Schiit Jotunheim impressions

Discussion in 'Headphone Amplifiers and Combo (DAC/Amp) Units' started by Bill-P, Aug 30, 2016.

  1. RiflemanFirst

    RiflemanFirst New

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    One of these days I'll be getting a bigger, badder amp. Probably the Jotunheim, but too early to say for sure... Lots of stuff on my plate now with the Wife and I going through job changes and finally buying a house later on this year. Definitely ready to get the hell out of this noisy apartment building!
     
  2. gaspasser

    gaspasser Flatulence Maestro

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    I honestly believe there is something to us "middle aged" folks not finding the treble problematic with Jot. It makes sense from a physiology perspective with hearing degrading at the ends of the spectrum as we get older.
     
  3. jexby

    jexby Posole Prince

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    YMMV applies to this hypothesis.
    am over 45, and with certain tracks / mixes the Jotunheim presented a cacophony of electric guitars as "steel guitar" sounding instruments.
    whereas with Vali 2 or Mjolnir2, (my) ears now hear those same guitars as stringed instruments- lacking the metallic sheen. and instead with a stringed decay.

    just saying. depends on person and headphones and certainly eardrum wear n tear.
    and of course: burn in, cables made from shark sinew and clean solar power to the source mandatory.
     
  4. Abraham Lincoln

    Abraham Lincoln New

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  5. Lenroot77

    Lenroot77 Friend

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    :D
     
    Last edited: Apr 17, 2017
  6. cskippy

    cskippy Creamy warmpoo

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    I actually find it interesting. I don't know enough about amp designs to know what components are good or to see shoddy construction. I'm sure others here will have insight on that article.
     
  7. Lenroot77

    Lenroot77 Friend

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    Interesting to see it opened up for sure, but they seem to be doing some "Schiit Talking"?
     
  8. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Dr. Gilmore is disappointed that the design wasn't sufficiently unique, has no diff input, no mirrored VAS, and uses cheap switches that he managed to short. Overall quite a good assessment coming from those guys.
     
  9. Lenroot77

    Lenroot77 Friend

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    I have only looked at that site a few times, but just browsing thru it a bit now and wondering what they actually like over there?

    Sorry I've gotten off the thread topic :rolleyes:
     
  10. TMRaven

    TMRaven Friend

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    Seems like a reasonable and fair assessment to me.
     
  11. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    Not off topic at all. I do feel Spitzer's power argument is a bit of a straw man. Maybe it applies to HF more than here, but we've observed this isn't the amp for power hungry orthos. Outside of the subjective, the technical argument for this amp is the super low opamp like distortion, as measured by @atomicbob and me.
     
  12. SSL

    SSL Friend

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    "Hand soldering at minimum wage"

    Doesn't Schiit's board house use automated assembly?
     
  13. Johan

    Johan New

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    WELP! the gilmore girls have spoken! time to sell all my amps and buy this

    http://www.ebay.ca/itm/Finished-KG-AMP-Kevin-Gilmore-full-balance-Class-A-headphone-amplifier/222118780512?_trksid=p2045573.c100033.m2042&_trkparms=aid=111001&algo=REC.SEED&ao=1&asc=20170119204035&meid=165116f227a5419592f0acf3e165dcc8&pid=100033&rk=1&rkt=8&sd=222118780512

    Or better yet the GSX MK2 for 4x as much and listen to it with stock hd800s. I like jamming nails in my ears


    (gilmore amps for non e-stats are literally the most sterile, boring, yet annoying to listen to amps for headphones I've ever heard, ,measurements be damned)

    funny thing is, the jot is probably the closest thing to a "gilmore" sounding amp schiit has so it's kinda funny they make fun of it, yeah the parts quality isn't top notch on the switches and such but the amp cost $400... that solder job is disappointing as well I have to say
     
    Last edited: Apr 17, 2017
  14. MattRG

    MattRG Facebook Friend

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    And I would have to add where are you going to find another amp that sounds this clean and detail oriented at this price point? Or sports the Jot's imaging capabilities? Fair criticisms are fair but it's useful to remember that the Jot cost's $399 out the door and that it's reasonable to expect Schiit Audio to be making a decent profit on it (meaning it's not even going to have $400 worth of parts in the box)

    Having put some quality hours on mine I am not at all disappointed with the Jot considering the asking price.
     
  15. Johan

    Johan New

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    they did the same shit to the black widow too, basically any amp without "gilmore" is shit
     
  16. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    Didn't @3X0 have build problems with his super spritzer kgsshv carbon or whatever? And they're taking a shit on the Jotunheim?

    One interesting engineering point: they're poo pooing power. Well, I want to look at swing which is an important metric to look at with regard to capability to drive different headphones. +/- 13V rail to rail which means 52Vp-p balanced or 26Vp-p single ended. GSX MK2 does 15Vp-p SE and 30V p-p balanced.

    Otherwise, I love the armchair engineering. I love the assumptions about BOM and how to run a profitable business without running one. It's really embarrassing that "Schiit is so big they must be evil" now. The thing is, I don't know the exact BOM:MSRP ratio jason runs with (I have my guesses), but I know that his margins are either as low or lower than I'd go.

    This is a small, niche market even at Schiit volumes. Are you moving less than $500MM in product every year and want to have a higher BOM:MSRP ratio than 1:3? I hope you have a large f'ing bank account in case something wonky happens in reverse or you have an unexpectedly high EFF rate, or you mis-calculated what your inbound or outbound logistics costs would be, or you made a mistake with forecasting a unique part (which you had to provide a 16 week rolling forecast and a PO at least several months before taking delivery), or all your boards in a shipment are failures, or there's a global shortage of some random part due to a hurricane somewhere and you haven't second sourced because you're a small retailer, or your finance person forgot that you'd eat 3% on transaction fees, or you're targeted by scammers with stolen CCs and a huge amount of funds get pulled from your bank account due to chargebacks, or even that you forgot that selling goods online as a small retailer without a huge risk team means you're going to lose between 5-10% of sales to chargebacks or any one of a large number of potential terrible things happen.
     
  17. atomicbob

    atomicbob dScope Yoda

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    Voltage swing, voltage swing, voltage swing. To adequately replicate specific 95 dBA ambient environments from the acoustic lab noise library on HD650 requires average of 8.16Vpp. Allowing for 10 dB Crest Factor this puts peak swings at 25.8Vpp. So if you like to rock out at 95 dB SPL with HD650 or other 300 ohm headphones that have similar sensitivities, and want the sound to remain clean, 30Vpp is a good goal.

    *EDIT* - not recommending anyone listen for extended periods of time to 95 dB SPL without hearing protection. This level of sound will cause damage over time.
     
    Last edited: Apr 17, 2017
  18. atomicbob

    atomicbob dScope Yoda

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  19. Johan

    Johan New

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    Nah dude, the measurements are 100% meaning less and irrelevant. Didnt you see? The input isnt differential and it had a mediocre soldering job. Worthless amp. Float it down the LA river
     
  20. Gemini

    Gemini Facebook Friend

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    My Jotunheim has a five year warranty. I don't see any published warranty at Mjolnir Audio. Just maybe this is an indicator of how much confidence the designer/manufacturer has in their product? Kevin should just return his Jot with the blown switch and get it exchanged or fixed; nice and easy.
    I wonder how much it would cost to ship a KGSSHV to Iceland and back for warranty work (if it's even doable)?
    Spritzer's a funny guy. Sometimes he makes funny amps, like the stat amp that had the Ikea bowl on the top covering the toroid. I wonder who ended up buying it on HF.
     

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