but I may use them in time. I do however think a screen on a portable amplifier is a bit over the top really.

 

[PsilocybinCube]

This has probably been covered in the 778 pages of DT880 reviews...I'm trying to assess people's opinions of the DT880 600 ohm with the Bottlehead Crack.

I have the BHC w/Speedball and this seems like a good fit with the amp.

Thoughts?

I currently use the HD800, but I have to admit that Zeus made me curious about the headphones.

 

[gooeyrich]

From my experience I liked more than 300+ MW into the 880 600 ohm. Even more if you want to do any eq on them. The BasX A-100 does about twice that (600 Ohms: 0.6 watts / channel) so to me it makes a lot of sense, it is mostly about lowering the distortion by having more headroom. Class A amps work a little differently so they tend to be able to drive the 880 600 ohm differently.

Beyer's spec sheet says:

Power handling capacity. . . . . . . . . . 100 mW

So why would anything above make a difference? I'm not a technical expert.

 

[Gazny]

Beyer's spec sheet says:




So why would anything above make a difference? I'm not a technical expert.

It is not that you want to put a full 600 mw or 350mw into them.
It is that if you want to put in 100, you wouldn't want that to be 100% of your amps capabilities. Having it be a smaller ratio leads to performance gains. 1/2 < 1/3 < 1/6th of your amp has improvements due to amplifiers distortion numbers.

 

[gooeyrich]

It is not that you want to put a full 600 mw or 350mw into them.
It is that if you want to put in 100, you wouldn't want that to be 100% of your amps capabilities. Having it be a smaller ratio leads to performance gains. 1/2 < 1/3 < 1/6th of your amp has improvements due to amplifiers distortion numbers.

But what's the threshold for that ratio? 25% above capacity? 50? 100? There has to be some science behind it.

Surely it can't be double the capacity.

 

[Gazny]

But what's the threshold for that ratio? 25% above capacity? 50? 100? There has to be some science behind it.

Surely it can't be double the capacity.

It all depends on your amp, they all sound and perform differently on different loads. Speaking from my experience about 300 is pretty good, more would not be bad. 600 seems good for someone who enjoys eq.

 

[mvule]

Z Reviews seemed to suggest the distortion he heard was not the headphones but the amp.
So seems to be crucial getting enough power into them, comfortably...

 

[Kammerat Rebekka]

This has probably been covered in the 778 pages of DT880 reviews...I'm trying to assess people's opinions of the DT880 600 ohm with the Bottlehead Crack.

I have the BHC w/Speedball and this seems like a good fit with the amp.

Thoughts?

I currently use the HD800, but I have to admit that Zeus made me curious about the headphones.

The BHC w speedball does very well with the 600 ohm DT880. In fact I vastly prefer 600 ohm headphones for that particular amp.
One thing though: both the HD800 and DT880 share a similar sound signature, so if you’re looking for a complimentary can I’d probably look elsewhere.
Good luck

Btw I saw that Z review and found it highly entertaining whilst at the same time cringeworthy. He is such a likeable person, but man it irks me when he yet again starts talking about stuff he doesn’t understand. He still has no clue about ohms and power and the relationship between the two.