recstar24

Good questions Nate. I cannot speak for DNA, but that standard of 120 ohms is pretty old school. The older version Beyer DT880, which I believe is 600 ohms, is an example where if driven by a more modern near zero ohm output, sounds really really bad. That was my 1st review, and looking back at it, I wish I knew then what I knew now. However, the fact that Beyer released a 32 ohm version I believe shows that even Beyer understands that the 120 ohm output spec might be a little outdated. The older Meier amps also had a 120 ohm output, I believe Jan once talked about in Europe especially Germany their studio standard for headphone output was for a very long time 120 ohms, hence the "Standard" spec. But even with the Sennheisers, I still prefer it well damped versus the decreased damping when that output gets high, as the lower damping factor can really make the senns sound sloppy. Just my personal experience, and would be interested in what DNA has to say.

Thanks guys - and as Nate alluded to, serves me right for not filling in my profile. 27 on the 27th, that is supposed to be special, right? Sure didn't feel like it - spent all day grading papers and getting grades in:mad:

Who knows anymore:p Yeah, the ZD has gone through a couple different iterations, mostly dealing with different rectifiers/damper diodes. I think the last revision resulted in some tweaked values in the power supply. This special edition, according to what Craig told me, will have a 3 ohm output for the low switch, and the hi switch is the stock ZD out of 12 ohm. Craig didn't tell me anymore regarding how its done or what the nickel plated capacitors are all about.

Yeah I know, hence the slow comment, and yes, we are still friends:rolleyes: ...

Sarcasm is tough to read on the internet Thanks Dusty;D

I think postie and I are going to have to mudwrestle for that one

Ummm...I admit I am slow today...your talking about the tubes, correct? ...please don't ban me please don't ban me...

The alerions are absolutely fantastic. The guy I picked up the cicadas from had a set of alerions powered by the Firstwatt F1. I was startled at the amount of bass that came out of that thing. What a special sound, just really engaging with a beautiful top end.

I love the look of the rectifiers on their side, that is really pimp. I totally dig the looks, definitely my style. Elegant, simple, understated come to mind. I wonder how much it will cost though...seems like it will be around the $4000 mark...

Head-Fi: Covering Headphones, Earphones and Portable Audio - View Single Post - REVIEW: TTVJ FET-A solid state amp I posted a bit of a review on headfi, if you care to read. Its a fine unit, I enjoyed it a lot. Yup.

The ASC's were what Doug suggested as well, but would probably have to parallel 2 of the 100uF as I believe that is the biggest they have, and there is space for them to fit for sure as the inside of the moth chassis is massive once you take out the power transformer and make it external. its SET, DC coupled design, input is 6j5 into 2a3 or 45 tube, output transformer coupled.

Hey guys, I ran the schematic of my moth to dsavistk and he offered some recommendations for a couple of places to upgrade the caps. Looking for 33uF 450V high quality cap, film for sure. They are cathode bypass caps. Right now there is a solen polypropylene in there, the only thing I could find which may be an improvement is the Obbligato film in oil cap, they have a 30uf and 70uF 630v. All of the really really nice film caps are around the 250v range, which I think might be risky in my amp as the schematic says for 450v, but the actual amount of voltage across that point is probably closer to 250. Also looking for a 220uF 500v cap upgrade as well that I believe is in the power supply. Figured I would explore some cap options before even thinking about silver output transformer options:p

Whoa, watch the attitude. I know a lot of people have issues with larry's posts or reviews or what not, but that doesn't give you a reason to act like an asshat just to provoke someone.

Haha, it really is not as big as it looks in the picture, the scale is totally off on that pic for some reason. Though I can see that you would think that as it kind of looks as big as the moth:palm:

Robert Harley's book on audio basics is a pretty good read, or introduction for someone like me who is relatively new to speakers and acoustics. Very basic and elementary info that is probably below what you can get elsewhere, but it has provided me with a basic cursory understanding that will help me with further questions on my own, and given me a nice foundation to build upon. All I can say is that there is no universal rule to speaker setup and positioning, other than the actual concept of where you place your speakers and how you position them is probably the #1 influence on the final output. My speakers are meant to be put smack dab in corners to linearize the response throughout and bring the low cutoff to a respectable point due to the rear horn loading, and to my ears they still image and soundstage like a muther though traditional theory says that method is completely wrong. Listen to a set of klipschorns in corners in a nice large room driven by a 2a3 and the enveloping sound can be pretty remarkable. Old setup - really problematic after living with it. Lack of symetry between left right wall and left right speaker created all sorts of frequency imbalances, destroyed sense of imaging and soundstage air and ambiance. Notice the right speaker feeds into "nothing" New setup - corner loading the way they were designed has restored the soundstage, actual imaging, my bass cutoff is a clean 50 hz at -3 db with the -10 db point around 40, and with the sub set at its lowest point to augment below 50 i am just really surprised at how cheap and easy this "tweak" of changing speaker positioning was (ignore the bookshelf on right, it appears to be in the way but the speaker actually has plenty of room to radiate outwards towards the listener)

Running back yes - Matt Forte had a very nice rookie year and shows a lot of promise and potential. He is a 3 down back that is a good blocker and a very suprisingly good receiver out of the backfield. He exhibited good break away speed and has some pretty shifty moves to evade tackles, yet he also showed good power in between the tackles. The line, though old, overperformed last year imo, and was really surprising how well they maintained the pocket and running game, but due to age they lost steam towards the end, the running game suffered a bit, as well as the pass protection schemes. WR is incredibly weak IMO. Brandon Lloyd showed promise but he was injured a lot. Devin Hester cannot play the position imo. Greg Olsen had a great season and is probably are #1 option, but as a TE defenses will double up on him and with no WR's to throw to it is an issue. I am hoping that Cutler will be able to maximise whatever dormant potential may exist within lloyd, olsen, and who knows rasheed davis or earl bennett may prove to be worth something. Thankfully WR is very deep in the draft and I am sure there will be a quality wr to choose from 2nd and 3rd round. O-line - the bears did pick up Orlando Pace. He is old and his durability is a concern, he is definitely not the pro bowl/hall of fame LT that we saw years ago, but he is an upgrade at that position and will help shore up the line and mentor some of our young tackles like Chris Williams. That is my brief synopsis. We need a WR though for the passing game to be taken seriously by opposing defenses. Last year towards the end of the season, as our running game suffered due to our aging line, teams ran nickel against our 2 TE sets, and put a nickel back or doubled up with a safety on olsen, pretty much taking him out. Single coverage on the WR's was fine because hester doesn't know where to run his route and whoever is on the other side can't separate. Defense still has another safety devoted to the run, and we were essentially stopped pass or run with the defense running only 2 LB's and a nickel back. A quality WR coupled with a QB who can throw downfield will open up everything, and I am happy that as of right now we have one part of that equation.

I think the broncos got a really nice deal. They have a 1st and 3rd round this year, and a 1st round next year. The defense was atrocious, so they really need to bulk up and with the draft picks they have tons of options. I like Orton and think he will do decent, one thing is that Orton is a very good leader, he will get tons of respect in their locker room just like he did here in Chicago, which can't be underestimated. With 2 1st round picks this year they easily can trade up and possibly get mark sanchez who they have been eyeing over.

...finally got a decent QB...let's take a quick inventory of our past OB's (from at least when I was born - 1982) Jim McMahon Mike Tomczak Jim Harbaugh Eric Kramer Rick Mirer Shane Matthews Cade McNown (ouch) Jim Miller Chris Chandler Henry Burris (ouch ouch) Kordell Stewart Craig Kenzel (who?) Chad Hutchinson Kyle Orton Rex Grossman Brian Griese ...and now Jay Cutler...woot:D

There are a couple of solid state rectifier plug in modules for 5ar4 that you can find around the web and bay, but who knows what's inside those little magic boxes.

Well curiosity killed the cat, and I bit on a metal gz34, the price was right and I figured it would be a nice experiment. Have been listening for the past 2 hours and I don't think its a sonic revelation or anything, but it looks nice for sure. Since my moth has the bias volt meters I did observe that the tubes started to bias up sooner than my rca/mullard gz34 (which I am aware is not necessarily a good or bad thing), so it appears on 1st glance the mullard i had in there had a slower startup time. Ah well...

Now that would be fun, and probably really good sounding, just a nice transformer on the output for dynamics, I am wondering if it could be done and sound decent... This is a more philosophical question, but what is it about Ray's amps that seems to really get people on a personal level? The statement about "ripping" one's hair out over something as silly as whether its balanced or not seems overly sensitive, and I know that we all have much better things to do than agonize over an amp that you are probably not going to own in the 1st place. It's just that the whole anti-rsa/he doesn't know anything is just getting a bit old. What is the major issue at play? Ray's marketing skills and techniques? Ray's "engineering"? His personality, the way he does business? Is it internet bravado that takes over and causes some people to say things they probably would never say to him in person? I really am curious why there is still such an animosity still towards him. Some for sure is grounded in actual interactions (cue Kevin and Jacob), but I just don't understand where a lot of you have left alone companies like ALO for the most part but still feel the need to attack anything RSA (Which i though we were getting away from and focusing on quality stuff like Justin's BHSE). Heaven knows I have plenty of reasons to not like the man as there was a time where he personally attacked my credibility and conveyed that our "friendship" was meaningless, but even I have moved on to a point where I can accept him for who he is, and just leave him alone to do what he wants. I will probably never even listen to another RSA amp but I don't feel the need to attack and question his every move. At the last meet we actually talked and shook hands and put everything behind, and though that doesn't change the fact of what took place in the past, I still think there is value in moving on and letting the man earn a living the way he sees fit. Excuse the Dr. Phil moment:palm:

Isn't there a guy in our neck of the woods Kevin that has been trying to sell off his concerto for quite a while now? I will try to find the link... ...SPF - Singlepower Electrostatic and Dynamic Amp in Maestro Chassis MUST SELL THIS WEEK - Head-Fi: Covering Headphones, Earphones and Portable Audio Already sold.

How much does something like a pbase or pro flickr cost?

Damn man, for a couple of hundred more (which is minimal at that point you probably can afford even more expensive) the TTVJ 307a is a no-brainer. I have no idea what Craig asked for his Balancing act but I think 3200-3500 tossed around. Even looking outside headphone amps I could probably get a killer preamp with remote AND power amp for that price figure. If you wanted to source a SP XLR from a reputable source and if it was part of the series when Mikhail actually did quality safe work (a la Voltron's) then I believe that would still be cheaper. I think even if someone wanted to take that $5000 and break it down to a quality preamp with remote and a quality headphone amp separate you would still be looking at stellar performance for under the price of the b52

I understand where your coming from - I would say a fear for a very expensive out of production headphone is probably a more reasonable, logical, grounded fear than that of house or electrical fire, even with the higher voltages at play. Of course if the headphone itself catches on fire which then causes a massive fire that is another thing in and of itself. So I do acknowledge the skepticism that is present, I just think it should be more focused on the sound quality/circuit aspect, and not necessarily the UL listed certification/possible house burning aspect. EDIT: The above is assuming that most amp manufacturers actually do follow UL guidelines for electrical. I don't think its that much of a major issue and even if an amp manufacturers doesn't follow it by the book the possible chance of actual electrical fire I would imagine is very nil.