Do amps really have different sound signatures?

with youtube it’s still fairly easy to tell nuances and differences in headphones. though I am also in the camp of using music that I am well aware of when using headphones but that’s because I know when to look for and I know when a new detail is being revealed to me

2 Likes

Apparently they have. Why wouldn’t they? After all the sound path has to go through different electronic components which might attenuate or emphasize different frequencies.

I personally think that the most desirable sound signature (or lack of it) is to have a neutral amp like an Objective2. If you want to color your sound there are better places to do it at the end of your chain (for example, your headphones), or at the start of your chain (for example, using convolution or filter simulation via software). In my opinion an amp should just amplify the signal.

Welp I think I’ve heard probably the first instance where my Schiit Modi/Magni sounds notably different from another piece of gear. I could be tripping or maybe not.

Got a hold of my sister’s old iPhone SE, and been playing around with it. Was wondering why I wasn’t really enjoying the sound. Switched to my stack. Volume matched. Changed volume again. And again. Different track.

If I have to describe it, my Schiit stack sounds “fuller.” I kinda want to even say “warm,” but not in these sense of FR - really hard to describe but I think I kind of get what people are saying by using these rather vague descriptors.

Again, I’m not the type to tell between my PC, a $10 portable CD player, and several DAC/amp setups I’ve tried, so this experience surprises me. And with easy to drive earphones at that - ATH-EW9. Maybe its better to say the Schiit sound “normal” like anything else I have and the iPhone sounds mmm, “brittle?” I really can be spouting bullshit like the way some audio reviewers do about DACs/amps, but I feel this difference go a little further than any cognitive bias I may have. :thinking:

Edit: Interestingly, people on headfi say the SE sounds “warm.” lol. Too lazy to actually set up a blind test, so I’ll just leave it as a plausibility, not certainty

1 Like

thats whats great about this hobby: different strokes for different folks. when i was younger i used to eq the hell out of everything to my tastes. these days i like the chain to be how i like it. theres soooo much more variety then when i was younger. hell headphone amps didnt really exist for the masses back then. u had headphone ports on most stereos and boomboxes, but they were bad. and headphones mostly didnt exist unless u had a lot of $ to spend. outside of course, sony walkman headphones. you could get just the headphones for cheap. but they were cheap lol. like koss cheap stuff, but much worse sounding.

so these days i like the fact i can just plug and play gear and it sounds the way i like it to sound.

different strokes for different folks :slightly_smiling_face:

edit: forgot to mention the fact that the gear itself is soooooo much better over all as well these days. cheap stuff when i was young, sounded cheap. a lot of cheap stuff now sounds great.