Comparing the JDS Labs Atom and SMSL SP200 THX AAA 888

Yeah it’s great, can easily recommend. I was very surprised when I heard it because they drastically improved the sound. I was not a fan of older schiit stuff, but I think the asgard 3 was a break out product for them in my mind, for it’s price its an easy pick if you wanted a single ended amp

It’s a pretty powerful one too. Have you tried the basx a100. Do they both sound the same

I think the basx on crazy more does offer more power, but it’s really not as refined as the Asgard 3 to my ears. I would really only recommend the a100 if you wanted a speaker amp first and headphones 2nd

Sweet thanks for the help

That’s really refreshing to hear! Might test this one too. Would you prefer the RNHP over it if power was none of your concerns? Were you able to find any glaring issues with the Asgard 3? Like grounding issues or PSU hum?

I personally would prefer the rnhp if power was not a concern. The asgard 3 is more of a balanced and slightly fun amp, and there really wasn’t really any concerns I had with the unit I heard. I think I would only pick up the A3 if you had a power hungry headphone if I had the rnhp already

1 Like

Sounds interesting enough to go try it. With this thread and testing the SP200 I found out myself first hand that measurements mean nothing as to how an amp actually sounds :man_facepalming:t2:

1 Like

I was reading through a thread on another site, which will not be named… but apparently some others have had issues with the SP200 as well. Seems like there may be some bad QC with the amp. Honestly wouldn’t be surprised as SMSL seems to be trying hard to undercut the massdrop and Monoprice versions, while using the highest-end THX chipset… THX 888… something is going to ‘give’ somewhere…

I would rather have a better designed amp with the lower tier chipset then the new one with a lacking design

Between all the M100, Su8, sp200 dissatisfaction, SMSL is being talked about for the wrong reasons.

Yeah this recent wave of alot of the trusted chifi brands having issues actually. Topping, smsl, blon, hifiman, monoprice (counting this as china lol, tin, etc

Topping and Blon completely went unnoticed for me. What happened to those?

Off the top of my head… The Topping D10 has been rebranded or become a scam item on amazon. No one really knows what’s going on with that, it unfortunately happened to someone new to this forum. The Blon BL-03 has possible(?) quality control issues with its tuning amongst its batches though it’s hard to tell the truth of it since it’s so hard for some to get a good seal with it that some people are going to hear it different and not know any better.

2 Likes

Hmm. Maybe they just rushed some items for christmas…

Thanks (to everyone!) for the comparisons, by the way. I got an Atom, may get an SP200 too one day, and now I know it may “complement” it!

Random off-topic question into the round:

If you guys had a 2000$ USD total budget for headphones and an amp, and the goal would be detailed and clear but still extremely fun and hype, what would your choice be?

I’m sorta a sucker for detail and clarity. I love hearing all those little details and quirks from the recordings, but at the same time I just love sitting in front of my desk, listening to my music and get super hyped and entertained.

What’d be your pick? :grin:

You really want the bulk of your money in the headphones. They have the largest impact on the sound.
Having said that everything else needs to be good enough.
And at that price a lot is personal preference, I just haven’t heard enough headphones in the $1200+ dollars range to have a strong opinion.

my choice would be easy:

Sendy Aiva and Tor audio balanced tube amp
or
ZMF Aeolus with a SP200 AAA 888

Easy cheap one though not using half the budget would be:

Sennheiser 6XX with a dark voice tube amp with some swapped tubes

On the other spectrum to that X00 Ebony or EMU Teak with your choice of amp probably more dark voices

My DAC with all this would be the geshelli labs Enog 2 pro not just for balanced but mainly for the voltage output control is really nice

@giova05 Just a quick question (since you had both the SP200 and still have the RNHP):

How does the volume compare? For instance on my Amiron Homes with 250 ohms I was at roughly 9 - 10 o’clock on the SP200 on low gain. How much would that be on the RNHP roughly (9 o’clock SP200 low gain)?

I probably did not go past 9 o clock too often on the sp200 either. On the RNHP With the Clears I probably stay around 10 o clock… 11 o clock most of the time… 12 if I want to push it to 85db-90db… but I don’t like doing that too often… as it’s considered unhealthy. With the Neumann NDH 20s (150 ohm) I was probably pushing it towards 12 o clock more often… and maybe 1 or 2 o clock if I really wanted to push it, again to slightly unhealthy levels. I believe it was with the Sennheiser HD 6xx/650 (300 ohm) where I could max it out, but it was very uncomfortably/painfully loud. The volume is logarithmic… so basically all the way up to about 2-3 o clock I could probably take on most full sized headphones… but the last quarter gets extremely loud very fast.

I think with most headphones… 300 and lower ohm you should be perfectly fine.
You would probably run into issues with some of the moderately hard to drive planars and some of the 600 ohm headphones. But it’s worth noting you can get an additional +14db of gain by using the ‘c’ input, albiet with a raised noise floor.

I’ll also add it’s probably the nicest feeling potentiometer I’ve personally ever had on an amp. =)

2 Likes

It is an Alps (Japan made) potentiometer, basically the nicest you can get without ordering custom made.