Budget setup help, im a noob

Hi! My ATH-m40x recently broke and I decided to upgrade a bit, so I picked the DT990 Pro 250ohm and when they arrived I started looking for amps and that’s where I discovered Zeos. Big mistake.

So for the past week I’ve been through the rabbit hole and willing to update my setup a bit but every video/post whatever bit of information I read leaves me more confused lol, so I’m looking for your expert help to advise me and make a better decision :slight_smile:

My current setup is:
-Behringer UMC22 (I mainly used this for a condenser mic but I discovered I can use it as a DAC)
-DT 990 Pro 250ohm (I’m probably returning these to get a better set of cans)

I’m pretty convinced on getting the JDS ATOM Amp in order to power the new headphone I’m about to add but I’m having doubts on what would be the best bang for my buck.

I haven’t really tried a lot of headphones but I would like a more pure/natural sound like the ATH m40x I think have, I’ve looked only at open back headphones but I’m open to your suggestions. Budget is around 400$ usd max

Options atm are:
-HD6XX (220 usd)
-HE5XX (220 usd)
-Mackie MC-450 (300 usd)
-and Hifiman Sundaras (350 usd) which would be my endgame I guess.

Thanks a lot for reading my post, I hope u can help a noob out, I’ll mainly use these to listen to music and I would like something that stays true to the original music sound.

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The 990 Pro 250 ohm is not necessarily a bad pick depending on preference. It would tend to be pretty elevated in the treble region, so if you’re sensitive, that might be an issue. What you might try is to pick up something like the Liquid Spark. You could run your UMC22 as your DAC into the Liquid Spark. The Spark, though, should help to tame the Beyer treble a bit, and give you a warmer and more natural tone than something like an Atom, which would lean a bit more analytical and accentuate the Beyer treble to a degree.

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thanks a ton for the insight! Would you recommend a more neutral headphone in that price range?

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DT880 250 or 600 would be more neutral to neutral bright and again pairs pretty well with the Liquid Spark. The good thing about the 880 is that it also scales really well with future source gear upgrades. The 6XX you mention is also fairly neutral with a mid focus, but greatly benefits from a tube amp which gets pricier.

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If you buy an HD600 and you make a Bottle Head Crack with the speedball option, you will be hard pressed to justify spending a nickle more on gear. :slight_smile:

I say this only partially joking.

Do yourself a favor and read through the BHC thread.

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Sadly I haven’t tried the 6xx, 5xx but I have owned the sundara. Phenomenal headphone, guess the only thing about it is that personally I couldn’t own it as my only headphone because of how little slam it has. Everything else is great tho pretty A plus. I have owned the 58x which I love and did consider it to be a general upgrade. Tbh I doubt u can go wrong, it just depends on the headphone u choose that you get dif source gear. Tubes for 6xx, solid state maybe warmer amp for sundara and I don’t know anything about the other headphone u mentioned

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