I found the THX to have brittle sounding treble, which could be perceived as harsh.
The thing it does well is detail retrieval, but It doesn’t sound natural doing it.
The Sound stage is also very flat.
It’s not a bad amp at all, I wouldn’t choose to own one. And with options like the Heresy or Atom and the fact almost no one needs 6W’s to drive a headphone, to me it’s a hard amp to recommend.
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I have nothing to add to everything @Polygonhell just said, other than his observations and experiences with THX amps mirror my own 100%.
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… this weekend it’s the only amp I’ve been using. Cold and flat are accurate words for the THX. Even with my Blon B20’s I’ve never found the amp to be harsh. Got a headphone that would be hard? I have a khp30 if that could do it.
I’m having more difficulty enjoying my SP200 by the day. In fact I rarely listen to it anymore. The treble is too aggressive and often sounds thin. I’m lumping thin and aggressive into “harsh.” It is detailed, I give it that. But it will make most of my headphones sound sibilant before my other amps do. To the point I replied to @M0N with, when using a tube buffer that aggressive, thin, and sibilant treble doesn’t go away until I back the treble tone control down on the buffer to the point where open- and air-iness also disappear.
I’ve never sold gear before but am giving serious thought to selling the SP200 and either staying put with the Atom, Liquid Spark, and Darkvoice for awhile or giving the Asgard 3 a shot.
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The other thing I noticed is THX amps completely fail at vertical imaging. The soundstage sounds non existent to me, and the mids are really wonky, which makes the treble sound even more off.
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I currently enjoy my Asgard 3 and RNHP both very much. I came from having an SP200 myself, so I completely understand what you are saying.
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It’s all relative it probably isn’t an issue of which headphone, but rather the material being played and what your used to.
Higher end amps tend to have smoother sounding treble and stage better, they don’t sound warm, but people used to lower tier amps tend to describe it as such.
The issue IMO is the amps tend to present what I would term artificial timbre or detail, sibilant and often older recordings sound harsh, it’s hard to find a measurement that quantifies this, my current theory is this has to do with an amps ability to retain it’s linearity at very low volumes.
My biggest problem with the THX is the words used to describe it paint a false picture in my mind, Neutral for example is basically meaningless, but using to describe a THX amp implies other amps are in some way not correct. Clean etc etc.
I saw a quote on another forum today to paraphrase “neutral is a word used to describe what the reviewer likes”.
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I have a feeling the SP 200 and my Monolith THX 887 may have a different sound signature. The damn amp is so lifeless it doesn’t know how to be harsh. Only when I use my Blon B20’s does even approach to sound offensive. BUT, the DAC is use on the THX is either an Airist R-2R or Bifrost 2. The harshness maybe your DAC.
I primarily feed my amps with an SU-8. That DAC can be a touch treble forward, yes. However, since I feed all my amps with it and the SP200 has those issues moreso than the other amps, it is also true the SP200 has a more aggressive treble. FWIW I’ve also used a Topping D10 and an SMSL M100 and gotten similar results.
Interesting. It clearly has to be my DACs since the thx sounds overly smooth to me. Welp. Might need to order and e30 now to verify.
When I had my SP200, my DAC was a Geshelli Labs Enog2 Pro, which is pretty even in the treble, yet I still found the SP200 harsh.
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Could the SP200, 789, and 887 actually handle treble differently?
I dont know about that, but the Airist and Bifrost both are much more forgiving in the treble than delta sigma DACs.
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They could, but not very much. They all measure almost the same and reviewers routinely comment they all sound basically the same. I’m finding my ears are becoming increasingly treble sensitive, which is a complication. If you’re not treble sensitive, be grateful, you have more listening options before you.
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Think it could be produced with a BTR5, Dragonfly Cobalt, or Modi Sigma Delta?
The Modi has a rep for an aggressive and harsh treble.
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I’ll give it a spin, I have the same DAC in my Fulla 3 so… I’ll report back tomorrow!
The filter implementation (slow roll-off) of the DFC helps tame the infamous ESS ‘sharpness’.
I’m sure some here can attest to the bright (sharp treble) sound of a poorly implemented Sabre dac.
First time reading this thread and I found it very interesting. I’m fairly new with audiophile stuff but every time I see someone mention “sound the artist intended” I can’t help but to chuckle. I’m sure the intention is there but how do we know what’s the real reason recording artist make the recording the way it sounds? If I have to guess I think it’s because of business reason. I think it’s fair to say that probably 90%+ customer based equipment out there will color the sound towards popular FR such as Harman’s target. As a recording studio, they have to make sure that their records will sound at least good/decent with most customer level equipment out there. They can’t just make the recording sounds like how they would like to listen personally. What if the recording artist is a bass head? The records would sound like a hot mess with the like of Beats headphones. That’s just a bad business decision.
Unless they know the recording artist and ask them personally, there’s no way to know what’s the real intention is. Even if you do know that they personally like it neutral or not, just the way they recorded it in the studio, why is this even matter to what you personally like?
This self isolation starts to mess with my head.
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MQA has taken an interesting approach to bringing listeners the “what the artists intended” experience.
They go as far has having artists, producers, or engineers involved in the recording sign off on content before it’s released (MQA version).
MQA sounds good to my ears, though I’m certain a good portion of this is due to the remasters and not solely the MQA filtering.
Edit: I also agree with MON’s sentiments earlier regarding the use of pro equipment manufacturers gear. It’s probably one of the best ways to get closer to the originally recorded sound. That’s one of the things that drew me to the RNHP. Rupert Neve Designs consoles are ubiquitous with high quality recordings. Similar things can be said regarding others that MON listed earlier.
If “what the artist intended” is your goal, then I see no better way than to go with the above mentioned scenario.
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