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The (new) HD800 Impressions Thread
Jul 29, 2013 at 6:39 PM Post #4,142 of 29,010
Quote:
songmic said:
I wonder what is the best - or the most expensive - OTL tube headphone amp currently existing in the market. OTL tube amps tend to be less expensive than their transformer-coupled counterparts because they don't have a output transformer as their name implies. Yet they are usually optimized for high-impedance headphones, especially Sennheiser HD600/650/800.
 
The best sounding OTL headphone amp I've heard with the HD800 is Allnic HPA5000, hands down.
http://onsongaudio.com/hpa5000/
 

 
Allnic amps are not well-known in Head-Fi, but I got to listen to it here in Korea and mother of God... I honestly didn't think I would find an OTL amp that could beat my maxed out ZDSE in its performance to drive the HD800. It was even better than the Bakoon HPA-21 in my opinion, another headphone amp made in Korea which is the best solid-state amp I've heard with the HD800. Unforunately, the HPA5000 is very expensive, priced at around $5K as its name suggests (one could buy a top-of-the-line electrostatic headphone amp or fully balanced amp with that kind of money!). The owner of Allnic claims that the HPA5000 is not only OTL but also OCL (output capacitor-less) in the strictest sense, I have no idea what that means but he says that is why the HPA5000 sounds so good. I only listened to it with the stock tubes but it was nevertheless the best sounding OTL amp, period. The downside of this amp is that it didn't sound that good with low-impedance headphones, including my LCD-3.
 
The second best OTL headphone amp I've heard was my ZDSE, which I'm sure everyone's familiar with.
 
I'm not sure about the HPA5000, but is anyone aware of an OTL amp that beats the ZDSE in sonic performance? I know several renowned OTL amps such as Schiit Valhalla, Bottlehead Crack w/ Speedball, Decware CSP2+, RSA Raptor, WBA Virtus-01, EarMax, EternalArts, and so on, but I haven't heard anyone claiming that any of these are superior to the ZDSE (I've heard the other way around). While I found an OTL amp that beats the ZDSE (albeit at more than double price), has anyone else?
 
Also, IS THERE SUCH A THING AS A "BALANCED" OTL HEADPHONE AMP? It seems that every tube balanced headphone amp I've seen on the market is transformer-coupled. I am not an engineer, but does the inherent design of an OTL toplogy make it impossible to be built balanced? Why haven't I heard of any balanced OTL amp? Does anyone else know?
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i heard this amp at the chicago meet last month with the HE-500. it was amazing. it almost brought me to tears, the HE-500 sounded so ******* unbelievably good, so warm, rich, so full of emotion. so dynamic and powerful yet sweet and romantic, i preferred the HE-500 to the abyss+liquid gold combo with this amp, it was just so musical and good sounding. i can only imagine how good it would sound with my beyerdynamic T1, i wish i had taken the time to test it out and see how it compared to my much cheaper WA2.
 
this amp i think would be one i would really like to own one day as an endgame. 5 watts into 50 ohms, output transformer-less and output capacitor-less, about as pure tube as you can get.
 
i also momentarily heard it with grado RS1, they did sound pretty good too, but not much better than my WA6-SE imo. grados will always be grados... 
wink.gif

 
Jul 29, 2013 at 6:40 PM Post #4,143 of 29,010
Quote:
preproman said:
 
 
Cool - Gotcha....
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Make sense, or no? Anyway it's the best I could explain it. :wink: Just, sort of reminds me of a slight digital artificial sound. Granted, I wouldn't be slightly surprised if top end ss (GSX etc) amps don't exhibit it, but it's pretty easy to notice on a lot of lower ss amps. Granted I never really noticed it on the m-Stage, but that is so warm sounding and somewhat muddled (but GREAT at it's price!) that probably masked that a little bit.
 
-Daniel
 
Jul 29, 2013 at 6:40 PM Post #4,144 of 29,010
Lost in the past few pages of discussion - I'ld like to know also - anyone tried the HD800 out of the AudioLab M-DAC HP out?
Quote:
taliesin said:
has anyone here tried the hd800 out of the audiolab M-dac headphone output?
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Jul 29, 2013 at 6:46 PM Post #4,146 of 29,010
Quote:
bourneperfect said:
Make sense, or no? Anyway it's the best I could explain it. :wink: Just, sort of reminds me of a slight digital artificial sound. Granted, I wouldn't be slightly surprised if top end ss (GSX etc) amps don't exhibit it, but it's pretty easy to notice on a lot of lower ss amps. Granted I never really noticed it on the m-Stage, but that is so warm sounding and somewhat muddled (but GREAT at it's price!) that probably masked that a little bit.
 
-Daniel
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Of course it makes sense.  I'm also sure it exists.  I'm just not sure I've heard it or not.  I have to compare the GS-X mk2 to one of the EC tube amps...
 
Jul 29, 2013 at 6:57 PM Post #4,147 of 29,010
IME, most changes I notice (subtle ones anyway) usually come from the downgrade, not the upgrade. Also, paramount above all is extended listening with your own rig, til the differences (if there) are much easier to notice. Training your ears to hear, if you will. I find this to be a much more realistic and pleasurable approach than, say, looking at a chart and climbing a clock tower. IMO.
 
Also, the GSX mkii is number 1 on my purchase list after my Leviathan arrives. But I will more than likely take a strong look at the Rag impressions before making that deposit.
 
-Daniel
 
Jul 29, 2013 at 6:57 PM Post #4,148 of 29,010
Jul 29, 2013 at 7:59 PM Post #4,149 of 29,010
Quote:
kendoji said:
 
Nice!  My current setup is basically the most high-end one I've heard, so I don't have a lot to compare with, but for what it's worth the Violectric stack seems to sound very good with the HD 800.  The Mjolnir has a reputation for being aggressive, so I'm curious how it will work with your HD 800.  
 
Most of all, I'm looking forward to my Taboo MKIII arriving - it should ship any time now.  :)
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Whatever you do go balanced asap. The Taboo w. balanced headphones cable is something else. It was impressive before with the LCD-3s, but now it's gone up a notch again. The HD800s are also supposed to scale a lot when balanced.
 
Oh yeah and then there's tube rolling.
 
Jul 29, 2013 at 8:22 PM Post #4,150 of 29,010
Jul 30, 2013 at 5:54 AM Post #4,154 of 29,010
I wanted to come back on here what would probably now be a month after I bought my HD800/WA Firefly combo and I'm now really appreciating it, I'm now actually noticing the larger audio spectrum over the old HD590's that I preferred previously :)
 
very happy!
 
about the only things I'm not a huge fan of are little cosmetic things now!
 
Jul 30, 2013 at 6:45 AM Post #4,155 of 29,010
Do you mean the build quality?  I have to say that's the most disappointing thing about Sennheiser headphones for me.  Although the design is great and they look fantastic, they tend to feel very flimsy and plasticky.  I'm constantly worried about chipping the paint on the HD 800.  The demo model in a local shop looked horrendous, with huge paint chips all over the headphone, it was terrifying to behold.  
 
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