Loaner Gear Request/Progress Master Thread

I've reached out to Zach about a loaner for any new headphones he is working on, and it went well, I hope he will reach out with anything new for us to hear. I'm not sure a loaner of a current ZMF makes a lot of sense since they are so insanely popular here already there are tons of impressions. I could ask, I'm just not sure many would sign up.

 

Not sure if this has been asked already, but any chance we get a mani 2 loaner?

 

Schiit is @purr1n 's department. They only want to deal with him to keep things simpler for them. I've tried, but I can't blame them with all the forums and you tubers asking for gear.

 

There's some growing murmurs about ES Labs (https://www.eslabhk.com/).

They created a Stax Omega Clone a few years ago (https://www.eslabhk.com/product-page/es-1-alpha-electrostatic-headphone).

They recently also created a Sony R10 Clone (https://www.eslabhk.com/product-page/es-r10-closed-back-dynamic-headphone).

Any chance we could get a tour from them?

The Omega clone got some positive feedback, even from the mafia (https://www.eslabhk.com/articles-reviews)

 

thanks! I'll look into it. Are there enough Stax users here to make it worthwhile? I don't notice a lot of Stax discussion or love here. But I don't really know.

 

We are indeed a little Stax light. I certainly would be interested. I saw awhile back @3X0 was looking for a pair as well, don't know if he ended up with a set.


Sorry, should have linked Vtory's review as well: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.o...headphones-measurements-and-discussion.10505/. There was a few people interested there as well.

 

I’m letting us catch up on current loaners but I’ll reach out for sure! Thanks.

 

I'd enquired with ES Labs about potential loaners for the ES1a when I was back the electrostatic market in October, and they mentioned at the time no (then-)near-term plans for a new ES1a loaner as they were focusing on a "new dynamic headphone product." I guess that must be the R10 replica.

ES Labs has serviced several SR-Omegas prior to the ES1a, so I would not be surprised if similar repairs to R10s predicated the eventual ES-R10. Unlike the HiFiMan abominations, ES Labs are more respectful "tributes" and they further honor the originals by providing extensive repair services (at, from what I gather, reasonable costs). Truly good folks.

I'd be very surprised if the electrostatic tour garnered more than 5-6 applicants unless an energizer is provided, and unfortunately the smaller ones like the 323S/353X aren't very good. FWIR there might be the possibility of using a modded SRD-7 adapter box off speaker taps or higher-powered headphone amps which might broaden the potential audience of interest (by allowing for tour participants to use their own amp).

ES-R10 tour would be cool though -- looks very interesting.

 

ZMF's new Atrium headphone I feel would be an obvious candidate for a loaner if possible.

@rhythmdevils

 

I believe SBAF already has a pair

 

Awesome vid, thanks for sharing. It's always cool seeing such content and seeing Zach talking about his latest was a pleasure.

 

Bumping this thread per my profile post. Should we open a thread specifically to determine if SBAF were to open a vinyl cleaning machine rental program, what machine should/could we get?

 

More of an accessory but I’ve seen this pop up a lot

https://spindlespinner.com/

 

sure that's a great idea. If it could be rental based so it pays back the loaner fund and SBAF doesn't have to cover it that would be better, we don't have tons of extra funds right now.

 

Not sure how fancy of a record cleaner you're thinking, but I have an old Nitty Gritty 1.0 that has been literally sitting in a box for like 5 years. Happy to send that one out on loaner.

Think we'll just need to replenish solution as we go, but I've always just used a mix of distilled water, splash of iso alcohol and a few drops of dawn.

 

I think I mentioned it in one of my profile posts, but my thinking is if we were to do something like this, it would make some sense to me if the experience was a little more high end, i.e., ultrasonic (maybe >40kHz oscillators), self-contained (no shop vacuum setups), and fully automatic. Love it or hate it, most analog rig folks should have a spin clean or similar for day to day jobs. I'm seeing the SBAF rental unit used more like a month-long, several session, full (or large portions of) library deep cleaning. And fully automatic. This to me is key; drop in a LP, walk away, 5-15 minutes later a totally clean and dry LP is ready to be re-sleeved. This is where something like the Degritter or a VPI or Nessie or whatever would make the most sense to me, at least.

 

SBAF can't afford the right now unfortunately and I don't want to bug Marv about funds right now.

Could the interested parties come together to purchase it, and then I could coordinate a loaner among those people?

 

I'd be willing to chip in $200 if it's going straight towards a loaner. Get 10 or 15 of us willing to contribute a little up and over the normal contribution and we'd be in the ballpark.

 

Wondering if we can ask a loaner product for this: https://www.carousell.sg/p/nan-6-planar-magnetic-headphone-1093042937/

Shortly speaking, it's HE6 driver transplant mod. Voicing looks interesting. Price doesn't seem bad, either.

 

I'll check it out, but I'm tempted to just send out my own modded HE-6SE haha which I've completely redone since Marv measured them...

How much interest is there in the Violectric V266?

https://power-holdings-inc.com/Violectric-DHA-V226-Headphone-Amp-DAC-p418868537

Power Holdings is offering SBAF one of them while I try to get one of the Musician Friends R2R DACs for us. Would be very interesting to compare to Yggdrasil!