brat

Right now I'm listening to XA-5400es. Someone here already said it: good player but not great. Mine is not burned-in (about 10-12 hours) but I doubt we can expect some great improvement. My Cary 306 SACD surpasses it in every way except bass depth where the sony goes a little deeper. Sound is more two-dimentional and flat - the most obvious difference. Tonal balance is good with slightly humped bass compared to the cary. There are some peaky highs which may settle down with burn-in, I suppose. Headstage is much smaller. Something interesting: somewhere I've read an opinion that the 5400 makes CD and SACD sound similar. It's completely true: SACD playback is terrible!! The same flat sound as the CD!! My Cary has opened my eyes for the superioriy of SACD standart. I've never heard so spacious and naturally balanced sound, so well shaped instruments and "real" vocals. But I can't feel anything like that with the sony - on SACD mode my hybrid SACDs with original DSD recordings sound worse than their CD layers on the Cary. Some good words: mmm... The bass is great - textured and well controlled. This player will fit some bass-shy transducers. Maybe If I have another player, not the Cary, I would like this sony but now.... In fact I have another player - an old heavily modded Pioneer PD-9300 (two PCM58 DACs) and it's sound is quite similar to the 5400 but the pioneer has bigger soundstage I had some hopes for XA-5400ES. I wanted a new player with warmer and more "analog" sound to replace the Cary. This sony definitely is not it's successor.

Any new impressions on XA-5400ES? I consider to take one for an audition today... and I hope it doesn't need much burn-in.

I've found some sockets from Amphenol: New-Old-Stock Miscellaneous Brand Tube Sockets They are the 6-th position from the N-O-S list. Are they the same as the WPI's?

hmm... they both are female plugs. Which is the correct one? And can we find the PN of the male plug?

Hehe The same problem but with my old 727 returning from test and repair. At first I considered UPS to blame for the "damage" but my friend has found the two screws on the rear knob and I've fixed them.

I've posted my complaints in the other head-forum but no adequate responses or even any guidelines have been written. For the last month I hear a conciderable increase of the highs of my O2mk2. Somehow the highs "opened" and become more shrill and noticeable, some squeaky and ticking sounds protrude above the whole sound "picture". I mean sounds like the sound of a harpsichord or the movement of the fingers over the quitar's neck, or some "parasite" sounds which are found in all acoustic records. It sounds to me like sharp peaks in the upper frequencies range. Before this transformation the sound of the O2mk2 was smooth and laid back without anytning annoying and distracting my listening. Now it's more k701-like In fact now the amount of the highs of my Omega are much louder of the k701's. After comparison with another SRM-727II it was found that my SRM-727II causes the sharp peaks of the highs and the overall harshness and sibilance. The sound symmetry of the problem makes me think that it is in that part of the circuitry which is before the channel separation. Any ideas what may cause these shrillness and harshness of my amp? Has anyone bump into such a problem with any electrostatic amp?

NO! Time for O2Mk2! STAX made them to fix this specific problem (and major complaint).

If you read carefully all Stax threads you will know that O2mk1 is the Omega with the right bass.

Thanks. I'm impatient for my future O2 mk3. And I really hope they will not be the worse STAX product ever made. I believe the continuous regress of the Omega-line will be finally interrupted.

My respect to your experience with all STAX products but it's hard to believe that such a serious company will not design and test very carefully every product and especially their top end product. It's ridiculous. If some of us don't like the O2 mk2 it's not a fault of the STAX engineers but what they intend to make. Maybe the so called midbass hump is just a response to the hype taste. In fact I don't find a problem with the midbass. I find my SR-007mk2+SRM-727II system very linear. My only complaints are about the missing deep bass (below 25Hz maybe). But it concerns about 0.1% of my music collection.

What is the part number?

I think it's the only way to evaluate ANY component. Every comparative review has a huge amount of subjectivity which is influenced by personal tastes. So compared to the k701+Corda Prehead combo the Omega IIMk2+SRM-727II system has more prominent midbass and a distinct drop below 30Hz (roughly). I still don't know which is true and more linear. Personally I like the Omega's type of bass more. Comparing headphones with test tracks and test tones is just not correct when we talk about bass region. Try it.

No, if you read the entire post you'll understand I try to avoid general conclusions before longer period of listening. I'm saying that all our initial impressions are comparative, not objective and correct. So I still can not say which sound is linear - Omega's or those of the k701.

BTW at this point (about 120-140h maybe) I find a big change just in this "problematic" midbass area of my Omega Mk2 - this bass decreased a lot till now. There is not a change in its quality (for better or worse) but only the above metnioned hump is not so impressive as it was at first.

Why don't you just listen to the Mk1 instead of making the Mk2 to sound like them? It's excellent headphone. Yes, the bass is not linear - the hump in the midbass is followed by a drop in the deeper bass. Also I feel some "headphony" coloration on the female vocals, not the male ones but it's a question of construction of the earpads I suspect. And these observations are not absolutely objective but only comparison with the other headphone i use - k701. So I'll give a chance to Mk2 by listening them for some time. Maybe the next time I use k701 I'll feel a drop in the midbass, a hump i the deeper one and unnatural "airy" female vocals