E_Schaaf

How about a slightly more budget-friendly alternative? Hoping to keep it under $500. Maybe a high-end pioneer? Or a mid-tier Nak

I have a Nakamichi 582. I got a good deal on Craigslist. Three-head, dual capstan. Very good deck. Research on TapeHeads.

http://www.tapeheads.net/showthread.php?t=2487
http://www.tapeheads.net/showthread.php?t=43813 <--similar to you.

Still suffers from LCD staging claustrophobia, though localization and separation are a bit better than the other LCDs. Smoother and less grain overall, though lacking a little excitement vs LFFs. Not as dark as LCD-2.1.

LFFs are substantially more open with better tactility. If someone offered to trade the 4 with my 2.1 I would... but not worth the cash, and I won't miss it when it's gone. 2.1 gets me 90% of the way there, and I prefer the LFF signature regardless.

AB-1266 Phi coming in a couple weeks.

What kind of power requirements does it need?

Diana is 40 ohms and 91dB / mW. Pretty typical planar, I'll take the demo pair home a few nights and try it out and report back. Probably likes SS or hybrid power.

AB-1266 Phi is 42 ohms and 88dB / mW. So probably does well with similar amps, just takes a bit more juice.

I recently got a pair of HE-4XX for a work setup and pad rolling made a noticeable difference. I tried MrSpeakers Alpha pads, ZMF Ovals, HM5 pleather and sheepskin. I ended up with the sheepskins. I'm thinking the next step is to mod the outside grill to open them up just a bit. What mods were you thinking of trying?

Nothing in particular planned, I was going to make incremental changes / trial and error. Materials include rug liner, felt, foam, dynamat... I'll cut and place different shapes here and there, trying to optimize bass response and tone down that sparkle just a tad. Maybe bass lens?

If you could, let me know if you come up with any game changers for them, I'm interested in modding mine as well.

I really wanted to be there. I got my brother-in-law to pick up a bunch of stuff for me though since he lives right by there. Did not know about the L55s!

It's kinda funny, I have speakers in this apartment before I have any furniture.

Speakers are furniture, they can be used for shelves, bench's, bed's. They're the Swiss Army knife of the furniture world.

I might too, in Aurora. Let me check

Just need enough to satisfy my curiosities of what it can be used for in various configurations with open back planars. I'm sure something like 10x10 is plenty!

If it's headphone modding then yah... I've KISS modded like 3 pairs already and still have 75% of the first sheet left. You can PM me if you want me to send an unused sheet to you for the cost of postage.

"natural" isn't what I'm going for (I'll be using them as a "fun" can mostly for electronic and instrumental hip-hop), just trying to maximize the listenability of the V

Probably except for your sanity and pocketbook. But hey, party on Denver!

World's largest selection of tubes and tube gear! If that's not enough bait I don't know what is.

^Strippers.

I'm imagining a 2D grid where x axis value indicates a bright to dark sound sig and where y axis indicates MSRP.

So bottom left is brightest cheapest and top right is darkest most expensive.

Each transducer type - dynamic, planar, stat has it's own grid.

Patch bay to connect sources with amps and dac bypass option for aux / analog input

This puts unmodded HD650 close-ish to bottom right or center... where it's most easily accessible.

Something like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oZi-wYarDs

You really have to make up your mind.

Oh lawd, not the Inland Empire! It isn’t really considered SoCal, is it? Seriously, congratulations

Nice that's on my commute man. I'll swing by sometime, just tell me when.

^this, as much as i love processor3, it’s such a monsterous 2-box set up (dac+psu) that make me rearrange the whole rack when put it in the chain.

All good points here. Not trying to make a sweeping claim, just reflecting on price/performance with vintage DACs compared to contemporary designs.

Contemporary DACs of good quality and above are more accurate while vintage stuff can be more pleasing. Just depends on the goal.