spritzer

The cables I reterminated were a few years old but they had stranded wire, what looks like a normal in wall wiring. They might use solid core in their more expensive cables but why they use such massive connectors I can't fathom. The skin effect is horrible and all that ferrite is killing the HF but then again they are supposed to be so musical...

A Lambda with a clean midrange? Now I've heard everything! It's clear that you lot like a hyper euphonic sound and that you are never getting from a Stax headphone or a Stax optimized system. You could with some horrible tube rolling and bad IC choice but the phones are going to fight you every step of the way. It's obvious we come from two totally different schools of thought on this subject.

The last one is next week AFAIK.

Amazing how exactly? It doesn't matter what I use to drive these phones, the character is always the same. From the SRM-Xh up to the BH and the HE60 smokes every one of the Lambdas, even my favorite open SR-Lambda.

He90 fanboy...

The Lambda Pro's are the black sheep of the family and this has been known since they were released. The Stereophile review(J. Gordon Holt wrote it) said you should definitely listen for a while before you buy and noted the same flaws I hear. The midrange is very recessed, the highs are either bright or dull depending on frequency and the bass is detached from the rest of the spectrum and very uneven as well. The good ones are the SR-Lambda, Lambda Signature and SC1 of the Lambda range, SR-Sigma, SR-X Mk3, 4070 and of course both Omegas. The choice between them will often depend on the music used as acoustic stuff isn't as demanding as close miked, heavily mixed music and system setup is crucial. IC's will make or break a Stax setup. This can not be stressed enough and always plug the amps directly into the wall without any power filters. Both setups you mention you are describing the amps and not the headphones. If you like the He90 then you should try to find a SR-Omega to listen to as they are similar but the Stax coming out on top in key areas. They aren't as diffused and the soundstage, while overblown and unreal is closer to the real thing, the midrange is better with nearly the same magic as the SR-007 and the bass is extended and deep with only a slight confusion when things get tough as the drivers can't dump the excess energy into the housing and then the head. They are still slightly uneven in the upper midrange as the He90 but it is a rare artifact.

It was my understanding that Audiogon refused people to advertise their CDSA and Signature setups after they made a deal with Emm Labs. There was a thread about it on AA with sellers posting that their ads weren't accepted if they contained any EMM gear. There was always a very healthy used EMM market but it has completely vanished. Edit: Found one: http://www.audioasylum.com/forums/shady/messages/3410.html and another: http://db.audioasylum.com/cgi/t.mpl?forum=general&m=488196&highlight=audiogon+emm

The Pro's are some of the worst phones Stax has ever made so you should hear the good ones... I can only listen to them for a few minutes before getting some other set that actually isn't so alarmingly flawed.

They are about 100$ more or that's how I'm pricing the stuff I'm selling.

He isn't actually alone as AKM and Esoteric work with him and let him in on information they wouldn't normally share. A case in point would be the engineers from AKM coming to the US to hear his new player... It's basically the drive feeding a buffer where the data is slaved to a master clock and upsampled and fed through an array of AKM dacs. From there it goes to a transformer coupled output stage so it's only a transformer and the tube in the signalpath. All linear psu with R-core transformers and point to point wired with soft silver wire. The transformers are amorphous core Lundahl. Even though the PCB's are SMD they are still hand soldered as it sounds better then a wave machine. It's true about the ass kissing but thats a nasty side effect of this and applies to most manufacturers. I would personally never buy dCS as it is very expensive for what you are getting and EMM is a horrible company as they used Audiogon to manipulate the used market for EMM products.

That's true but both have a vested interest in DSD (both are big in the pro sector) and neither can match the APL in engineering.

I saw it but I decided to give somebody else a chance as I need a new source more then a second SR-Ω. Now if I only could find a used UX-1...

Go custom all the way you can get a lot of parts for just the dealer fees on a normal amp. You should choose the amp to match the speakers you are going to use so once you settler on what you want you can find the amp to match. More power is often the wrong way to go as a 20w tube amo will crush a 200w SS amp when faced with the insane load of an electrostatic loudspeaker and it will sound much better.

He's the exception

I wouldn't call a APL NWO3.0GO cheap and they do it for better performance. DSD will sound much better in 20 years time but now it's better to convert over to PCM.

There is a reason why DSD is converted over to 24bit PCM in many players. Still DSD is in its infancy while PCM is more then 60 years old

Using more then one output device will always give you some non-linear artifacts as they can't be perfectly matched. This has nothing to do with distortion as SET's have that in spades but it is second harmonic and we like that. SET's are also simpler as there is no need for a phase splitter so you can spend more money better parts but p-p will give you more power. You can have a 50w SET with the right tubes but that will cost a lot of money. Spend the money on power and output transformers and what ever is used to couple the amp, either caps or transformers. You can also go vintage and discard electrolytic's completely in the PSU and use really big paper-in-oil's instead.

I'll just use my bias supply's to protect me...

It grows!!! Arghh...

It's bad news indeed but I can't believe they are supposed to sound like that. The drivers are identical so this shouldn't happen.

I don't think he bought the nr.249 that did the rounds on HF and ebay but the broken set that was on Y!JP. I'm not sure though...

I call them atmospheric as they don't have the fake and diffused soundstage of the HE90. They are very "audiophile" sounding a point which darth nut made in his epic comparison. If you haven't read it it is here: http://db.audioasylum.com/cgi/m.mpl?forum=general&n=80474&&r=&session= Ahhh so you bought that one... Mine were forced over the box for the photos but the arc is in pretty good shape.

So our sets weren't made that far apart. Pretty cool! The comfort is pretty good but they are always a bit loose on the head even with the headband as low as possible.

I knew about that site but I've never seen phones with the stock drivers that had the aluminum cartwheels. Those pictured there are replacement drivers from Stax not that they are available any more... It's a shame that the site isn't there in its original form as it had loads more info and comparisons. If they are brown then they are from the original run. Stax had the new black pads made in 2003 when the old stock ran out. They they are black I don't know. You can also get a new cable for them but it's light brown like the current cable and not dark like the original. If you remove the pads then you can see the date of manufacture or if they were repaired. Here is the sticker on mine: They are comfortable but the pads are too stiff and the vinyl/leather combo isn't all that great.

Now I'm all alone here...