ofajen
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- Jun 4, 2007
- Posts
- 19
- Likes
- 0
Hi, folks. This is my first post. This place is a handy source of way more info than I'll probably ever need on headphones. Very cool! I'll post a bit of my history here to get started and more later in the headphones forum, but right now I'm thinking about amps.
I've mainly been using a pair of HD540s for the last twenty-some years. Most of my listening is to my original recordings here in my studio, though honestly, my recordings are always mixed on my monitors, not headphones. Headphones are mainly so I can get at least something done when it needs to be quiet, but I still want them to be accurate and high resolution, just like my monitors and monitoring space.
Up until about a year ago, my music was all tracked and mixed on wide-track analog tape machines (3M M-56, M-79 and now I'm rehabbing a 45 year old M-23 2-track machine.) Now I do a fair amount of 24 bit digital recording, usually at 44.1 KHz, though I may start doing more at 88.2K.
Anyway, it's a familiar story, the HD540s now have an intermittent connection to one capsule. It isn't the cable as it stays with the capsule when I swap the cable connections. I should post pics of the things just for amusement sake. The thin layer on the cushions wore into nothingness decades ago, as did the foam layer over the drivers. Anyway, rather than try to buy another capsule and keep this ancient rig alive, I just bought rocktboy's modded HD580s at about the going rate for such a rig.
So, being the heretic that I am, that's most of the money I'm willing to put into this rig right now, but I'm thinking that my M-Audio interface's headphone outputs might be a tad challenged by all these high-impedance Sennheiser headphones and that a more substantial amp would tighten up the sound on signal peaks, if nothing else.
I happen to have an extra Halfer DH-200 power amp just lying around (doesn't everyone?) It's the same type of amp I use with my full-range main monitors. Rated at 100 watts per channel average into 8 ohms, 20-20K. I plan to rig up a little box to power the HD580s using this bad boy.
In the DH-200 manual it says "Headhpones are normally operated from the loudspeaker outputs, but are usually connected through a junction box which provides switching from phones to speakers. Such a box usually provides some added resistance to reduce the sensitivity of the phones, and thus minimize the likelihood of hearing component noise, because of the low setting required at the volume control..."
Later it says "some headphones, such as electrostatic types, are less sensitive and may need little or no resistance in series for normal operation. These could be easily interchanged with speakers through the use of double banana plugs."
Now, I don't need to worry about speakers, since this is a spare amp. I'm just wondering if anyone here has experience driving high impedance phones like the Senns (or electostats) with speaker outputs and whether component noise was a problem and added series resistance was required.
I don't see a sensitivity spec on the HD580s on the Sennheiser site, but the Hafler can swing a 10 KHz 60 volt peak to peak square wave with about a 3V input signal, and I assume I'll have to attenuate the signal either before the amp input using a stepped attenuator or after the amp output using a pair of big power resistors inline.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Cheers,
Otto
I've mainly been using a pair of HD540s for the last twenty-some years. Most of my listening is to my original recordings here in my studio, though honestly, my recordings are always mixed on my monitors, not headphones. Headphones are mainly so I can get at least something done when it needs to be quiet, but I still want them to be accurate and high resolution, just like my monitors and monitoring space.
Up until about a year ago, my music was all tracked and mixed on wide-track analog tape machines (3M M-56, M-79 and now I'm rehabbing a 45 year old M-23 2-track machine.) Now I do a fair amount of 24 bit digital recording, usually at 44.1 KHz, though I may start doing more at 88.2K.
Anyway, it's a familiar story, the HD540s now have an intermittent connection to one capsule. It isn't the cable as it stays with the capsule when I swap the cable connections. I should post pics of the things just for amusement sake. The thin layer on the cushions wore into nothingness decades ago, as did the foam layer over the drivers. Anyway, rather than try to buy another capsule and keep this ancient rig alive, I just bought rocktboy's modded HD580s at about the going rate for such a rig.
So, being the heretic that I am, that's most of the money I'm willing to put into this rig right now, but I'm thinking that my M-Audio interface's headphone outputs might be a tad challenged by all these high-impedance Sennheiser headphones and that a more substantial amp would tighten up the sound on signal peaks, if nothing else.
I happen to have an extra Halfer DH-200 power amp just lying around (doesn't everyone?) It's the same type of amp I use with my full-range main monitors. Rated at 100 watts per channel average into 8 ohms, 20-20K. I plan to rig up a little box to power the HD580s using this bad boy.
In the DH-200 manual it says "Headhpones are normally operated from the loudspeaker outputs, but are usually connected through a junction box which provides switching from phones to speakers. Such a box usually provides some added resistance to reduce the sensitivity of the phones, and thus minimize the likelihood of hearing component noise, because of the low setting required at the volume control..."
Later it says "some headphones, such as electrostatic types, are less sensitive and may need little or no resistance in series for normal operation. These could be easily interchanged with speakers through the use of double banana plugs."
Now, I don't need to worry about speakers, since this is a spare amp. I'm just wondering if anyone here has experience driving high impedance phones like the Senns (or electostats) with speaker outputs and whether component noise was a problem and added series resistance was required.
I don't see a sensitivity spec on the HD580s on the Sennheiser site, but the Hafler can swing a 10 KHz 60 volt peak to peak square wave with about a 3V input signal, and I assume I'll have to attenuate the signal either before the amp input using a stepped attenuator or after the amp output using a pair of big power resistors inline.
Any thoughts would be appreciated.
Cheers,
Otto
