Schiit Hel Impressions

Discussion in 'Headphone Amplifiers and Combo (DAC/Amp) Units' started by purr1n, Oct 29, 2019.

  1. Ash1412

    Ash1412 Friend

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    Should we make this a combined thread for Hel and Fulla 3 discussions/impressions? Hel is not really easy to search using the site's search function and Fulla 3 is not a big enough departure from Fulla 2 to warrant its own thread methinks.
     
  2. Ash1412

    Ash1412 Friend

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    Is there a reason the Fulla 3 has slightly less ouput power than 2 at the same gain? The distortion profile seems different from looking at the AP graphs...maybe different biasing?
     
  3. dmckean44

    dmckean44 In a Sherwood S6040CP relationship

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    Probably, office needs and gamer needs are pretty similar. Logitech sells webcams to the gaming market and the office market with identical internals with the only differences being software and aesthetics.
     
  4. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    Eff this amateur gamer setup. I use Bifrost 2 > Zana Deux Super > Modded HD800 + subs on my gaming rig.

    More seriously, though, this thing does look pretty versatile. I ordered within the first couple of minutes and can't wait to get my hands on one.


    I'll compare it to my GSX1000 as well. Now to dig out my AD2000 and see if I want to game with that or my HD6** cans.


    Yup. And I suspect willingness to pay is much higher.

    I ordered the Audio Technica ATGM2 to use with this as I dumped my modmic. I have the MassDrop clone of the ModMic somewhere but I want to see if the AT is any good. This might actually be an awesome little video conferencing/office setup. I might dig out the Paradox Slants as well to test them in the mix.
     
  5. RobS

    RobS RobS? More like RobDiarrhea.

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    The higher latency of Bifrost 2 doesn't affect your gaming (Jason measured it at 23ms)?
     
  6. Scott Kramer

    Scott Kramer Friend

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    Lol, casually talking about Shit Hell when norm'ies are standing around and within ear shot!
     
  7. Azimuth

    Azimuth FKA rtaylor76, Friend

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    You're Fulla Schiit! :p
     
  8. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    I have the reaction time of a dying walrus. I'm far from competitive. Also, this was a joke.
     
  9. RobS

    RobS RobS? More like RobDiarrhea.

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    LOL. I'm living in denial as a 33 year-old who buys expensive monitors/gear to shave off 1-2 ms as if I still have the reflexes and reaction speed of my 18-year old self playing CS 1.5
     
  10. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    BTW, the OPA1688 used in the Hel uses Feed Forward™ stuff. If anyone wants to make a deal big out of this. I seem to recall many audio neophytes and maybe few brand reps furiously jerking off, like really super duper wanking it fast and hard, to Feed Forward™ implementations a half year ago. Figured I would mention this.
     
    Last edited: Oct 30, 2019
  11. YMO

    YMO Chief Fun Officer

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    If using it with an office laptop, make sure your office issued laptop accepts USB inputs from DACs. My office laptop lock down the USB inputs, so it will not accept DACs.
     
  12. zerodeefex

    zerodeefex SBAF's Imelda Marcos

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    WTF is feed forward?
     
  13. Baten

    Baten Friend

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    It's like feedback, but earlier :p
     
  14. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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  15. rlow

    rlow A happy woofer

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    I saw a YouTube interview recently with a guy from Hegel, who also use feedforward but call it SoundEngine©®™†‡ and he said it’s basically like noise cancelling headphone circuitry for amps (see around the 1:10 mark):



    This is their marketing material about it:
    https://www.hegel.com/technology/soundengine

    “The Hegel SoundEngine technology is not using any kind of global negative feedback, it is using local and adaptive feedforward technology if there should ever be any need for cancellation of distortion within the audio amplifier stages.”
     
    Last edited: Nov 1, 2019
  16. Clemmaster

    Clemmaster Friend

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    With all those wires and parts in this amp, I'm sure they need "amp noise cancelling" :D
     
  17. schiit

    schiit SchiitHead

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    Yeah, feedforward is not exactly new. Sumo used it in their power amps thirty years ago, based on even earlier work from Malcom Hawksford and Bob Cordell. See Hawksford's paper here: https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a865/65635b6ba8a41b8be02c0c9e0d36d6c579be.pdf and Cordell's paper here: http://www.cordellaudio.com/papers/MOSFET_Power_Amp.pdf

    Sumo's implementation was used to linearize the transconductance of the MOSFET output stage around the transition region. When demonstrated on an analyzer looking at residual distortion, the performance was mighty impressive--you could literally "tune out" the crossover notch with nothing more than the Hawksford/Cordell circuit...with zero bias on the output stage!

    Of course, nothing is perfect, so the circuit didn't work as well at high frequencies, and could complicate the stability of the amplifier. But tradeoffs are part of all design, so the use of error correction has its place.

    If you want to take a look at its implementation, see the Andromeda 2 schematic here: http://www.davidsaudio.com/andromedaII.pdf . Note the wacky bias arrangement with two complementary transistors and a central connection sampling the driver output. This is the error correction--it is a small local loop with only the difference, or error, rather than the entire signal, as part of the loop. Some people call this "feedforward." Of course, today's implementations usually are unlike Sumo's, and are not discrete, but actually op-amp based topologies.
     
  18. Ash1412

    Ash1412 Friend

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    So all these feedforward implementations that are mostly meant to correct for crossover distortion are in contention with Continuity in terms of goal, but Continuity doesn't cancel anything right?
     
  19. schiit

    schiit SchiitHead

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    It's not really the same thing.

    Feedforward (or "error correction") can be used in many ways. You can think of it as error-dependent feedback. It feeds back only the part that's wrong, not the whole signal.

    We were using error correction to (almost) eliminate the crossover notch in Class B. It still needed some Class AB bias to make it really work well. Which means you'd still have droop outside the Class A bias region. So it would be possible to do a Hawksford/Cordell error correction output stage with Continuity™ as well.
     
  20. PacoTaco

    PacoTaco Friend

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    Today I did an oopsie. I visited Schiit's site, and now I have a Hel ordered. I returned the EVGA Nu Audio I bought for shits and gigs (since it uses an AKM chip and was suppose to be fairly awesome) that had too much processing on the mic input and other things. I've actually gotten to the point where I don't bother using anything with "3D Sound/Virtual Surround" because nothing does it as good as the GSX1000 (despite the GSX using tablet DAC/ADC and Amps...yah, it's that bad) and in-game options are always better.

    I just wanted something simple. This fulfills it. Especially since Audeze build quality failed me. Until it comes in, it'll just be me and my mobius with both earcups being held together by ducttape and styrofoam.
     

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