Hey everyone, has anyone got any recommendations for a nice, warm headphone amp that can be used to power both over ears as well as IEMs.
The impedance doesn’t have to be high, no higher than 300 Ohms, and it doesn’t need to have a DAC.
Balanced does not matter, it just needs to be warm and sound good with most types of drivers as I will be using Planar, Dynamic and BA drivers.
I have no real preference between tube or Solid State, but seeing as tubes will give a warmer sound then they will be a preference.
Looks do matter a tad as it will be sitting on a desk and be used for multiple hours a day.
I have a budget of around $600
Thanks,
Felix
Have never tried it but a lot of people seem to like the Audio-GD-R2R11
Sorry to keep hyping this but a Little Dot MKII sounds awesome with plenty of tubes available to roll and the impedance can be adjusted internally…
The two dip switches are for changing gain.
A. Switch 1 off, Switch 2 off = Gain 10 (Highest Impedance)
B. Switch 1 on, Switch 2 off = Gain 7 (Medium Impedance)
C. Switch 1 off, Switch 2 on = Gain 5 (Low Impedance)
D. Switch 1 on, Switch 2 on = Gain 3 (Lowest Impedance)
Cheapish yes but don’t let that fool you it punches above it’s weight 
Common wisdom says (low-impedance) planars can’t be driven with tubes because they can’t produce the necessary current, so you may need to stick with a solid-state for full coverage of that list of use cases.
In your budget I would suggest the iFi Micro iDSD (Silver or Black Label), which gives you full driveability of everything and anything, plus a warm-ish sound option if you set its digital filter to “Bit-perfect”/non-oversampling (-1.5 dB @15k, -3 dB @20k). But it does go a little over board on features vs. what you’re looking for, as it has a DAC and a preamp section and a battery for portable use, and extra bass and 3D/spatiality effects, and you have to be able to live with its rather industrial look (more of an issue on the old silver version).
Schiit Lyr might do the trick. And you can add the multibit DAC module to reach your $600 limit.
https://www.schiit.com/products/lyr-1
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