purk

Tier 1: HE-90, R10 (both versions), and Qualia respectively. (I suspect the K1000 will be on this tier too, but the best I've heard them was with the RKV MKII) Tier 2: HE60, L3000, SR-007II, W2002 w/ L3000 drivers, HP-1/2, K1000, and HD-650. Tier 3: W2002, W5000, K701, W11JPN, Ediiton 9, JVC DX1000, CD3000, RS-1, RS-2, SA5000, HD-600, D5000, and W10VTG. Tier 4: DT880, HD-580, CD1700, A1000, SR-325i, HF-1, A950LTD, A100ti, E500, and Ety ER-4s/p. Tier 5: E5c, DT-531 SR-325, SR-225, and HD-590. Tier 6: SR-125, SR-80, MDR-E484, MDR-V7 & MDR-V6, HD-280pro, JVC HA990, and Denon D950. Tier 7: KSC35, E2c, MDR-E888, PX100, and E565. Tier 8: Bose stuffs, Sony MDR-NC11, and EX70LP. I still can't believe that I've owned or auditioned the above headphones in my system. It has been a great journey and a dream comes true for me.

Those portable DATs are so neat. Especially the TCD-D100.

Sennheiver HE90+HEV90 and following closely by SDS-SE+R10. Let's see how far can the ES-1 takes HE90.

Actually, I appreciated both pairs equally. In fact, I would love to keep my lighter bass pair and get a better amp to make them sound better, but I found the bassier R10 to be more enjoyable, although not as refined sounding as the pair I let go. IMO, if one can bring out slightly more bass extension and quantity while keeping the rest of the sound signature unchanged, one can have a close headphone that is superior sounding to the HEV90+HE90 combo. After all, I still like the way the R10 does vocals more than my HE90. I believe the answer lies in the SDS-XLR that is way too expensive for my wallet.

I suspect the R10 will move behind the HE90 after you receive the Supra XLR. Hope you get it soon man. BTW, my ES-1 is coming in 4 days.

I now left with one R10. My SN. # 287 (lighter bass pair with better midrange and soundstaging) is now in the hand of the new owner who lives in Colorado.

Yes, but not to the level of the HEV90+HE90 combo but certainly very close. Of course, I'm biased but both Mulveling and Tom Hankins agreed with my finding when they came over. The R10 is all about powerful amp and source. They are the most picky headphones I have deal with to date.

Guys, Anyone wants to give this a try? IMO, you can mod a headphone to have a tighter bass and a more natural high but you can't improve the midrange,details, and soundstaging. What do you think? Can the modification be as good as claimed? MarkL has an interesting check on his pair of R10.

Well...I would wait for the up and coming replacement for the HD-650. I still think the HD-650 is the best headphone under 1k as long as you don't mind building a good system around them. They never fail to impress me out of moderate rig like the Maxed PPA and out of my SDS. They also scaled up significantly when I heard them balanced out of Tom Hankins's SDS-XLR. I would stay away from the D5000 because they are less refined sounding and place more emphasis on bass than the HD-650.

With that kind of profit...get yourself a true source.

Yes, and that is very disturbing to me. My Maxed PPA can definitely best his amp for much less. Back in 2004, the MPX3 6SN7 was compared favorably to the RSA Stealth and earned the Bluemoon Award from 6moon.com. I thought the Raptor was a lower model than Stealth...so what's so speacial about the Raptor. Trose49 probably generates serious cash flow for RSA at the moment. Purk

Elephas, Nice very nice. When will you get your Supra XLR? Your headphones look great. BTW, send over your e-mail address and I will forward you a copy of the R10 Service Manual.

Billy, I wish the XP-7 and HR-2 can be had for that price. However, Trose49 wants almost 900 dollars for his and someone else now want 780 for the HR-2. I can't recall seeing the HR-2 went below than $600 bucks. Personally, I think people are paying too much for portable amplifiers. When I want to do portable, I only take my DAP and my E500 and that's it. BTW, I like Ray's SR-71.

My HE60 seems to be lost in the mail system some where. It has been 17 days, and it has yet to turn up. Looking good Elephas!!

Vicky, I hope you get your Diablo soon. The Diablo looks pretty amazing. Hope it as good as its look.

From RSA's site: Another amp/dac combo for your portable applications. So many of these are available now. I rather save my hearing for my home/work rig.

You should. The bassier pair of R10 can have pretty nice bass impact.

Nope it is real.....you probably have not heard the R10 in the right system yet.

Thanks for stopping by Hirsch. Send your amp in and get high voltage option.

Earl, Sadly he had done plenty of damage. I'm wondering if he has some of affiliation with Ultrasone or not.

Vickie, I don't have any more information really in exception to that there might be 4 versions of drivers on the r10s, please don't ask me why b/c I have no answer to that. However, there should only be two types of sound associated with the R10s: Lighter bass R10 with better midrange, air, image, and soundstaging and a more bass output pair with smoother presentation and less analytical presentation. Icarium's and your pair are definitely the pair with more bass. I believe Hirsch has the lighter bass pair, which he prefers over the bassier pair. I like both of them equally. I also agree with Mikhail that the lighter bass pair will sound better than the bassier pair when the two are being driven with a maxed out SDS-XLR. Mikhail thinks that the lighter bass pair is sligthly more refined, and I totally agree. I believe Elephas feels the same way as he has both versions of the R10s.

Dan, Congrats on getting the R10 in your hand finally. I hope to hear more of your SDS+R10 vs. the SS-1 + Qualia. Don't forget to check out the GE 12AY7 soon.

Well...the D5000 is definitely not my cup of tea. Too much bass, not anatural mids, and too forward souding and not that refined. I will take the a well amped HD600 over the Denon any day. The Denon D5000 is pretty similar to the Ed.9, but the Ed.9 is slightly better.

http://www.enjoythemusic.com/superioraudio/ Not a bad review but I wish the reviewer did a better job at reviewing the B-52 as a headphone amp rather than pre-amp. I'm wondering how well does the B-52 handle the R10, Qualia, and L3000.

Jpak, With the 6414 on the driver position and 6BL7gts the amp will be less tube and has very nice and upfront presentation. It is all about tube rolling really. The SDS is so transparent that you can change the sound by just switching the tube. The SDS can be very tubey or even very solidstate depending on the tubes.