[shogankiller]

Hello, please forgive me if what I ask here has already been asked in other posts, but I have sifted through many posts here and on OCN and I haven't found a specific answer.
 
Okay, so I have the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional sound card and I just decided to buy the Ultrasone pro 900's (Amazon for $330 .  I now have a few questions.  I am (somewhat) familiar with the basics of what amps do, and what certain terms mean, but I am really confused as to what I should be doing for my setup:
 
NOTE:  I am looking for the best significantly noticeable sound quality.  I am not an audiophile, I just like to game and listen to music and I would like the best experience for my ears.
 
-Do I need an amp?  If I do, what would be a good amp for these headphones? my budget is ~$100 and I do not need it to be portable.
-I am confused by all this digital and analog talk (I am a COSC student so I know the basics and that analog has a high quality than digital, but I don't know how to apply this knowledge to my setup).  With my setup, do I need a DAC? do the drivers I have for my sound card matter? I don't even know what to ask here, lol.  Dolby Digital? (yes that's a real question, but I'm so dumb I don't even know what I should be asking about it)
-I have read many posts talking about burning in your headphones.  According to other posts (correct me if I am wrong) I should burn in my headphones for about 40 hours.  My question is though, how exactly do I burn them in?  Do I just plug them in and play techno for 40 hours straight? or do they need to be given a rest every X hours? can I hurt them by burning them in in the wrong way?
 
Alright so these are my questions.  I am not too confused by amps, I just don't know if I should be getting one or not with my setup.  My biggest confusion is with the digital stuff, with the dolby drivers, DACs etc. as you could see above, I don't even know what I should be asking.
 
Thank you  for all and any help!

 

[NamelessPFG]

Your sound card IS a DAC, just not an external one. While you could probably do better (like the Prelude, Forte, or Titanium HD), it'll cost you $300-500 for a competent external DAC that you can feed through S/PDIF from your X-Fi. And while most would say that this makes the sound card redundant since you've effectively bypassed its analog output stage, if you're into gaming like I am, the X-Fi's DSP will still be of use for EAX and CMSS-3D Headphone.
 
I wouldn't worry about Dolby Digital Live or DTS Connect. Those concern encoding a 5.1 signal on-the-fly into one of those formats to send to a home theater receiver over S/PDIF, which only has enough bandwidth for two channels without compression. Audiophile DACs of the sort you'll hear about here are only designed to output two channels anyway.
 
You have no dedicated headphone amp, and the Pro 900 is said to benefit from one. How much so, I can't say. If you want to buy a new one, you could try the FiiO E9 (it's reasonably popular around here), or if you're willing to try your hand at DIY, try building an Objective 2 amp.
 
Burn-in is a very real phenomenon, if the Panasonic HTF600 was anything to go by. (Electrostatics may not be effected by it nearly as much as conventional dynamic drivers; if anything, it might be a more gradual process spanning decades.) However, I can't say that there is a best method of burn-in. I just let music play over them at a reasonable volume (one that won't blow the drivers, of course) overnight, and then just use them normally. Part of this is because it's not just the headphone drivers that need to be burned in, but your own brain, so to speak. You're used to hearing things one way, and your new headphones will undoubtedly be different.

 

[NinjaSquirt]

Quote:

Hello, please forgive me if what I ask here has already been asked in other posts, but I have sifted through many posts here and on OCN and I haven't found a specific answer.
 
Okay, so I have the X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Professional sound card and I just decided to buy the Ultrasone pro 900's (Amazon for $330 .  I now have a few questions.  I am (somewhat) familiar with the basics of what amps do, and what certain terms mean, but I am really confused as to what I should be doing for my setup:
 
NOTE:  I am looking for the best significantly noticeable sound quality.  I am not an audiophile, I just like to game and listen to music and I would like the best experience for my ears.
 
-Do I need an amp?  If I do, what would be a good amp for these headphones? my budget is ~$100 and I do not need it to be portable.
-I am confused by all this digital and analog talk (I am a COSC student so I know the basics and that analog has a high quality than digital, but I don't know how to apply this knowledge to my setup).  With my setup, do I need a DAC? do the drivers I have for my sound card matter? I don't even know what to ask here, lol.  Dolby Digital? (yes that's a real question, but I'm so dumb I don't even know what I should be asking about it)
-I have read many posts talking about burning in your headphones.  According to other posts (correct me if I am wrong) I should burn in my headphones for about 40 hours.  My question is though, how exactly do I burn them in?  Do I just plug them in and play techno for 40 hours straight? or do they need to be given a rest every X hours? can I hurt them by burning them in in the wrong way?
 
Alright so these are my questions.  I am not too confused by amps, I just don't know if I should be getting one or not with my setup.  My biggest confusion is with the digital stuff, with the dolby drivers, DACs etc. as you could see above, I don't even know what I should be asking.
 
Thank you  for all and any help!

-You don't need it. Chances are your headphones will improve it with it (not a day and night difference though).
-If we're talking analog vs. digital in terms of vinyl vs. CD, there's no great advantage that makes one better than the other. It can be argued that CDs produce sounds more accurately but some people like ritual/popping of vinyls and like music that was only released on vinyls.
-Again, you don't need it but a good standalone DAC can improve the sound quite a bit in your case (X-Fi DACs aren't bad, they just aren't great).
-Stay away from Dolby Digital or whatever fancy effects that come with your sound card.
-Burn them in as long as you listen to music (If you listen to music 2 - 3 hours at a time, do that. If 30 minutes at a time, do that). No need for pink noise.
 
Right now, chances are, a good DAC will make more significantly noticeable difference than an amp of the same quality

 

[shogankiller]

Quote:

You have no dedicated headphone amp, and the Pro 900 is said to benefit from one. How much so, I can't say. If you want to buy a new one, you could try the FiiO E9 (it's reasonably popular around here), or if you're willing to try your hand at DIY, try building an Objective 2 amp.

I've been researching and am I correct that the FiiO E9 connects to my computer with a USB cable? and if so, doesn't USB diminish the quality of audio? or does that only apply to headphones that have a USB connection?

 

[NamelessPFG]

 
Quote:

I've been researching and am I correct that the FiiO E9 connects to my computer with a USB cable? and if so, doesn't USB diminish the quality of audio? or does that only apply to headphones that have a USB connection?

Are you sure you're not mistaking the E9 (which is a pure headphone amp, only takes analog input) for the E7 (which is a USB DAC and a portable amp)?
 
The reason I state the E7 in particular is that the E9 has a dock on top for it, so that you can use the E7 DAC with the E9 amp, bypassing the E7's more meager amp circuitry completely.

 

[shogankiller]

Yes, I haven't seen the the cables connected to the device in any pictures (I've seen the ports, but I'm confused as to what ones I'd actually use), so I looked at a bunch of posts and sites and it kept looking like it was a USB connection, so I looked for a "what's in the box" to find out what cables it came with and I found the following on http://www.miccastore.com/fiio-desktop-headphone-amplifier-black-p-42.html
 
What's Included:
- FiiO E9 Desktop Headphone Amp
- AC Power Adapter
- USB Data Cable
- User's Manual
- Rubber Feet 

 

[NamelessPFG]

I'm guessing that's a passthrough for the E7 dock part. The E9 has no DAC, which leaves that as the only possibility.
 
I can understand the confusion, though...

 

[SKULL]

I would suggest you to try out the obj.2 but you have to diy.