Little Dot and Naim

Lovely combo you got there, offering surely a very fine and relaxed presentation, but the HD-650 are way too smooth for my personal tastes honestly (even with 3rd party cables).

I'm playing more with DAC/headphone amps for secondary systems, using a HifiMan EF2A and Grado SR-225 on my main computer, and the same headphones but with a Resonessence Labs Herus on the laptop and smartphone.

And even after 9 years, I still love the Headline 2 and Grado RS-1 on the main rig.

Happy Holidays!

Bye.

Dear Simon,

Your thread is interesting to me! For my replay of recordings and other things digital such as youtube I am currently using my Tivoli [Model One radio] directly fed with the analogue output of my MAC Mini. It is a surprisingly fine, but I have my doubts whether this would make a great source for a mono valve amplifier for my ESL fed [as planned] by my beautiful Trough Line.

I was considering various headphones, and rather settled on the idea of getting the Senn- HD 600. Previous version before the 650 ...

This would be a fine headphone would it not for late night listening, when a loudspeaker is unacceptable for the sake of annoying the neighbours?

As I understand it, Senn-s are not particularly demanding of the amplifier? I used to have the now defunct HD 415, which though not expensive was actually more natural than some of the DJ type headphones that Sen made, and which are posessed of prodigious bass, which I hate. Enough is sufficient. As you may see from my using an ESL that I am not interested in more than a clearly pitched elucidation of the bass-line rather than something that drowns the inner voices of music.

Sorry for a slight diversion of your thread.

ATB from George

The Dot III is very popular in my neck of the woods but Naim is generally unheard of and I think you may wait a while before getting a bite on the forum for this combo. Not surprised you are getting good results with the 650s either since even Sennheiser use opt for valves in the Orpheus. It may be different current delivery requirements but valves on headphones seem far less hit and miss than valves on main components.

I'm interested Simon, what is a) stopping you from trying it on your 252 now (no spare DIN-RCA)? and b) How you rate it is an analogue headphone amp compaired to the output stage on your loved Hugo?

Simon, the NAC 282 and up have an active monitoring section, so everything will be fine without any sound quality degradation for all connected components. That's the beauty of a high end preamp. 

Dear George, If you're into Senn's, I would suggest you the HD-650 instead of the HD-600. The later appeared slow and veilled to me compared to the HD-650. Also, my combination of HifiMan EF2A and Grado SR-225 is pretty good at the price point. It will be better than the integrated sound card of the MAC, and the SR-225 is more vivid and crisp in its presentation than the HD-650... But a little less comfy, I have to admit.

Bye.

Chaps, thanks for the replies. Feeling_Zen the only thing stopping me is pure laziness of not building a suitable lead between tape out and headphone amp.

Stoik, yes it is a nice combination, and I mostly the use the amp it in the bedroom driven by my IPad ! and it really does sound incredibly good on lossless audio such as Tidal.. as Richard says on another thread.. it almost breaks the source first theory. The 650 are a recent pressie... and they replace my Grado IEMs ... so far very impressed.. left running in for 24 hours to tighten the bass frequencies up and open out the sound.. Regarding Hugo.. haven't compared yet.. Hugo all set up on main system.. and when sounding amazing I am loathed to start unplugging leads and moving things about... Just in case I break the spell 

George .. The HD650 are 300 ohm ( or possibly 600) headphones and so are not demanding loads, and the Little Dot III with my limited experience of the past 6 weeks or so is that it is a lot happier with higher impedance phones... despite being able to set some switches on the amp to match load.

i think playing YouTube or other computer audio would be absolutely fine.. as I say above I play from my iPad into the amp, and it is incredibly good.. who would have thought a humble iPad could sound so good..hence why I will try on my 252.

I understand the 600s are a lighter sound.. and initially the 650s did sound a bit too bassy .. but after running in that seemed to sort itself out.. but both headphone models are available. The 650s do sound incredibly good now, and appear to help you hear timing well.. which is something I didn't notice on my previous Grado on ear phones or IEMs. They also have lovely natural detail.. I was listening to The Beatles, Strawberry Fields on Tidal using the LDIII and I could hear what sounded like John Lenon counting very softly upto one of the verses...

Simon

The 650s at 300 ohms, while not too demanding do really struggle to sound unforced on lesser headphone amps. While I know the 600 and 650 are not the same, I found my 600s, which really grooved beautifully on a Rega ear (alas donated to a friend), just don't come alive driven by the built in amp on the UQ2. I imagine the Dot III is all important to your experienced. The sound from the 6*0s falls apart a lot faster with a lesser amp than a lesser source.

Yes you could be right - I have just been listening to the 650 on a little Dragonfly USB DAC plugged into my MacBookPro and although entirely respectable - albeit a little coarser - it doesn't have that smooth  seamless quality of the Little Dot III valve headphone amp

I have my LD connected directly  into my ND5XS & just switch the output setting over when I'm listening with cans...

Thanks to Simon' idea, I've just made my experiment. I have one redundant Hi-line (5DIN-RCA), swap left-right input din to output din in Air-plug. Now I can take the signal from tape out to headamp, & enjoying my Hifiman He-560, Schiit Lyr 2 with different sources connect to my Nac 252.

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Yes you could be right - I have just been listening to the 650 on a little Dragonfly USB DAC plugged into my MacBookPro and although entirely respectable - albeit a little coarser - it doesn't have that smooth  seamless quality of the Little Dot III valve headphone amp

Simon, I dug out my HD600s and tried them with the Dragonfly on my MBPro.  I was a bit underwhelmed really.  I felt that the HD480s worked rather better - not quite as detailed or transparent perhaps, but a lot more engaging, which leads me to suspect that the Dragonfly isn't really up to getting the best from the 600s.

Dear Richard,

I am tossing over the idea of a pair of HD 600s. From what I read, they are fairly consistently reported as being lighter toned than the HD 650. Lighter toned suits me! Would your experience lead you to be able to confirm this generally made observation?

ATB from George

George, the HD600s are one of those headphones that I think I should like, and everyone seems to reckon they are very good, but for some reason they are my least used pair of headphones.  Perhaps it's because they live tucked away in their box.  I bought them about 15 or so years ago and I've probably only put less than 20 hours on them.  For portable use, I usually grab my trusty (and rather excellent sounding) Sennheiser PX100s. For any monitoring duties when recording, listening via the MBP, or indeed, just about any other time I just want to plug in a pair of 'phones without a thought or care, the Sennheiser HD480s are the cans of choice.  And for when I really want to immerse myself in the music and hear absolutely everything then it's electrostatics - STAX 404 Signatures with an SRM-006T energiser.

By my reckoning, you're something of an Electrostatic fan, so I think that if headphones are what you want then a nice pair of STAX 'statics would be ideal.  There are models to suit all budgets and they're all really rather wonderful.  The entry level 2070 is a bargain and of course there are lots of wonderful s/h models from the '70s onwards.

Richard Dane posted:

Simon-in-Suffolk posted:

Yes you could be right - I have just been listening to the 650 on a little Dragonfly USB DAC plugged into my MacBookPro and although entirely respectable - albeit a little coarser - it doesn't have that smooth  seamless quality of the Little Dot III valve headphone amp

Simon, I dug out my HD600s and tried them with the Dragonfly on my MBPro.  I was a bit underwhelmed really.  I felt that the HD480s worked rather better - not quite as detailed or transparent perhaps, but a lot more engaging, which leads me to suspect that the Dragonfly isn't really up to getting the best from the 600s.

Richard, I while ago i asked for advice on a portable dac and went  for the M2tech HiFace. It works really well with the Senns 700s and MBP. Some may say the 700s are a bit bright but I just find them very detailed and as a bonus they are extremely comfortable. Give the them a try if you have the opportunity, especially the little M2tech

Plus the HD700 you mentioned are easier to drive than the HD600 by quite a bit. Despite being a better set of cans, the 700s work pretty well even without a seperate headphone amp. 600s simply won't come alive without one.

Simon, welcome to the wonderful world of HD650s. Warm and comfortable - I remember testing them against those Grados that everyone was raving about at the time (which, quite apart from being aggressively bright, were physically painful to wear) - no comparison! I use mine through my Hugo and would be very interested to hear your comparison in due course between the Hugo and LDIII.

Simon have you been able to compare the Hugo headphone out to the little dot one?