First of all, that is too big of a list. There are tons of headphones that accept balanced and nobody is gonna make a list for you.

Second of all, don't worry about balanced. It doesn't make that big of a difference. You're better off getting whatever headphones you want than limiting yourself to balanced only connections.

it made a huge difference on my mdr 1am2 on the qudelix 5k, just saying.

(Edit: idk why you guys can't take me seriously. I 100% guarantee this isn't a case of placebo. Bass is definitely a lot tighter. Not talking about the increase in volume.)

A matter of wiring.

If the headphone has 4 wires, it can be used "balanced"

If the wire is fixed to 1 cup, it is probably a 3 wire connection.

If it has a connecter to 1 cup and the plug is TRRS, it can be used balanced.

If it is a Y-cable with connectors, you can get a balanced cable.

But is a bad balanced headphone guaranteed to sound better than a good single ended headphone?

Balanced simply for the sake of balanced is meaningless.

I'm convinced that the HUGE difference you mentioned is the VOLUME

I couldn't detect any difference with balanced apart from volume.

I think balanced only makes sense over distance.

But if it's for the sake of double braided oxygen-free snake-oiled cable, it will enhance the proverbial sound perception in the front cortex responsible for cognitive separation with a wad of cash.

Nope. Bass is tighter and less muddy. Not placebo

It's a pretty great pair, sounds fairly similar to my akg k400, just less separation and soundstage, and more bass.

Bit more vshaped, but pretty close to the harman target, and a little warm. A bit boomy when i used it single ended, but it got a lot better when i used it balanced. Idk why either, but it's definitely not placebo. Volume isn't a problem bc it's only 16 ohms.

Thanks, but i know all this. It's just if i look for TRRS headphones, none show up. Instead i get articles talking about the different kinds of headphone jacks.

Idk what the downvote was for. Volume isn't even a problem bc THIS PAIR IS ONLY 16 OHMS jeez

Hey i'm not making this up haha, idk how i hear a difference either

Every speaker transducer is inherently balanced. You can run it with a so called 'balanced' (technically differential) signal. You just need a separate 'minus' wire for each headphone cup. Normally left and right are connected somewhere in the wiring to save on wire strands. Normal cable has only three strands, because the ground wire from left and right is shared. You need to identify where it is and circumvent this part. For example if it's a Y-split cable, then the connection must be in the cable. So you replace the cable with a 'balanced' one and you're good to go. If your headphone has a socket, but only on one side, then the connection is in the cup and you need to open it and modify it so that you can solder a cable with separate 'minus' strands. The socket may for example have only three pins in which case you need to get rid of it

Certain devices may favor one output over the other, it doesn't make the "balanced" headphone output universally "better". Let me use the Cayin iHA-6 and your Sony as an example... via the trs (SE) output they would see a 10 ohm output impedance to a 16 ohm nominal headphone, this is an impedance matching issue. Assuming the Sonys are like most dynamic headphones there will be a rise in impedance near the reasonance frequency of the driver... in the bass region... that gets boosted when fed a high output impedance.

Via either the dual 3 pin XLR or 4 pin XLR that same Cayin has a .3 ohm output impedance which would NOT result in any measurable FR changes. Headphones below 80 ohms are best ran via these "balanced outputs", above that threshold there are minimal differences between the two on that device.

Thank you for the insight

Interesting. Does that mean higher impedance headphones don't have this problem as much?

I was in the process of a quick edit, see above now.

Good to know, thank you. I knew it wasn't placebo, but i'm not surprised by these skeptical audiophiles, bc there's a lot of snake oil in this community.

If there's a headphone you're interested in, it'll be obvious if it has two cables going to each cup, and if it is one cable, then a modest amount of searching for the "replacement cable" will identify whether it is a TRRS. Z Reviews on YouTube also always talks about the cables as one of the first points of the review.

Balanced/unbalanced is a silly thing to search for as your very first consideration. Start with budget, tonality, staging, portability, or even aesthetics. All balanced cabling does is give you some extra power connected to a balanced output. Almost any device with a balanced output would have to be an enthusiast-oriented DAC/amp, which probably outputs a lot of power even on the unbalanced output. On the other side of the equation, only a handful of headphones are so power thirsty that you'd see any benefit from extra power. The one exception I'd make is if you're planning to use over-ear headphones (rather than IEMs) with a portable bluetooth device like the Qudelix. The portable devices don't have an overwhelming amount of power, and the balanced output on those can actually be useful. It's a different story with desktop dac/amps, they'll have no problem powering just about anything.

That particular amp allows you to take impedance matching a bit further... one of the TRS jacks is 120 ohm output impedance, only really useful with HD800, T1 Gen 1, etc... but can be fun to experiment with.

You do realize that it could be your brain just believing the bass is tighter, hence it being placebo?

Like not trying to be an ass but saying "the bass is tighter I hear it" isn't a very good defense to someone saying that what you hear is placebo.

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Bro.. Why so skeptical? I could definitely hear it.

Answer from another commenter: > Certain devices may favor one output over the other, it doesn't make the "balanced" headphone output universally "better". Let me use the Cayin iHA-6 and your Sony as an example... via the trs (SE) output they would see a 10 ohm output impedance to a 16 ohm nominal headphone, this is an impedance matching issue. Assuming the Sonys are like most dynamic headphones there will be a rise in impedance near the reasonance frequency of the driver... in the bass region... that gets boosted when fed a high output impedance.

> Via either the dual 3 pin XLR or 4 pin XLR that same Cayin has a .3 ohm output impedance which would NOT result in any measurable FR changes. Headphones below 80 ohms are best ran via these "balanced outputs", above that threshold there are minimal differences between the two on that device.

Good idea about looking for replacement cables.

As to having a good single ended pair, i've got the akg k400, which runs perfectly fine in the 3.5mm jack.

Apparently output impedence also has effect on low impedence headphones:

> Certain devices may favor one output over the other, it doesn't make the "balanced" headphone output universally "better". Let me use the Cayin iHA-6 and your Sony as an example... via the trs (SE) output they would see a 10 ohm output impedance to a 16 ohm nominal headphone, this is an impedance matching issue. Assuming the Sonys are like most dynamic headphones there will be a rise in impedance near the reasonance frequency of the driver... in the bass region... that gets boosted when fed a high output impedance.

> Via either the dual 3 pin XLR or 4 pin XLR that same Cayin has a .3 ohm output impedance which would NOT result in any measurable FR changes. Headphones below 80 ohms are best ran via these "balanced outputs", above that threshold there are minimal differences between the two on that device.

I think a 10 ohm output impedance is high for a headphone amp, but in any event I wouldn’t worry about it, it’s ultimately still an issue of power, and it’s unlikely you’re going to be short on power. Try to find a headphone that’s comfortable and sounds good to you, rather than mathing out a headphone that can draw the most wattage from your amp.

i’m not skeptical, what i’m saying is that your defense doesn’t in any way disprove that what you are hearing is placebo. I’m not giving any opinion if what you are hearing is placebo or not

And fyi, while what the redditor you are quoting is right, what he is saying doesn’t apply to you since the Quedlix has the same output impendance from the balanced and unbalanced port, meaning it wouldn’t be a factor. He was using a complelty diffrent amp as an example.

Then maybe the increase in voltage. The difference is big enough to safely say it's not placebo. If that was the case all headphones are different from eachother because of placebo, not bc they actually sound a little different (hd600 and hd650 for example)

1. Like everyone is saying, it’s probably because you are listening to source louder than the other. Louder usually equals better, especially in the bass region

2. The reason why we know that a hd650 sounds diffrent than an hd600 is because there are a multitude of graphs published by established sources with industry equipment that show those 2 headphones are diffrent

I purposefully try to listen at the same volume bc i don't wanna damage my hearing, and the hd600 thing is just figurative

I don't have much experience with balanced output, but the easiest way to narrow down your list is to understand how it works. It sends power down both wires, so it has to have 2 ends, that's why the single mini XLR end of AKG headphones doesn't take balanced. You will need the headphones to take 2 inputs, one for each driver. Meze and Hifiman use 2 3.5 ports for balance, Sennheiser uses the 2 pin connectors.