General Headphone Audio

[Timber]

It's weird that no matter what I try, I end up going back to the HD 650. It is my forever headphone.

I'm down with the kids.....based.

Spent the evening on my HD 6XX. Love it.

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With my ongoing DDR5 EXPO shenanigans I've bought a new temporary B850M mATX motherboard which doesn't include optical out. So it's messed up my very recent audio re-organisation using both optical & USB. So I really wanted to see if I could downsize my audio setup which resulting in spending hours tonight really comparing the K15 & K13 R2R. Honestly lucky to own either and they are both bloody brilliant, but I think since I've bought them I gained a slight appreciation of the K13 particularly driving the TA-66. I remember in a blind test I wasn't always able to tell them apart, so I don't know how much of this is bias, but it does feel like the K13 softens the source in a really nice way. Seems particularly apt with all the new K13's on the forum recently.

So I've ended-up with: USB -> K13 -> RCA to TA-66 & XLR to 4.4mm -> K15 -> XLR to Edifiers MR3. And then boxed up my iFi Zen CAN Signature 6XX. I still have the K15's dedicated controls which are nicer to use, whilst also leveraging the better amp. I can always easily add the USB lead back to the K15 if required.

I think what all this playing around has made me think about, is that when and if I change my audio gear, I'm wondering if it makes sense to have a standalone DAC + seperate AMP + OTL tube amp. 3 boxes instead of 2, but seperates gives a certain freedom. But the other thing I realised is that the K13 even on its own; its good enough. Like the HD 6XX sounds lovely on it. So I'm not sure how much I want to stray into more expensive DACs etc.

One downside is my GPU/TA-66 inteference is back. Even though the TA-66 is now really clean, a quick gaming session gave me a slight interference noise so need to resolve that one again.

 

[Angst]

Speaking of the Hd650, I'm still tweaking designs but I'm getting pretty damn close now to a HD650 with slamming bass.

 

[Timber]

I have a question for you all. Taken from this r/headphone post.

What is the 'A-B switcher' box at the bottom of this reddit poster's stack, below the silver K17?

I'm just curious as to what model/purpose it serves. Google image search was useless in this case.

 

[Jenz]

@Timber I’m going to guess at either:

Input switcher to get over a single input limitation of the Fiio, so 2 inputs into the A/B and then on to the Fiio connection.

Or:

Output Switcher to A/B switch two connected sets of speakers (maybe in another room or a desktop set plus a music set).

 

[Timber]

@Timber I’m going to guess at either:

Input switcher to get over a single input limitation of the Fiio, so 2 inputs into the A/B and then on to the Fiio connection.

Or:

Output Switcher to A/B switch two connected sets of speakers (maybe in another room or a desktop set plus a music set).

Thank you. I did ask in the reddit post, but didn't get a response.

The K17 has USB, Optical, Coax inputs and can output Optical, RCA and XLR (apologies mis-understood what you mean by input limitation). The K17 could drive both the TA-20 and iBasso Kunlun.

 

[mrk]

Excellent headphones immersion track.