[ZeeMox]

I recently decided to start investing in audiophile-grade equipment, starting with headphones since I spend the largest portion of most days at work. Being as my office environment is open, the cans gotta be closed. After much research and agonizing over options, I'm pretty confident the best headphones I could get for my purpose and budget are the Audeze LCD-XC. I even found a couple of places online selling them for $1300.

Never having had audiophile-grade headphones before (I'm upgrading from Sennheiser 380 Pro), I've never considered amplification or DAC. My total budget is about $2k, which leaves roughly $700 for these things. At first glance, the Mojo seems like a shoo-in since it performs both functions, but a few folks on here weren't impressed with the Mojo paired with the LCD-XC specifically, considering them a bit bright. I'm not a total basshead but I do like a slightly warmer sound. Given what I'm coming from, there's a good chance I'd be none the wiser getting a Mojo with these as the sound will still blow my previous experiences right out of the water.

I figured I'd drop in here and get some extra opinions, as I'm teetering on the edge of:
- Just getting the Mojo with the LCD-XC because it's a great bang for my buck.
- Getting a warm-ish tube amp, undetermined what that might be in my price range
- Getting no amp for now since these phones do not require one and waiting until I have a budget for something significantly better. I'm not super wealthy, I just really love music, so buying a Mojo now and a better amp later isn't really something I'd prefer.

Halp? Oh yeah, and for reference, my source would primarily be a work desktop computer for which I cannot change the sound card, and I listen to primarily to a variety of electronic music with delicate acoustic elements.

 

[buke9]

People saying the Mojo with any headphone is bright must be very sensitive to highs. I think the Mojo and my HD-800’s is very good and not bright at all. Even with my Ether-C’s that I find brighter than the XC’s they are not what I would call overly bright either not warm but not bright. I do prefer a tube setup myself. Have not heard the XC’s from the Mojo so it might not be the right choice for them. When your talking high end headphones they don’t always work well with just anything . I think the Mojo is just a great little device but it doesn’t work well for everything as I don’t like it with the HD-650’s at all. It great as a dac but not a amp for everything as nothing is. I would look at a Schiit Modi Multibit and a Garage 1217 Project Ember 2 as a good start for what you need. Have to say haven’t heard the XC’s from that but have heard my Ether-C’s and HE-1000’s from a Project Ember and it was very nice indeed the Modi Multibit would only have made it better. These are just my opinions and as always YMMV.

 

[ZeeMox]

Thanks for the advice. The Ember in particular looks solid for the price. I'll spend some time looking into it.