Shiki

I'm in the same boat... I finally gave in and ordered from TTVJ a few weeks ago, thinking I could replace all my other headphones if I liked it. But due to Sennheiser's policy I now have to cancel my order or find someone in the US to ship it to. Maybe I'll just wait till they get released here so that I can actually audition it first.

Damn, all the reviews are really enticing me to get one but I just can't get over the fact that it costs 3 times what I paid for my ESW9...

I had an Opera for a while and the K701 did sound a bit thin with it. I wouldn't say that it sounded bad though. I didn't really use the DAC much as I liked the sound of my E-MU 1212m sound card better at that time. You probably want to try auditioning it first. Currently I'm using the K701 balanced out of a B22 and it does have much more weight and warmth to it.

I had this problem too initially, but it hardly creaks now after I bent the metal bands to get a tighter fit.

Oops, looks like I'm wrong on some of what I said earlier. 1. The Sonata doesn't have any recording feature, so there isn't any need to turn off duplex mode like the Transit. 2. I just played some of my 24/96 files and they are 4608Kbps (4.6Mbps).

Which is why I said "usually", not "always". I'm faily sure that the Transit that I mentioned as an exception is also USB 1.1. I guess full speed (12Mbps) is there for devices that don't actually need to use 480Mbps. Those are the theoretical speeds but USB actually has a very high overhead, which is why Firewire (IEEE 1394) that is rated at 400Mbps is usually faster than USB 2.0. Maybe that's why devices like the Sonica or Transit only support 24-bit/96KHz when turning off duplex mode, even though a 24-bit/96KHz file takes up roughly 2.5Mbps. Anyway, I'm not an expert on these things so if someone with more knowledge on these can enlighten us, please do.

I think USB 1.1 devices usually only support up to 48KHz playback whereas USB 2.0 devices usually support up to 96KHz (and perhaps more). However, the Transit (which I use) lets you switch to 96KHz if you set it to playback-only mode. In fact, I'm using it out of my laptop to a 840C too. Haven't tried it with any 96KHz files yet though.

Do you need XLR outputs? Not sure about those you listed (apart from the Opera, which is really primarily an amp), but the Northstar that was recommended only has RCA outputs.

Wow, didn't realise that this thread has been dug up. When I had the Opera, K701 and 1212m, low gain was plenty loud for me.

Hmm, I'm thinking of getting the RS-1 but Grado's are really expensive to get here. MS-Pro is much cheaper for me as I can order directly from Alessandro. If it's very similar to the RS-1, that sounds like the way to go for me.

Hmm, how about the the SR-Lambda Pro that you are (were?) selling? Would that be a good introduction to the electrostatic world, or would the SR-X be better? Btw, would a speaker amp be good enough to power something like the SR-007A?

I'm thinking of trying this to find out what the electrostatic sound is like: http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f10/fs-stax-sr-sigma-srd-7sb-australia-292519/ How good (or bad) does it sound if I use a speaker amp instead of say, Stax's own amps or a KGSS? I can use an old Denon PMA-860 amp lying around or the B22 I'm getting soon.

Are you moving on to speakers?

Whoa... That'll teach me for not browing Head-Case more often at work.

Got it. Less sensitive, not more impedance. Anyway, looks like one of them might be going on sale soon...