[RayleighSilvers]

Hey guys. I'm having a really hard time working out what is going on with my sound. I've been researching for over about a month on this forum I've bought 3 headphones/earphones after reading good reviews on this site (soundmagic e10, koss kcs75, Sennheiser HD558).
 
I've been plugging in all 3 into different sources and getting very different results with the source. I have a stand HD onboard sound card. When I plug in the koss and E10's into the line out I get a very loud buzzing noise. Only the 558's don't make a noise. Using my 558's through the pc l/o there isn't really any bass.
 
Next I plug in my cheapy trust 7watt speakers and connect each of the 3 to the l/o of that (which is connected to the pc). I still get electric noise from all 3 but it's a lot less. Now I don't know why but the music sounds completely different out of the speakers. There is significantly more bass and the songs have much more energy and punch. Soundstage is slightly bigger and musical seperation is better. Why is this?
 
My 3rd device is my rockboxed sansa clip (v1) and fiio e6 amp. I get absolutely no noise through these which is good but the sound from the clip is the same as the pc line out. Compared to the trust speakers, Bass is significantly less with all 3 headphones. I've tried it with and without the fiio amp and it sounds the same, just louder. The EQ on the fiio doesn't give the bass any more punch, it just increases the Db, which sounds exactly the same as increasing the Db on the clip. 
 
Can anybody help please? Why am I getting electrical noise out of the Senns when it's impedance is much higher than the other 2? And more importantly why does my music sound so different out of the 3 devices.

 

[RayleighSilvers]

Help please? 

 

[shadow419]

Quick question first, are you using the front panel line out?  Many cases have terrible grounding on the front panel line out which can introduce the noise.
 
Either way, pc line outs can be noisy.  I can only speculate that the line out on your speakers are cutting some of that noise, because the input impedance of the speakers are rejecting some of the noise.
 
I have no experience with the Fiio E6 so I wont comment on it's eq abilities or lack thereof.

 

[andrewberge]

Quote:

And more importantly why does my music sound so different out of the 3 devices.

 
Because they shouldn't sound the same. There are huge differences in sound from headphone to headphone and speaker to speaker, which is why many of us came here in the first place: to find the set with a sound that suits us.

 

[Roseval]

The higher the resistance of the headphone, the lower the hiss.
But obvious your PC has a hardware issue if the hiss is really loud.
 
A lot of people like a disproportional loud bass.
It is possible that the speakers use some kind of tone control to boost the bass and this might be applied to the headphone out as well.

 

[Iniamyen]

Most sound cards have a headphone out as well as a line-out. I don't know which you are using, but line-outs are usually meant to drive very high-impedance loads, like the input stage of an amplifier. Headphones are not very high-impedance. See if you can try a headphone-out.

 

[RayleighSilvers]

Quote:

Quick question first, are you using the front panel line out?  Many cases have terrible grounding on the front panel line out which can introduce the noise.
 
Either way, pc line outs can be noisy.  I can only speculate that the line out on your speakers are cutting some of that noise, because the input impedance of the speakers are rejecting some of the noise.
 
I have no experience with the Fiio E6 so I wont comment on it's eq abilities or lack thereof.

Haven't tried the front panel line out. I'm using the back panel.

 

[RayleighSilvers]

Quote:

 
Because they shouldn't sound the same. There are huge differences in sound from headphone to headphone and speaker to speaker, which is why many of us came here in the first place: to find the set with a sound that suits us.

I meant the sound from the different sources sound different to each other. The headphones themselves sound very very similar (to my untrained ears?). After more listening I think the sansa clip is sounding a lot like the pc l/o which means it's the desktop speakers that is the anamoly (although it sounds the best to me). 

 

[RayleighSilvers]

Quote:

The higher the resistance of the headphone, the lower the hiss.
But obvious your PC has a hardware issue if the hiss is really loud.
 
A lot of people like a disproportional loud bass.
It is possible that the speakers use some kind of tone control to boost the bass and this might be applied to the headphone out as well.

What do you mean by tone control? A code programmed into the chip or a component of the hardware? Sorry for my ignorance 

 

[RayleighSilvers]

Quote:

Most sound cards have a headphone out as well as a line-out. I don't know which you are using, but line-outs are usually meant to drive very high-impedance loads, like the input stage of an amplifier. Headphones are not very high-impedance. See if you can try a headphone-out.

Ok just tried it all again. I'm getting no electrical noise from any of the 3 head/earphones when connected to the l/o at the back. I'm pretty sure I did last time. I also tried the front headphone jack (the senns wouldn't fit in). No electrical noise here either. Where I am getting noise from is the speakers, it's about the same sound level for all three. I've also tried connecting the senns to a receiver (sony dav550). There is noise from there as well which is very annoying as it's supposed to be dedicated to audio (well moreso than my pc anyway). It increases with the volume. I don't really listen to my music loud anyway but just hearing it is very annoying.