Moved on to Eraser from Long Distance Calling. This is their latest release from 2022 and it’s one helluva drop. This is instrumental prog/prog-metal at its finest. Great musicianship and high quality production work to boot. Switched over to the Stealths fir this one and kept the rest of the chain the same.
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Tonight I have the Hifiman HE560 V3s plugged into the Ferrum Oor/Hypsos stack with the Gustard R26 pulling DAC duty and being fed bit-perfect from my laptop. I’m crazy impressed by these V3s, but while looking around for info on them I saw @M0N saying that the V3s are garbage and the V1s are significantly better.
***Edit: Apparently, I misunderstood M0N’s objections to the HE560s. He doesn’t think they’re garbage, just that they have lesser build quality and because of that they can fail more or have subpar performance. If, however, you get a good pair of the V3s (or other Adorama versions I would imagine) they can actually sound quite good though possibly still not the same as the V1s. M0N PMed me and I wanted to make this clear. Sorry for the confusion!
Thankfully, I have a friend who is big into these round cup Hifiman headphones and, as the current custodian of my HE-6s (six screw), he owes me a favor and is going to let me borrow his HE560 V1.1s (wood veneer, 2.5mm jacks) for some back to back listening with my V3s. If the OGs are really that much better, then I’m definitely going to have to track a pair down for myself because the V3s are already very good. It’s awesome to have generous, cool friends that are also into this hobby. I wouldn’t get to try out a third of the gear I do if it weren’t for loaning gear amongst friends. 
For music, we have Wheel’s album entitled Resident Human. I LOVE the way these 560s present the bass on music like this. It’s not really elevated in quanitity much, but it’s tight, articulate, and agile and it digs deep, coming at you with a visceral, but controlled quality that I’m really diggin’. For anyone who, like me, finds the Sundaras to be a bit too bright and unnatural/metallic sounding, the HE560s are a great alternative and you can get the V4s (Same as V2 and V3 aside from a headband change) on Adorama when they go on sale for between $249 and $349 (do NOT pay the $899 MSRP).
Same signal chain, but now I’m listening to Kaleo’s 2021 effort Surface Sounds. I really dig this guy’s voice and the music in general is just a really fun listen pretty much regardless of mood.
Switched over to the ZMF VCs plugged into the Ferrum Oor/Hypsos with the Holo Audio May KTE pulling DAC duties again.
On deck in my queue is Rodrigo y Gabriela’s 2019 release, Mettavolution. Listening to these two and their deuling guitars arrangements is always a lot of fun. This album has a nice rootsy feel with some latin flavor sprinkled throughout. Another great listen and the VCs are the perfect headphone to listen to this album.
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I’ve got the Hifiman HE560s (V1 and V3) plugged into the Ferrum Oor/Hypsos stack with the Holo Audio May KTE pulling DAC duties being fed bit-perfect from my laptop.
For music, I’m currently listening to Gov’t Mule’s album Heavy Load Blues in hi-res and I’m enjoying every minute of it!
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Gotta check that one out. I’m curious about the bit-perfect part. Are you referring to the player?
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Stumbled into this one tonight! I’m likin’ it, too. I was in the mood for something different. Sorta fits the mood as the weather rages out there tonight.
I like the way this album was done. It’s got a nice flow to it. Nice find!
AMHD > Douk U2 Pro > Schiit Bifrost 2 > SMSL SH-9 > Focal Radiance
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It’s just a fancy way of saying that the audio is leaving my laptop untouched and unprocessed so that only my DAC is doing any decoding, filtering, etc. That’s all.
I’ve only ever heard an EP by Patterson and Melbourne that was called something like The Flood (I know it was something about a flood anyways lol). Gonna go hunt this one down.
Ah, OK. I started searching a little and found this Neutron Bit-Perfect player. This is what it says:
"Bit-Perfect output guarantees that internal or external DAC will receive the same, unmodified, bits which were sourced from the lossless music file (WAV, FLAC, ALAC, …).
Neutron’s audio engine is capable of passing source bits without any modification to the output device. Please refer FAQ for more details how to guarantee Bit-Perfect output."
Sounds good. I’m thinking about getting it. If I commit to it, I should probably uninstall the Peace APO first. Hmmm…
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I don’t know about Peace, but with most programs once you set it up to run bit perfect all EQ, filters, etc will be deactivated. If you’re into using software EQ (nothing wrong with that) you can’t pass audio bit-perfect. I used to be big into EQing, but now I much prefer the way different gear can be nixed and matched to create unique signal chains to fit my mood, my listening, etc. I also like how using a transducer without EQ gives me someone else’s or a different perspective on audio. It’s all just a preference thing at this point.
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BTW, same rig, but now listening to Sever by INHALO. Never heard it before, but came highly recd by a fellow drummer. I’m diggin’ what I’m hearing so far.
OK, the more I read on this the clearer it becomes. I have already played with a couple of things, and I get it now. Peace is stayin! 
At least for now.
I like to EQ. My hearing is so fucked I need all the help I can get. And anyway, I like playing with the EQ and shape the sound the way I want it. The nice thing is, as you say, when you turn it off, it’s off. Apparently, there are other things you can do to your PC to ensure bit perfect audio, stuff in BIOS and whatnot. I may explore that piece in due time. For now, I will play in peace.
See what I did there? LOL
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Another pretty good find, and in the theme of the show tonight
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Mystery is one of my favs. Was it you I rec’d their live album, Caught in the Whirlwind of Time, to?
Right now, I switched over to Audeze MM-500 for a quick comparison and I’m listening to Vola’s 2021 album Witness.
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I believe so. I haven’t done it yet, though! Thanks for the reminder. I’m enjoying this one more the deeper into it I get.
Man, I would love to hear your impressions of those headphones. Another item I have been lusting after lately! Funny, everything I have shown interest in has been right at that 1600 - 1700 dollar space.
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The MM-500s are probably my favorite Audezes. I have owned multiple versions of the LCD-2, the LCD-3, and the LCD-X and I have extensively demoed the LCD-4 and LCD-5 this year when checking out TOTL cans. All of those models have something about them that made them unsuitable for certain parts of my library or just didn’t suit my preferences as well as I would like. The MM-500s, on the other hand, are a pretty sizeable departure from Audeze’s “house sound” and come across as a very well balanced, highly technically proficient pair of headphones. When Audeze said these were going to be a “true” studio headphone aimed at pro audio applications, they weren’t kidding.
That said, they went for balanced rather than reference neutral which gives the MM-500s a bit more life and musicality than perhaps your average studio over ear. The bass is linear, reaches deep, and is accurate and articulate. The mid range favors neither lower or upper mids, but still sounds full and detailed. The treble isn’t boosted so it also isn’t super airy, but it is well-extended, carries over the great detail retreival from the mids, and is non-fatiguing. The layering and separation are great, as you’d expect from a top notch studio headphone. The soundstage is nothing to write home about, but it is reasonably sized in width and depth.
Overall, the MM-500s are a very good pair of headphones. Folks who like boosts to either end of the spectrum or warmth and richness through the mids should look elsewhere, but if considerable technical prowess in a near-neutral, very balanced headphone sounds like something you’d be interested in, then the MM-500s will be right up your alley.
One last note, they aren’t particularly hard to drive, but they are a bit picky about the quality of the source and amplification driving them. The MM-500s will make you hear potential flaws in the gear you use to drive them. For example, they love my Ferrum Oor/Hypsos and Timekeeper 3i, but they make my JDS Labs El Amp 2+ sound very bright and kinda thin and for DACs they have paired well with both of my R2R models and a couple Sabre based boxes, but they don’t like my ADI-2 or any of my SMSL DACs which are all AKM based so take that FWIW.
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