Tonight I drug out my Audeze iSINE10 I haven’t used in about 3 years to try out with my new Emotiva A2m amp to see if a decent amp could help make them sound better. I haven’t used them because vocals sounded so rough. I’m still not liking how they sound. Even my $6.00 Mee RX18 sound better. Do planar need break in time like normal non planar earphones do?
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Problem with all open back planar IEM are that they really need EQ to sound okay. That’s why the isine comes with the Cipher cable (build in EQ) .
So you can either try with the Cipher lightning cable on an iPhone, the same cable with a special anker usb-c adapter on android, the Cipher Bluetooth cable or you use some EQ software.
Do all planar headphones suffer from this affliction? I’ve been kinda sorta looking at the Hifiman Sundara but now I’m thinking I’ll stay away for any future planar plans.
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No, only open back planar IEMs (isine 10, 20, goldplanar gl20…) have this problem.
Closed back planar IEMs like the 7hz timeless are good.
Planar headphones are fine. The sundara will sound way better out of the box compared to the isine 10.
I never needed eq with my 10s if I ran them off of a powerful enough amp. They really need 1w to open up and sound their best and none of the cypher cables really could put out enough power to make I’m sound right. Also it doesn’t hurt to put 2 or 3 days on any headphone to “break in”. It won’t ever make them sound worse.
I’m running the Audeze with a 50 watt at 8 ohm amp. I’d think that would be enough. I’ll give a few hours running a try to see if it helps.
Did you do the page 11 mod?
I don’t use the Cipher cable, but I do use EQ for them (I also use an external amp with them), I usually use them with Roon and I use the Audeze preset or I also use it with EQ convolution with EQ settings from Crinacle or Oratory, they do need EQ to make them shine. If you can use EQ I would say give it a try, before you spend money on something else.
Yo can fine the EQ settings here:
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Page 11 mod?
To see the full 50w at the headphone jack you have to open up the unit and install jumpers. On my A100 I believe the instructions are on page 11 lol. It will be very similar for your amp. Without the jumpers installed I believe I read maximum output would be around 600mW.
From the Emotiva web site. No idea about the max headphone output is 600mW.
The BasX A2m is a two channel power amplifier that delivers 50 watts / channel into 8 Ohms, and 90 watts / channel into 4 Ohms, with a rated THD+N of < 0.1%, and an A-weighted S/N ratio of 112 dB. The BasX A2m features the same high-quality Class A/B amplification and full-sized five way speaker binding posts as our other BasX power amplifiers, but utilizes an advanced switch mode power supply, which contributes to its compact form factor and efficient power utilization.
Here is from the specifications tap on the website for the A2m.
Power Output (headphone output; normal mode):
8 Ohms: 60 mW / channel
33 Ohms: 200 mW / channel
47 Ohms: 250 mW / channel
150 Ohms: 430 mW / channel
300 Ohms: 440 mW / channel
600 Ohms: 350 mW / channel
Power Output (headphone output; direct drive mode - requires internal jumper; USE WITH CAUTION):
8 Ohms: 50 watts / channel
33 Ohms: 12 watts / channel
47 Ohms: 8.5 watts / channel
150 Ohms: 2.6 watts / channel
300 Ohms: 1.3 watts / channel
600 Ohms: 0.6 watts / channel
So normal output you have 60mw to 440mw available. With the jumpers installed you would have 50w to 600mw available.
Without the jumpers installed you actually don’t have much power and with them installed you’ll have much less than half a watt under normal listening conditions.
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Thank you for the site address! I tried settings for my Quarks and my everyday carry, Samsung Z Fold3 and USB Audio Player Pro. AMAZING! Just looking at the EQ settings they didn’t seem to make sense.
I’ll try the Audeze and hopefully it’ll make a difference.
I’ll try installing the jumpers and see if it makes a difference. I’m sure it will.
Just please be careful as that is a ton of power to a relatively small driver.
Absolutely! Thanks for the help!!
That will be too much power for the iSine 10, you won’t have much volume room, the EQ settings from the EQ are usually for Parametric EQ, you might want to read about it and learn how to use it, you also might need a EQ that supports those settings. All Audeze headphones/earphones need EQ to give their best performance, without EQ you are not taking full advantage of the headphones/earphones sound quality.
OMG! I just setup my Audeze’s EQ. WOW!!!
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Awesome, glad it worked out!! I didn’t have to use any on mine but I know they take eq like a champ. My Euclid’s on the other hand need some help with low-end.
Glad you didn’t give up, I would say don’t bother with the 7th Timeless if you are considering it, the only advantage is the “better” tuning, but when using EQ with the iSine 10 the iSine is better, just look at the size of the drivers of the iSine 10.