I may not hear the improvement, but there is an improvement I don't yet knowSubmitted by Gallus780 t3_z72zny in headphones
Clickbaitllama t1_iy54ujm wrote
Reply to comment by PenisFly_AhhhhScary in I may not hear the improvement, but there is an improvement I don't yet know by Gallus780
Most modern solid state amps don’t make much of an audible diffrence to most headphones. As long as you have enough volume headroom and the distortion is under audible levels (which almost all amps are, unless they are meant to distort), most solid state amps are going to sound the same.
Basically they 100% make a diffrence, but those diffrences are usually so small, they don’t matter to the normal person with normal ears
PenisFly_AhhhhScary t1_iy55w87 wrote
highly disagree having tried multiple different solid state amplifiers. A lot of them sound similar but most of them have discernible differences. I think it’s more of the headphone benefiting from more power or current rather than the actual sound of the amplifier. But to say there is no difference just means you haven’t tried multiple amps in multiple price points on headphones that scale well. A perfect example of amps making a difference are on the hifiman susvara. When I tried susvara for the first time I heard it on dcs lina. I thought it sounded like dogshit. Later that day I tried it on a benchmark hpa4 and I was blown away. To this day it’s still the best sounding thing i’ve heard. Amps make a difference more at the mid to high end. From seeing peoples profiles it seems most people who say this only own one or two cheap amplifiers or are fairly new to the headphone space.
blargh4 t1_iy59js1 wrote
did you test them blind?
PenisFly_AhhhhScary t1_iy59rjs wrote
no I was just like ooo this one looks cool. Most of the time It’s like ehh not much difference from zen can but sometimes there would be a really big difference like when I tried hpa4, nautilus, and iha6.
Clickbaitllama t1_iy5henq wrote
The only way a headphone can benefit from more power is either having more headroom, or you just cranking it up louder than usual. Which for most headphones, from the low to high end, can be achieve with amps in the 100-200 dollar range/
PenisFly_AhhhhScary t1_iy5hsxo wrote
Quick question but have you tried multiple different amps in different price points with multiple headphones?
Clickbaitllama t1_iy5jmam wrote
Couldn't say I've tried the highest ends of audio amplifiers, but i've tried amps from the apple dongle to the balanced output of a thx 789. From the lighting apple dongle, I can definitely hear a difference from let's say my e10k-tc, since even with Iems, I have to max out my phone to get decent volumes.
But when comparing the e10k to other higher end and expensive amps, the only time I heard a meaningful difference was when the e10k either wasn't loud enough or had no headroom. This is with both iems, and open backs (though I don't own anymore open backs, as I sold them).
My question to you though would be have your volume matched, and blind tested your amps? Without that, placebo can very well be in play.
coldchillin-nc t1_iy6ppmw wrote
The differences aren’t things like details or timbre. Although that could happen. The biggest differences I hear in scaling up is the stage becoming deeper/wider more holographic and much darker background and a sense of effortless performance. It’s so obvious. It’s not even in the realm of placebo it’s like a slap in the face. But a good one lol
PenisFly_AhhhhScary t1_iy5khf4 wrote
i’ll definitely do some blind test when I get a new amplifier. My experience is just trying stuff at stores.
CBSU t1_iy6vakt wrote
I blind-tested, to the best of my ability, my Enleum AMP-23R against an Atom amp (made of plastic!) with Hifiman’s Susvara and couldn’t tell a difference. I have mild hearing damage but it shouldn’t be that bad.
Besides the Susvara, I also tried Focal’s Clear and Audeze’s LCD-5. The Clear isn’t said to “scale” particularly well and I’m not familiar enough with LCD-5 to have heard differences there. This was done in my quietest room, which is acoustically treated and quite silent.
That said, I am not a practiced listener by any means and my audio pursuits are based on feelings of “this sounds like live”. I did this test alongside an upgrade-chaser with more discerning ears and we came to the conclusion that it didn’t make an audio difference but they look or feel nice. Our findings weren’t upsetting, I primarily upgrade for aesthetics and wasn’t aware that it was meant to sound better.
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