[beat]

Hey all,
I have gone to start a new thread in this circle a few times and then never finished. Each time it seemed a new angle on things. Let me get this off my chest though. Someone correct me if I'm not getting the whole thing. It seems to me that headphones can be EXTREMELY revealing of the recording. This could be due to the sources that power my headphones kinda sucking, or it could be my headphones, or both are doing their job and I'm uncovering stuff in the recording. I really dont know what to say. When I listen to rocky stuff, or complex jazz or even vocals I don't notice so much and I am missing the chest thumping bass but the clarity of mids and highs makes up for it. What is boggling me today is a solo piano recording of a friend of mine's dad (which is actually very good) I can't figure out if what I'm hearing through the headphones is actually something funky going on in my electronics, or I am just picking up some serious detail. If it is in the recording it must be the dampers coming down on the strings and occasional page turning of sheet music. I listen today on my SET rig and it isn't there (though my speakers are not that sensitive 90-91db maybe) I don't know, sometimes I love em. Sometimes they are unlistenable, but either way, I have this sudden urge to just go out and buy a good headphone amp to put an end to all these questions. My sources have been: the jolida jd-100 (way too noisy and downright unlistenable), the outputs on my old and new marantz (not bad), a 180$ philips dvd player which has been the most listenable of all but this is the one that seems to have the most revealing and weird stuff going on. It seems backward to me. I thought the jolida had a great headphone section. Basically I'm intrigued and boggled. So there you have it. My confused idea of what headphones are all about. Has anyone experienced similar things? How did you resolve it?
thanks,
beat

[Figo]

Most decent headphones need an amp.  No way around it.  You wouldn't drive a pair of thiels with a 5 watt amp, would you?

[beat]

Thanks,
that is kind what I was thinking. There are times when they sound so good but I cant say that across the board. It is like I have to select which source to use for what type of music. I knew something is amiss here.

[Jon L]

What headphones do you have?

Good headphones and good headphone amp section should be very revealing and detailed and sound very "direct," but should still not be overbearing and overdone souding.  

Cheap DVD players can paradoxically sound more "detailed," but it's not true detail.  You just notice more sounds b/c they are accentuated and not part of the grand scheme of music.  

Get some decent headphones (there are a lot) and some good headamp, such as Xin SuperMacro to really see what headphones can do.  

You mention SET driving speakers.  SET setups in general (there are exceptions) do many wonderful things, but presenting master-tape type of extreme micro-detail is not one of them IME.

[beat]

Thanks Jon,
I have a pair of electrostatic ergo model 2s, and grado 125s. It seems my premonitions were fairly accurate given what I've gathered and you have confirmed so far. My biggest bother was that I thought that the jd-100 sounded great from it's headphone section but due to noise found it the worst. I wonder if there is a problem with it or I have some sort of impedance mismatch.? I contacted jolida with it but havent heard back.
Regarding serious headamps, is class a what to look for?

[ooheadsoo]

Check out a gilmore lite for a detail oriented solid state amp on the budget side.  It's a diy roots amp designed by a EE professor.  head-fi would be the place to go to look stuff up.

[randytsuch]

I just built a pimeta headphone amp.  Think parts cost was around $150, but it depends on what opamps you use, and if the stack the buf634's (which I did), and what case you use.  There is a pcb for it, so it is pretty easy to put togeter, hardest part is putting it into a case, and wiring all the connectors up.

The Dynahi is Gilmore's latest amp, and it is full class a.  Thing dissipates about 30 watts total.  I am building it, but had some transistor matching problems, and am waiting for replacements, which are on backorder.  This is a pretty serious project, not for a novice.

Here is a link to a simple DIY amp at headwize
http://headwize.com/projects/showfile.php?file=cmoy2_prj.htm
The library at headwize has lots of diy amp projects, with a lot of infomation.

Or, if you want to buy something, check out the group buy for the Meier Porta Corda here,
http://www6.head-fi.org/forums/showthread.php?t=95367
will cost you about $150 shipped, which is much cheaper than normal.

Randy

[elnero]

The nature of headphones is they are like a direct link for your ears to the music so yes they can be extremely revealing of nuances that a speaker rig might miss.

I'm going to suggest an Eastern Electric MiniMax CD player as a possible solution. It would kill two birds with one stone at a reasonable price. Bill has them on for $700 for AC members during the holidays which is an absolute steal because for that price you get an excellent CD player and headamp all in one. It may have tubes like the Jolida but it doesn't have any noise, it's dead silent through my Grado RS-1's, it's not overly tubey although the tubes do seem to add a nice warmth.  I've had mine for just over a week and it just keeps getting better.

[mojoman]

Thanks Jon,
I have a pair of electrostatic ergo model 2s, and grado 125s. It seems my premonitions were fairly accurate given what I've gathered and you have confirmed so far. My biggest bother was that I thought that the jd-100 sounded great from it's headphone section but due to noise found it the worst. I wonder if there is a problem with it or I have some sort of impedance mismatch.? I contacted jolida with it but havent heard back.
Regarding serious headamps, is class a what to look for?

I have a JD-100 and it I don't have any problems with noise. I've used the headphone out to drive Senn HD-650 and Grado SR325 with no problem although the Senns require most of the volumn control to power them.  I have a dedicated headphone amp and it smokes the Jolida as a headamp so I don't use the Jolida to drive headphones much anymore.

I'd get  your player cheked out.

[TheChairGuy]

I've found with the 104db or so sensitive Grado SR-60's...they seem to want as much clean power as you can find 'em paried with.  They are rather low impedance, easy driving and fairly sensitive for 'can headphones. It revels some real differnces in sources....'power' output seems to be chief among them.

I also have the Westone UM-2 canal earphones that I use when traveling.  I have quite a collection of walkman to choose from (Sony, Aiwa, JVC, Panny, twin AA's, 4 AA's ranging from 1996-2002) and, no matter which I choose, they all end up sounding much the same (also the same as my modded headphone outputs of my Sony DVP-S7700 or my laptop).  The character is a little different on each play back device, but more the same than anything else.

The sensitivity of these are 117db and they are pretty revealing for a  $450 list canalphone (they have separate low and high transducers a la Shure's top-of-the line model).

So, my experience has been that the higher the sensitivity of the headphone, the less important an amp source is.  The less sensitive headphone is more particular to a good clean amp driving it.

Perhaps the answer is that every amp (power, headphone, whatever) sounds best when not driven too loudly and a higher sensitivity headphone will not require as much cranking to get to satisfactory levels.

That's been my experience, at least.

[beat]

Thanks everyone,
looks like I'll have to start doing some shopping.
peace, beat

ps, jolida got back to me...he suggested I open it up and make sure there are no wires touching anything in the transport area. Hopefully that is all it is and I can use it in the meantime.

[beat]

Woo hooo,
I stayed up late last night and dampened the interior of the jd 100 while pushing wires around..I found the offenders... Much to my satisfaction, the build quality of the headphone section is pretty nice. It looks..repeat..looks better than what I've seen in my weeks of searching SS and tubed headamps in the sub 200 range. The caps are of decent size with heatsinks all over the place and it just sounds really good. Very satisfied for what I got for free...I never gave the HP output a thought until recently. It is far better than anything else I have in the house that I previously mentioned. Me likey. I may as well add that now that I can really hear these ergo model 2s I like em. They still tend to be on the lean side but what you gain is this etherial (sp?) openness. It doesnt feel or sound that there is a speaker placed right in your ear..there is some air around the music and you feel more of the room that it may have been recorded in. The foam actually touches your ears so I figure if you have stickyouty ears they could affect comfort and sound. Mine are set close to my head and find these things very wearable, though a little short on bass. I still like the grado125s but they almost seem EQed to back off the midrange maybe. After you listen to a couple songs you forgive the bass shortage. I've listened to some choral stuff through them as well as the white stripes..either way, you just hang on the vocals with these phones. It seems to be their forte.
enough for now,
beat