The All Purpose Advice Thread

Hey guys,

This might be a tough one, but does anyone have a recommendation for a $1500 or less power amp, just to drive bookshelf speakers? I am using the MB Gungnir, with the Zana Deux as a pre-amp, and the Yamaha AS-500 to drive my PMC Twenty.21 bookshelf speakers. I don't listen very loud, and the PMCs do a decent job revealing details. They are very treble oriented though, so I usually tone the treble down a bit on the Yamaha.

The Yamaha doesn't sound terrible... I'm just wondering if anyone could suggest a worthy upgrade. I'm not opposed to going SS or tubed... if I went tubed, I would probably be inclined to pull the ZD out of the mix. My preference is something capable of presenting as much micro-detail as refined as possible. Most of my tunes are acoustic, folk, indie rock... a bit of jazz.

Also doesn't need to have a phono input, or any crazy options. Balanced would be awesome, but I can live either way.

 

How do you guys clean old tube pins?

Any specific contact deoxidation products?

 

Looking for a new IEM to use at work - currently have the carbo tenores and enjoy them a lot. Is there anything that's a step above the tenores that retains their warm, non-fatiguing sound?

 

Water and baking soda mix, with a toothbrush works well on pins. I also use q-tips and rubbing alcohol, which works well.

Rinse with water and ensure you have a towel beneath the tube as it will be incredibly slippery. You may also apply deoxit or whatever anti-oxidizing paste you want. Doing electrical work, I can buy a huge tube for less than half the cost of those "tube cleaning" kits lots of people buy. I've never bothered myself... I just clean the pins with the above methods.

 

Any clear value/performance winners in the ~$100 closed headphones which offer decent isolation category?

 

You can see my first post regarding IEM's about a page back. The Carbo Tenores were highly recommended to me as you can see above and the RE400 were noted as being a "lateral" move at twice the price. You may want to avoid the RE400 for that reason, perhaps others can chime in if they concur with the opinion above.

I've gone ahead and placed an order for a set of RHA 750's... at $139 CAD including shipping they seem like a pretty decent bargain as several other options come at a larger premium when purchased in CAD$ vs USD. I will chime in with impressions when I receive them in a couple days. I hope the glowing reviews (including WOF status on IF) are indicative of what I'll hear. Going off of what I've read they may be a bit more "consumer" tilted in terms of the voicing you are looking for but I will certainly give my impressions relative to my old UE superfi 3's and a few "freebee" buds I have lying around including the latest Samsung and Apple iterations.

 

@GTABeancounter Yeah, I'm trying to avoid making a lateral move. It seems like there are a number of strong contenders in the $200-$500 range for full size open (HD6x0, TH-X00, HE400S, K7XX), but I get the impression there's a void in that price range for IEMs. Figured I'd ask in case I missed something. Hopefully you enjoy those RHA 750's.

 

I went from Carbo Tenores to Brainwavz B2. In no way warm and non-fatiguing but I much prefer them to the Carbo Tenores. Needs a deep fit for the treble peak to disappear.
You may want to try the Apple dual driver iems which are much warmer. I had big problems with their fit tho and the sound really isn't much better than the Carbo Tenores either.

 

I picked up a the 1more triple driver headphone they had at canjam. The sound signature is exactly what you described and with coupon code (event15) they're only $85!

 

I did see those on amazon but they don't ship to Canada. I also figured a 3 driver hybrid for $100 was too good to be true and/or must have other compromises... sounds like I may have assumed wrong.

 

Looking for a clear upgrade from my modi 1 (no wyrd), and magni1/little dot 1+. I listen solely to Spotify, I doubt that will change any time soon.

Zmf vibro mk2, mad dog pro, he400, dt880 pro and probably purchasing an hd650 next, which will be my last headphone for quite some time.

Is the next step for a dac a bifrost? Or do I "need" that with Spotify?

For amps I'm looking really hard at project Polaris. I like my little dot more than the magni, but I don't know that I want to go down the path of tubes again. I'm going back and forth with Polaris, ember; and lyr 2 though. I like the idea of tuning down the treble on the Polaris for the dt880 and he400, would I benefit from the extra power of the lyr 2?

Preferred sound signature is airy, clear, with some a little enhanced bass and slam.

 

Order directly from the company, pretty sure they ship to Canada. And they do sound amazing for $100 if your looking for fun headphones.

 

I will definitely give them a shot if the RHA750 disappoints. I should have asked about them before placing my order!

 

Have you checked the "dac chart of awesomeness"? Nice resource that was an eye opener for me.
If the 650s are in your future you really want to avoid lateral upgrades in your chain... seems they are end game for many around here when paired up with better upstream equipment. Though I can't comment on Spotify.

 

More concerned with the zmf and other orthos, I could see myself getting a sunrise for the hd650 in the future.

 

Right, the noise is back. Anyone got something on this? Is this the sound of the tubes beginning to crap out? No tube has died on my hands before.
Sound q is excellent though.

 

Sounds like a warning siren to me...
Do you know how many hours you are into the tubes? Could also be coming from power supply or a transformer in your amp? It makes me think of the transformers they used in old CRT displays to control beam motion, those things were the death of HF hearing in my youth.

 

So my setup right now is these
Desktop NAD D1050 -> Burson Soloist -> Ether
Portable Onkyo DP-X1 -> Balanced T8ie/ recabled IE800

Between the NAD and Burson, I've been seeing that people favor to get a better amp but I've been thinking of getting another pair of closed headphone to complement the Ether, any suggestions? I'm quite satisfied with my portable setup currently, I'll probably go for CIEM later in the year or next year.

 

What are you looking for in a closed headphone? Does it need to be driven off the DP-x1, or will it be used exclusively with the Burson? FWIW the PM3 sounds great out of the DP-x1

 

PM-3 or the Fostex TH-x00 come to mind.