Good Day!
I live in the eu and want to get my first amp and dac. Atm i have an hd599 but plan on getting an hd600 in the near future and after that who knows. As for dac i was looking into the topping e30, it seems to have all the features and some more i could need for desk use. However i am at a loss as far as amps go, the famed a90 is out of my price range unfortunatly. I was looking into the sp200 and the drop 789 but that could be problematic and expensive to get here depending on costums. I only have about 1 hour of experience with a fiio e10k my friend has so any advice is welcome.
Thank you!
THX does some weird stuff to the sound. Take a look at Topping L30 or JDS Atom.
Lake People amps are are often recommended in the EU, for example the G103-S, for the same price as the SP200. Thomann have an open-box article at a discount.
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I would get something less neutral and more warm something to the likes of the Asgard 3. The hd600s themselves are already super neutral and you really don’t want to make them sound lifeless with a thx amp
First of all thank you all for the help!
I was looking into the Topping L30 but i am afraid it would not power hungrier types of headphones.
Seems interesting but the gain adjustment seems rather painfull and i would guess the HD600 and the 599 would need different gain options
The trouble is the same as with the drop 789 if customs cheks i need to pay VAT which is 27% and who knows what else.
Again thank you for the help and sorry if i sound nitpicky
I personally never change the gain on my amps, I pick a setting and just adjust the volume.
The one time you might would be if you were using sensitive IEM’s and something hard to drive.
I also wouldn’t worry about hard to drive headphones, if your buying one of the really hard to drive headphones, Susvara, LCD4 etc, you’d want to spend more on an amp.
Just figure out what headphones your going to use and buy for that.
Not really. They have sensitivites of 106 and 97dB/mW. You would have to change the volume between headphones, of course. I’ve run the Nighthawk Carbon (99dB/mW) and Fiio FH3 (114dB/mW) on the G111 with no need to change the gain settings between the two.
Upon getting the unit, it would just take a few minutes to figure out whether you have not enough or too much room on the volume knob, then take the top off once. I agree, It is a little bit annoying, but on the other hand, Lake People amps are cheaper versions of Vioelectric amps which are much higher-end so at least there’s a known quality there.
Another option would be to get a combo DAC and an amp: connect the 599 to the combo unit and the 600 to the amp. You’d then be able to leave the volume knobs where you like them for each headphone. For this you would need a combo with a line-out rather than a pre-out, such as the ifi Zen DAC.
I am sorry i did not know or understood that metric before and thought it all depended on ohm value.
I will look into those amps a bit more.
Would a ballanced out make a lot of difference ?
It might give some extra power, but if an amp doesn’t have a balanced output and has enough power, it should be fine. I was also hunting for balanced in the beginning, but am learning the error of my ways. For a cheaper amp, the extra component cost for balanced probably isn’t worth it. Even more expensive amps like the RNHP and G111 don’t have balanced output, but people love them anyway.