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Headphone Heights

RE: "Drove with ease"....

69.250.26.204

In Reply to: RE: "Drove with ease".... posted by EdAInWestOC on July 11, 2017 at 05:16:04

I wouldn't consider myself a head-banger...maybe occasionally ; ) The majority of my listening is orchestral, small group jazz, and 70s funk and rock. On the whole - very moderate volumes.

I have Shure SRH-1540 headphones and Shure SE535 earphones...both very easy to drive. I chose them because they perform well directly out of my iPhone, iPad and MacBook or paired with a DragonFly Red. I travel quite a bit - my "road kit". On the road, TIDAL is my music source.

I've tried both 'phones with the Luxman. Definitely an improvement over the DragonFly (although it's hard to separate the DAC and headphone amp variables since I'm using a different source with the Luxman). My perception of "better" is based on improved fullness with both. The SRH-1540 volume is very comfortable at ~9 o'clock, fuller and louder at 10 o'clock, and uncomfortably loud at 11 o'clock; the SE535, a little less.

I attended a CanJam headphone conference earlier this year and decided I'd like to own an open-backed headphone for home use...either 1) Focal Elear, 2) Sennheiser HD800/800S, or 3) Audeze LCD-X or LCD-3. Since I intend to pair them with the Luxman, this thread is background to [hopefully] an informed purchase. Ultimately, since the Luxman is small, it will be possible to take it somewhere and actually audition all three cans before I purchase...not sure where, though.

Someone else suggested connecting headphones directly to the speaker taps. Thoughts (relative to my 3 possible purchases)?

I appreciate the feedback...thanks.

Follow Ups:

It wouldn't be worth the loss if you omitted a resistor... - EdAInWestOC 11:28:37 07/12/17 (1)
You definitely want resistors in line to drop the output a bit. You may not need the resistors for the HD-800 headphones but I wouldn't try it on the other headphones.
You also have the problem where you do not want to hook the two negative speaker outputs together. You want a resistor between the negative speaker output and the common negative hookup on the headphone. I believe most amplifiers would balk at shorting the negative speakers outputs together.
Single ended headphones have individual hot connections for the left and right sides but share a common negative hookup. You don't want to try hooking that to your speaker outputs. You may get away with that on some amps but I don't think you want to fry anything. Before you hook the grounds together make sure it won't damage anything.
Ed

We don't shush around here!
Life is analog...digital is just samples thereof

Edits: 07/12/17
- RE: It wouldn't be worth the loss if you omitted a resistor... - PakProtector 01:41:48 07/16/17 (0)
  " I believe most amplifiers would balk at shorting the negative speakers outputs together."
  
  So far I have seen very few that the individual outputs are balanced to ground. I happen to have one, and DIY amps with 0-4-16R output taps have grounded the 4R and used the secondary for some cathode fb. With SS amps, if you want to bridge them, you count on the negative already being tied together and connect only to the positives.
  cheers,
  Douglas
  
  Friend, I would not hurt thee for the world...but thou art standing where I am about to shoot.

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