I’m shopping for a headphone tube amp for my Sendy Aiva’s. I would like to keep it under 200$ I was looking at the Schiit Vali 2. Any good? anything better? Its a hybrid tube amp and i was wondering if that might be better for a planar since Z says that planars dont sound that great with tube amps.
Maybe look at the little dot 1+
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not just Z but most of the community including myself who have experienced it says it’s not that good. it’s not the tubes it the planars that are an issue. here is a thread on headfi that goes over this. It’s all beyond me so here ya go https://www.head-fi.org/threads/why-otl-tube-amps-are-bad-for-planar-magnetic-headphones.885106/
He’s looking for a hybrid, which will be fine imo. But if you go for an otl it’s not the best idea
The Vali 2 is a great little amp. The ability to easily roll one tube, so much easier and cheaper than matched sets, is great. It uses the 6922 family of tube which is one of the biggest types used in audio amps. This means tons of information and tubes to roll are plentiful, my personal recommendation is the Western Electric 396a using an adapter. The outputs on the back do not use the tube buffer which is kinda annoying, so if you wanted a tube preout into a set of speakers I would look elsewhere
someone has a Little Dot Mki1on AVexchange on reddit for $100 I think.
Their about that price new on Amazon.
I would use the other $100 to buy opams and tubes.
you would do better to buy a higher quality tube amp and get tubes to roll later. get the MkII or MkIII (it comes with both 6.5mm and 3.5mm jacks).
But if he’s using the sendy’s (or any other planar) that’s not the best idea
but the MkI is a good idea? 
The MK1+ is a hybrid if I remember correctly
that would be correct…it is a hybrid. my bad.
Yeah that’s why I didn’t recommend the MK2 or 3.
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Could order the Little Dot MK1+ and an Xduoo TA-05 off of Amazon and send back the one you don’t like?
The ta-05 is pretty good as well, but might be a bit over budget
The Little Dot MK1+ is VERY underwhelming in stock form imo - Uses cheap chinese tubes.
$120 on Amazon …
Sorry lol I was thinking of the ta-10 lol. Also is the 05 a hybrid?
I have a Vali 2 and I’m currently using a Sovtek 6N1-P tube. It sounds different from my Atom, which is all I really care about, but it also accentuates imaging a bit more. So in a way it’s more laid back and detailed at the same time. I’ve seen people use 6SN7 tubes with an adapter, so I may try that at some point because I’m very curious as to what that sounds like.