🔷 Singxer SA-1

Yes the highz pushed it further away with slightly softer highs. The difference is small. I also prefer the high z setting. Helps with ess9038 brightness. Using it with senn 660s.
Volume slightly lower on high z.
Great feature to have both settings.
Edit after break-in low z is superior. High z sounds a bit veiled in comparison. Better dynamics in low z.

My singxer has a RK 27 quadruple potentiometer. Can someone tell me the sonic and mechanical differences between this and say a lower level alps?
I appreciate a better pot because im constantly playing with the volume dial and have had many pot problrms in the past with those thx amps.
Thx

were these impressions with the GLmk2 with GRPS or stock power supply?

With the stock psu, this was before the new psu was released iirc

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Kind of wild coming back seeing my post has become the official thread for the singxer :laughing:
Is it still the best option in the fully balanced class A headphone amp in that price area, or would it be better to look somewhere else now?

Wow, talk about a dead thread. :grin:

I am thinking about picking up a used version to try this amp out. I am always looking for a great deal and this amp, used or on sale seems like a pretty good deal.

The feature I like best is that the volume has lots of room before it gets too loud. I am a quiet listener with several efficient headphones. What that means is that most of my listening is done in low gain, (if the amp has gain settings) and the volume knob does not go past 9:00. It would be nice to have more play/headroom with the volume selection.

Those preferences make me think - make sure your amp has an excellent pot, regarding channel matching.

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Ye the hype kinda died down after a while since the measurement people would get cheaper Topping or SMSL products and those who wanted something different might gravitate to a Jot 2 or Rebel amp in the price range, plus you kinda had to jump it to get better sound. Then the newer topping discrete stuff came out along with the hifiman r2r combo and you really never hear about them again but I seen them go on sale on APOS certified for $300 usd or less and classified ads are around that much.

Its prob one of the better ones in the range for less sensitive gear as I know that the Jot 2 absolutely has like barely any room to adjust and same with rebel so should be fine for iem. Annoying thing though is i think this amp has the gain switch on the bottom so its annoying to switch when you need it.

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I dunno, I continue to enjoy the SA-1. I never did the jumper mod on it as I never felt the need to. Since I don’t use IEMs, I just set the gain to high and forgot about it. I also like the versatility of this amp as I use its balanced output as a pre to feed my speaker setup. I love that Class A flavah! I feel like this amp is best when used with efficient dynamic driver headphones. Planars are not at their best on this amp in my opinion. This has been my experience with it.

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I’ve found that using an otl as a pre amp and then run planars on this amp makes every planar I’ve tried with it absolutely amazing IMO.

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Good idea. Perhaps that is the secret sauce that I was missing with regard to running planars on it! :+1:t2:

That is what the amp is known for. In this case, it might be a nice fit for my use.

I saw the certified units, but I didn’t like dealing with APOS in the past. There is a used one for sale on CAM that I have looked at.
I am going to put a tube amp up for sale on Friday. I bought a couple of tube amps to try the tube sound more strongly and now I am looking for a different sound, that will compliment my favourites.

Yeah I would likely just keep it in low gain and just use my efficient 'phones with it. I already have an iFi for the hard to drive stuff.

Glad to hear you still have the amp and still enjoy it. We all buy, try and sell so quickly that in some cases we don’t appreciate what we have/had. I can think of several amps that I wish I hadn’t sold.

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Yeah it’s still my main amp, good pairing with the Schiit Bifrost and Beyer DT880 600 ohm. Stopping here for the foreseeable future.

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My Hart Audio custom cables for my 2 KPH40i was delivered today so this evening I’ll swamp my TA26’s back to my SA1’s theyre on top of & give them a go in balanced for movie sound. Last night I had swapped to the TA26’s but I know the KPH40i need solid state to keep the low end clean. Both the SA1 & TA26 work great on 600ohm DT880 by the way. I haven’t yet tried the SA1 with the KPH40 for more than 2 minutes, because the stock cable is far too short. New balanced cables are 2 meters. I expect smiles.

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Well as it turns out, 2 meter long headphone cable is about 2 meters not enough cable for my purposes. 2 meters will be fine for desktop listening but sitting back 6 or 7 feet from the big TV I need more slack in the wire. Probably 2 meters more slack to be comfortable. However, I’m very pleased with the sound quality with both the Koss KPH40i & the Sennheiser HD660S2 on the Singxer SA-1. Note the stock cable for the HD660 is also far too short for anything but desktop listening.

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I did the same thing for my HD660S as well because they migrate from room to room. I have a 7-foot Audiophile Ninja cable for the office/music room desktop system and a 10-footer (also Audiophile Ninja) for the bedroom system.

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I haven’t had much time with my 660’s yet, but in the few minutes I did listen testerday I knew I had never heard a headphone before that had so much obvious 3D soundstage/imaging. That is what I’ve been searching for. Note I was previously only listening to music on Amazon HD via Bluetooth, but that rig is down at the moment & so I’m now listening to movies & shows on Amazon Video or YouTube from my TV’s optical output. Now The Expanse S1E1 is my main test reference lol.

Well three to four years later I am jumping on the bandwagon. Just bought a used model on CAM today. Hopefully I have it by the weekend.

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