I'm tempted...!
what headphones do you own thread - i own dt150's :)
- Thread starter garyfl
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I'm tempted...!
Will be interesting to see your thoughts as I have been tempted with the Fiio K17, the the Luxsin was announced and I like Zidoo products. Although I will wait until June when we get more news on the Fiio K13 & K15 versions before making a decision.
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Man of Honour
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For the first time in ages I’ve settled into a combo that I’m happy with. The Aryas along with the Creative G8 along with the Action and Adventure preset seem like a solid combo for most of my gaming. Very happy. My only slight gripe is that I find the Aryas to be a tad tight over a prolonged gaming session, but it’s a very small gripe. Too often I keep thinking there’s a noise coming from outside the room, they are that good.
You can bend the headband in the opposite direction to reduce clamping force, I did a little bit at a time over a few days to make sure I didn't overdo it and make them too loose. You could also try some softer pads like these.
Man of Honour
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Thanks for the tip.
The pads will help 100% as the stock pads are literally the worst and the only reason I can think why they still use them even on £6000 headphones is because they signed a contract with the pad maker so must use them. Otherwise it make no logical sense when superior pads exist that cost ~£20.
Soldato
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I know combos are nice in terms of looking neater, space saving etc but I still think you get much better value for money going for separate DAC and AMP, you also have the ability to upgrade them independently and potentially experiment with different DAC topologies, Delta Sigma, R2R, FPGA 1bit filtering DACs etc.
Regarding pad swapping on the Aryas just be aware it will change the sound from the original intended frequency curve by quite a margin, this may not be a good thing depending on your preferences and what you're looking for, sometimes the pads from more popular companies will show the difference in FR.
Regarding pad swapping on the Aryas just be aware it will change the sound from the original intended frequency curve by quite a margin, this may not be a good thing depending on your preferences and what you're looking for, sometimes the pads from more popular companies will show the difference in FR.
The Hifiman sound doesn't change much at all to the ear with those exact Voarmaks pads, the only thing that gets reduced is the high frequency peak brightness that is fairly common with planars and the memory foam/seems to absorb that away whilst retaining all of the other sound characteristics as the original pads. I know this because I've had these pads on three hifiman headphones now and others online have shared the same observations.
The only pads that do change the audible character of the actual music that I have personally heard are Dekoni pads and what material you opt for dictates how the sound changes and not always for the better. £70+ for pads that negatively impact sound isn't something I call good value, and I've tried 3 types of Dekoni pad over the years before either going back to stock or discovering pads like Voarmaks that don't change the music.
The only pads that do change the audible character of the actual music that I have personally heard are Dekoni pads and what material you opt for dictates how the sound changes and not always for the better. £70+ for pads that negatively impact sound isn't something I call good value, and I've tried 3 types of Dekoni pad over the years before either going back to stock or discovering pads like Voarmaks that don't change the music.
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Soldato
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This is why I've had to bite my tongue for so many years, factually speaking all pad changes will have a marginal to dramatic effect on the FR, fact, and then your HRTF to will also add a difference on top of that, for example even the exact same HD650 pads comparing old to new have been shown to deviate up to 10dB!!, you personally may not perceive little or no change when comparing pads but they exist on the FR, and to be quite frank if your not noticing much if any change in the sound from pad swaps than you'll be further hard pressed to tell the difference between AMPS and DACs, I'm not ASR nerd but the truth of audio I believe lies somewhere in the middle between the science and are subjective psycho acoustic perceptions of audio.
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Yes on the measurements, but not something you're actually here with the specific pads and headphones here being talked about. Don't spend too much time on ASR where they constantly live life solely on what a graph says regardless of whether you hear the difference or not.
They also believe OpAmp rolling has no impact on sound at all because one member there did some graphs on one DAC with one set of OpAmps, yet we know very different as OpAmp rolling has been a thing for many decades.
They also believe OpAmp rolling has no impact on sound at all because one member there did some graphs on one DAC with one set of OpAmps, yet we know very different as OpAmp rolling has been a thing for many decades.
Quite enjoying the WH1000XM6's..
They are still very much of the ilk of the QC Ultras/Airpod Max, but what is really apparent is their tuning is very much a Harman curve with a layer of excitement thrown on top, it's evident someone with a musical ear tuned these, its the first pair of wireless headphones I've been happy with the default tuning, but I do also like the provision of a 10 band EQ, that really lets you get them absolutely dialled in.
Do these compare to my desk setup? No.. the XM6's in isolation are good, nothing really leaps out as being deficient, but with a highly revealing 24/96 'Hi-Res' album, my desk setup can resolve more detail and has that next step up in control.. but it can't match the XM6 for injecting 'fun' into a wider genre of music.
The other stand out feature is the new ANC really does a good job of not having any noticeable impact on the music, this is quite 'new' for me, the Airpods Max (for example) struggles with over processing which is especially noticeable when ANC is working hard.. the XM6's are beguilingly transparent when in a noisy environment to a point its like having a quiet, personal listening space where ever you are!.
I'd give them 8/10, I'm still using them at my desk at the moment, the wireless 'freedom' and super lightweight on your head experience is not making me reach for the Focals I normally rock..
Even better, I have been using my phone for an LDAC connection and was a bit miffed at the prospect of having to buy some form of LDAC transmitter for my Laptop to allow me to use that at my desk.. However, I found the 'Alternative A2DP Driver' which essentially gives you LDAC on any modern blue tooth device so gave it a whirl, and it just worked.. immediately connected via LDAC @ 990kbps! The codec info is shown so you can see realtime what the current type/rate is, which also helps.. it's <£5 if you just want LDAC etc, adding AAC (for my Air Max's) brought that to £7.. well worth it..
The bonus being the multi connection to the phone means I can make/take calls whilst using the PC for music!
They are still very much of the ilk of the QC Ultras/Airpod Max, but what is really apparent is their tuning is very much a Harman curve with a layer of excitement thrown on top, it's evident someone with a musical ear tuned these, its the first pair of wireless headphones I've been happy with the default tuning, but I do also like the provision of a 10 band EQ, that really lets you get them absolutely dialled in.
Do these compare to my desk setup? No.. the XM6's in isolation are good, nothing really leaps out as being deficient, but with a highly revealing 24/96 'Hi-Res' album, my desk setup can resolve more detail and has that next step up in control.. but it can't match the XM6 for injecting 'fun' into a wider genre of music.
The other stand out feature is the new ANC really does a good job of not having any noticeable impact on the music, this is quite 'new' for me, the Airpods Max (for example) struggles with over processing which is especially noticeable when ANC is working hard.. the XM6's are beguilingly transparent when in a noisy environment to a point its like having a quiet, personal listening space where ever you are!.
I'd give them 8/10, I'm still using them at my desk at the moment, the wireless 'freedom' and super lightweight on your head experience is not making me reach for the Focals I normally rock..
Even better, I have been using my phone for an LDAC connection and was a bit miffed at the prospect of having to buy some form of LDAC transmitter for my Laptop to allow me to use that at my desk.. However, I found the 'Alternative A2DP Driver' which essentially gives you LDAC on any modern blue tooth device so gave it a whirl, and it just worked.. immediately connected via LDAC @ 990kbps! The codec info is shown so you can see realtime what the current type/rate is, which also helps.. it's <£5 if you just want LDAC etc, adding AAC (for my Air Max's) brought that to £7.. well worth it..
The bonus being the multi connection to the phone means I can make/take calls whilst using the PC for music!
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Associate
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I've been really pleased with my XM6s - so good to see that the muddy, mid bass bloated sound has been dialled back - I've tweaked the Eq just a little to my liking but as a easy, comfortable solution with great noise cancelling and one of the best Transparency modes I've used, I'd say these are pretty impressive.
This is probably the better thread for it but had a bit of a zen clarity moment today with the Luxsin X9 headphone amp side of things. I've realised that DACs like this offer a constant scope of upgrade to your existing headphones that makes them sound like a better pair of headphones, something a headphone amp that doesn't have these hardware level features can do. The HP-EQ for example is tailored to each specific headphone and you select the Harman curve profile you want. you can then go in and tweak it further and save it as a custom profile if you want making additional changes to the output.
This level of tailoring goes way beyond what something like Peace APO can offer from software EQing, or just basic tone controls found on other amps.
I get it now, I understand why kit like this costs what it does, you can throw any headphone listed in the 2500+ database and make it sound like a better version of that headphone with a few clicks. Maybe that alone is reason enough to warrant the extra cost over a more affordable headphone amp with a fixed sound signature.
The DAC side of things feeding the power amp is still using bypass mode of course as that sounds excellent through the speakers, the Arya Stealth is using the HMS II.3 Harman curve profile and it sounds so good.
My mind is now a bit of a mess, if Luxsin ask for this back then I don't want to give it back
This level of tailoring goes way beyond what something like Peace APO can offer from software EQing, or just basic tone controls found on other amps.
I get it now, I understand why kit like this costs what it does, you can throw any headphone listed in the 2500+ database and make it sound like a better version of that headphone with a few clicks. Maybe that alone is reason enough to warrant the extra cost over a more affordable headphone amp with a fixed sound signature.
The DAC side of things feeding the power amp is still using bypass mode of course as that sounds excellent through the speakers, the Arya Stealth is using the HMS II.3 Harman curve profile and it sounds so good.
My mind is now a bit of a mess, if Luxsin ask for this back then I don't want to give it back
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I was tempted by the XM6 but I think I'll hold out for the B&W Px8 S2. I really like my Px7 S2e so I'm hoping it'll be a nice upgrade.
Erm...I've lost it honest! Fingers crossed, or sounds like you might have an expensive purchase. Stretch the reviews out in a long-term review series...My mind is now a bit of a mess, if Luxsin ask for this back then I don't want to give it back
That looks slick. I feel like some of this is the integration, like making it really easy to use. I think you can do some of this with APO Peace on a PC with profiles and such, but I imagine it's a pain to learn/setup and that barrier is real. Kinda like the Xbass button in iFi Zen series; one little press and bang, away you go. Or the Qudelix 5K which has some similar stuff in its app, like community EQs for different headphones (so for example; multiple uploads for the HD 650/6XX, but differences like 'worn pads' etc). It makes it something I'm more likely to play with.
It does sound like you might have found an endgame?
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On a side-note I got my Fiio K7 BT today. Which I finally played around with tonight and basically lost the evening listening to music. Which is awesome. Not so much the new DAC/AMP, but just testing to see it works and then forgetting what I'm doing and falling into listening to music.
The K7 is basically the K5 Pro with balanced and some other small improvements. So like the K5 it will work in my awkward setup. Sound wise I just hear something neutral, clear, with that Fiio sound. Slightly different to the K11 (non-R2R) in that it isn't as lean, but I think that's just the more basic K11 AMPs vs. the THX AMP chips in the K7. I do like line/pre/PO switch on the K7, but I wish the Line/Preout was on it's own switch. I can see me accidently clicking line-out instead. Third DAC/AMP I've bought this year so need to stop it, but tubes are still a curiosity to me, so who knows.
Following a comment on headfi, I think the X9 will replace a lot of kit for a lot of people and become end game lol. The path of entry to hardware level EQing this way is so quick and easy and you can then add your own tweaks and save a new EQ is the main thing here. You can "upgrade" your headphones or speakers with just a few clicks and then play around with different soundstages and so on.
Yeah I've tried Peace APO before and whilst it is very thorough, it takes ages to get the tight curve as community profiles don't always resonate with your own sound likes/dislikes and I never found a combo of values that worked for me, hence going the hardware route and looking for headphone amps that by default sounded as close to my preferred sound as possible.
My K7 wasn't the BT version but I believe the rest of the DAC was the same as BT version, it was a nice amp for sure but for planars I just found it a little too bright sounding which was the main reason for returning it.
Yeah I've tried Peace APO before and whilst it is very thorough, it takes ages to get the tight curve as community profiles don't always resonate with your own sound likes/dislikes and I never found a combo of values that worked for me, hence going the hardware route and looking for headphone amps that by default sounded as close to my preferred sound as possible.
My K7 wasn't the BT version but I believe the rest of the DAC was the same as BT version, it was a nice amp for sure but for planars I just found it a little too bright sounding which was the main reason for returning it.
I didn't realise the EQ'ing was done in hardware. I thought it might have been software, particularly with that large screen OS/Dashboard. So it's very cool.
Is your preference for the internal DAC, or the K11 R2R as the DAC?
I see the X9 uses the AKM AK4499EX+AK4191EQ chipset that I think are their flagship. I've seen them in the original Fiio K9/K9 Pro and it seems you have to spend that much to get those.
I didn't want the BT version. One of those annoying times when I go to order the normal K7 and it just went out of stock. Did find somewere selling it, but then thought sod it I'll just buy the BT variant for £40 more. My experience is that I rarely use BT input. There's no differences other than I think the BT revision did have the newer firmware when they had software issues around launch (still had up to recently with the botched v1.24 No RGB firmware).
Interestingly I don't find it to be bright, or very much in-line with a solid state sound. I'm kinda with Zeos in that the Fiio K7 has that nearly neutral, smidge or warmth house sound that they did on the K5 Pro. Certainly not as analytical, or bright as the K11 (non-R2R), or the SMSL C200 (ESS Sabre DAC) that I had. I'd hazard a guess that the Topping DX3 Pro+ is more neutral, for example. The Fiio K5 Pro and Fosi Audio K7 use similar XU208/AK4493/OPA1612 configurations. The difference is the K7 has THX AMP chips, but maybe I'm also used to the sound. Certainly I don't have any bright headphones so in that sense I'm shielded. Equally though I with you in that I do also prefer a warmer sound, for most things, other than gaming. The iFi Zen Signature stack I bought in January has a lovelly warmth and smoothness to its burr-brown components, which along with the Xbass/HD6XX button is pure magic. Really elevates the bass on the HD 6XX/650. So I can imagine R2R and tubes do even more.
And I think that's were I ought to go next. I hate the thought of certain aspects of an OTL tube amp and there seems to be budget offerings (Darkvoice, Little Dot, Bottlehead Crack, Xduoo TA-66), or very expensive set-ups. Not much in-between. I have noticed there are a few that wax lyrical about the Fiio K11 R2R + Xduoo TA-66 combination where I can imagine the warness gooey sound is very pleasing. Particularly on the HD 6x0 series. Whether the R2R DAC is going to be that different from a iFi Zen CAN feeding the TA-66 is probably guesswork.
Still follwoing all the research I've done recently, I'm a bit fed up of looking at DAC/AMPs etc. That's why it was quite nice last night to remember to enjoy what I've got a bit more. I'm still not there on a final set-up and some headphones still calling, but want to get off the hardware carousel. 2026 needs to be a cold turkey/no new DAC/AMP/headphones year!
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Make the X9, half the size, put all the settings inside the unit and not on the app (in case they remove it or stop the support) and i'm there!
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