[Music Alchemist]

I don't know if it's burn in, as I have no real opinion on that subject, but the 2170 system is sounding particularly awesome recently. Had it a couple of weeks now but not logged too many hours on it yet. The sound is difficult to describe. I definitely appreciate more now how different they are than headphones. It is sort of like being in a room with awesome speakers playing a really clear FM stereo channel.

 
I can't comment much on mechanical burn-in either. After owning 50 or so headphones, I have never experienced burn-in to any appreciable degree. And I am someone who has encountered more than a few unexpected things that affect sound quality. At least one study was done to measure burn-in of headphones, and it did make a difference, but such a small one that I'm not even sure it would be audible. I do know that ear pad break-in is undoubtedly a genuine phenomenon that can change the sound of a headphone, especially when the pads break down to the point that you need to replace them. And of course, brain burn-in (gradually becoming accustomed to the sound of something new) is commonplace. For me, though, my perception of the core sound signature of a headphone tends not to fluctuate.
 
[mod edit - removed O/T discussion after post flagged]

 

[LaCuffia]

I am listen to the Stax through a vinyl rig - Pro-Ject Debut Carbon turntable and Musical Fidelity phono preamp and sounds great to me. But I am not one of those analog faithful that lift their noses at digital. Many modern vinyl records these days are crap anyway. I try to be selective in the records I buy. I don't understand the above posts that much but it's interesting anyway.

 

[Music Alchemist]

I am listen to the Stax through a vinyl rig - Pro-Ject Debut Carbon turntable and Musical Fidelity phono preamp and sounds great to me. But I am not one of those analog faithful that lift their noses at digital. Many modern vinyl records these days are crap anyway. I try to be selective in the records I buy. I don't understand the above posts that much but it's interesting anyway.

 
Ah, okay, that simplifies things. (Well, aside from the fact that it's far more expensive to tap into the potential of analog.)
 
I have a (mostly rare) vinyl collection as well, but amassed a CD/digital collection 40 times larger.

 

[LaCuffia]

Okay so I put the 507 pads on - it was a major pain in the ass and I didn't do a perfect job of placing them on but good enough. More comfortable and I already notice better sub-bass. That's the only fault I have with them is the adhesive used to mount the pads but I think the 307 has a clip on system now.

What I can't comprehend is how is the 2170 a "basic" system? It's just too good it boggles my mind. So I guess the SR-09 is what God listens to? I am already daydreaming about them. But let's see - paying mortgage, food for my kids v SR-09.

 

[ericj]

I started reading that "there is no such thing as digital" article and only lasted a few sentences. 
 
Yes, 1 and 0 are determined by voltages above or below a range. 
 
We're super good at that. You can see this text because of an astounding array of systems that are perfectly capable of shuttling around ones and zeroes at rates that make even the highest sample rate audio look like a slow drip - and do it without misplacing a single one of them. 
 
Some of those systems - the ones that communicate across distances of more than several feet - use error correction and retransmission. 
 
But within a computer or digital audio player, no such checking, correction, or retransmission is needed. If your computer weren't thoroughly capable of discerning billions of 1 and 0 voltage differences per second without getting a single bit wrong, you wouldn't even be able to boot it up without a crash. 

 

[jdpark]

Have you ever taken a walk outside? Did you smell something? Did you see some stuff? Did you hear some birds, perhaps multiple kinds? Did you ever wonder where the birds were, or were they more or less always in the place you expected them to be? If there were a bunch of birds, were you able to pretty much hear all of them simultaneously? If the answers so far are pretty much 'yes', then your brain is computing quite a lot more than any computer that most of us own. Quite a lot more 1s and 0s than it takes to start a computer. 

 

[Tinkerer]

Okay so I put the 507 pads on - it was a major pain in the ass and I didn't do a perfect job of placing them on but good enough. More comfortable and I already notice better sub-bass. That's the only fault I have with them is the adhesive used to mount the pads but I think the 307 has a clip on system now.

What I can't comprehend is how is the 2170 a "basic" system? It's just too good it boggles my mind. So I guess the SR-09 is what God listens to? I am already daydreaming about them. But let's see - paying mortgage, food for my kids v SR-09.

 
What I noticed when I had a 207 is it was on par with my flagship vintage planars, and they were damn good old T50 driver based. But then you move to the STAX omega frames and you can notice everything being even clearer and more detailed. For accessibility and bang for your buck, the 207 and LNS lambdas pretty much destroy everything else in the same class. It's just a shame that so many people don't realize it because by the time they even hear of STAX, they likely have already invested in a more conventional setup and are leery about taking the leap.
 
Also, the leather pads are likely helping you seal the headphones better. The 207 has basically flat bass if you get it sealed to your head right. Otherwise you get a midbass hump, like the one you see sometimes in the 207 measurements because they couldn't get it to seal to the dummy head. Same problem with the midbass hump in the 007 MK II's created by the port they added.

 

[LaCuffia]

I was lucky I bought the 2170 system when I did.  I would have been priced out had I waited just a few weeks later.  Prices are really up there now, but I don't know if that's a normal spike when Stax announces a discontinuance of a certain model.  I think you can get the new 3100 for cheaper but don't know if sound signature is basically the same.  Probably not that much variation though.

 

[Music Alchemist]

Also, the leather pads are likely helping you seal the headphones better. The 207 has basically flat bass if you get it sealed to your head right. Otherwise you get a midbass hump, like the one you see sometimes in the 207 measurements because they couldn't get it to seal to the dummy head.

 
Exactly. (Though in the below measurements it's more sub-bass than mid-bass.)
 

Spoiler: stock pads

Spoiler: EP-507 pads

 
I would always take my glasses off while wearing the 207 in order to get a better seal. (And comfort.)
 
Here's an interesting thing @Beyakusenn told me via PM. Hope he's okay with me sharing it here:
 

The SR-009 is linear in the bass at any volume, while the roll-off varies for all Lambda models depending on the volume. Various measurements indicate that the roll-off of Lambdas starts around 100 Hz at certain SPL.

 

[LaCuffia]

Just curious for those knowledgeable about Stax's product line, what would be the logical upgrade from the 2170?   I would think the 5100 system.  It's out of my league for now, and am greatly enjoying the 2170 anyway, but excited that I made the leap to Stax and will definitely be looking at other systems in the future.  

 

[Music Alchemist]

  Just curious for those knowledgeable about Stax's product line, what would be the logical upgrade from the 2170?   I would think the 5100 system.  It's out of my league for now, and am greatly enjoying the 2170 anyway, but excited that I made the leap to Stax and will definitely be looking at other systems in the future.  

 
Depends on budget and priorities. Personally, if staying within the Lambda range, I'd focus the upgrade cash on the headphones. Upgrading to the L700 would be cheaper than the 5100.

 

[LaCuffia]

So I could use the 252s amp with the L700?

 

[Music Alchemist]

So I could use the 252s amp with the L700?

 
Yes, you can use it with any STAX headphone except the old ones that are Normal bias instead of PRO bias.
 
The L300, L500, L700, and 009 all have the same listed impedance (145,000 ohms @ 10kHz) and sensitivity (101 dB / 100V RMS @ 1 kHz). The other recent production models are about the same, except for the 007MK2, which is 170,000 ohms and 100 dB / 100V RMS @ 1 kHz. (I'm not mentioning the specs of any portable models.)
 
You'll probably eventually want to upgrade to a better amp, but it's not necessary.

 

[ericj]

  Have you ever taken a walk outside? Did you smell something? Did you see some stuff? Did you hear some birds, perhaps multiple kinds? Did you ever wonder where the birds were, or were they more or less always in the place you expected them to be? If there were a bunch of birds, were you able to pretty much hear all of them simultaneously? If the answers so far are pretty much 'yes', then your brain is computing quite a lot more than any computer that most of us own. Quite a lot more 1s and 0s than it takes to start a computer. 

 
Brains and computers are very different. 
 
https://aeon.co/essays/your-brain-does-not-process-information-and-it-is-not-a-computer
 
Regardless, as measuring devices go, the human ear is a rubber micrometer. Sensitive, but no kind of reliable. 
 
And what could that possibly have to do with whether bit perfect means what it sounds like it means? 
 
People who are deeply invested in woo and mysticism about audio gear say a lot of nonsense about how digital audio must surely be getting mangled as it enters or exits one board level component or other -- and it's just that. nonsense. 
 
A given DAC may perform better than another. There may in fact be jitter in the bitstream but a reclocking DAC does in fact solve that problem entirely. 
 
If someone tries to give you some simplistic math for how bits are being lost as they go from a memory buffer to an output device, chances are very good that they (a) don't understand the problem, or (b) are whinging about a problem that was solved 30 years ago in mid-level gear and has been industry standard even on the cheapest devices for at least 25 years. 

 

[jdpark]

  A given DAC may perform better than another. There may in fact be jitter in the bitstream but a reclocking DAC does in fact solve that problem entirely. . 

It's not mysticism. Any high-end CD player is going to dedicate equal, if not more attention to the source (i.e. the transport) as to the DAC, even when the DAC is the master, and reclocks the data. This is basic knowledge. I always love how much faith computer people have in the ability of any computer to be able to do sound well without really thinking about how many things can go wrong in the 'transport' of data to the DAC. 
 
I agree that jitter is a sort of spooky word that isn't often defined well, but I don't believe that computers are always able to solve the problem with a simple pug and play approach to external dacs. The only really disagreement is that the source matters, and many computers are not very good sources, without a lot of attention paid to intermediary factors such as power supply, jitter, and timing. That said, with some care and attention to how your data is transferred on several levels and thought as to what might possibly interfere, it is probably more likely that a relatively basic computer can sound as good as a fairly sophisticated CD transport. But it is unlikely that a simple total system that does not invest an enormous amount of care in every possible detail, is going to sound as good as to begin to fool the brain whether you're listening to a recording or are actually at a concert.