Torpedo

Well, at some point you must have heard something that isn't colored, otherwise you wouldn't be so sure there's a coloration there It's true the O2 are very revealing and transparent, but they aren't cured from having their own character. Wait, or is it the amp? or the source?

Yeah, that's the point, the warmth and roll off are so subtle that don't make it a flaw nor convert it into a warm amp generally speaking IMHO, which was the impression I got from your comment It's with difference the most neutral Stax amp I've listened to, and also in the same range of low coloration as the own B22, provided the SRD7 isn't considered a colored adapter hehehe. Using dynamic cans I wouldn't say the B22 is colored either.

Compared to what? I mean, it's very difficult to be sure that those things you're taking as colorations aren't somewhere in the upfront components or the own headphones character. I don't mean the 717 is perfect, but I wouldn't say it's a warm amp on itself compared to the performance of the B22/SRD-7 combo, nor have I noticed roll offs to speak of.

Happy Bday Dan, I wish you're having a great one

The bassoon in Spanish is "fagot" so I might have expected that

Up, Bustle and Out - One colour just reflects another

It's a different nasal tonality than the DX1000 have, or the Grados have. In fact I would call it more "shouty" than "nasal" coloration. The best way I can find to describe it is as the singer giving the impression that is having difficulties to deliver the voice. My theory is that it's produced for the 5.5-6KHz peak. This enhances the 3rd formant area which changes a bit the pattern of the vowels. This can be also perceived as an "airy" feeling in the voices. It's also noticeable on wind instruments and violins playing high notes, they have a more piercing and airier character than they have on other phones. On violins it's kind of a metallic rasping tone and on trumpets with mute the timbre gets a bit harsher. I don't find it annoying unless the own recording is "hot" already. I must say this has slightly improved by using the Gilmore Reference instead of the B22, and maybe for some additional playing time on the phones. Mine are about 80 hours so far. IMHO the O2 are more effortless, relaxed, musical and engaging than the HD800. Their stage, while lacking the depth of the HD800's, is more precise, it changes following recorded differences in size and separation. The HD800 are more "generic", maybe not as much as K701, which seem to have a wide stage on whatever you play, but still always wide and open, showing less spatial differences among recordings than the O2 or even the R10. The O2 may sound as narrow as a pair of Grados or almost as wide as the R10 depending on the discs you play. No other phones I know of can do that with the sheer resolution of the O2.

No loaner for EU residents? I know of some people over here that would enjoy listening to it

Great idea!!!

Great! I'll try to remember

Best of lucks Luis, keep us posted

That's it, they're just having fun

Congratulations Al, I was concerned you weren't going to enjoy that amp anymore Enjoy it while it lasts No, seriously, enjoy it, hopefully it lasts working eons

Doug, first decide if the speakers are to your liking, then see how they fit your room. Just then, start hunting the power amp. Those speakers, as long as they sound like the Apogees and other planars, will reveal you too much of your upfront components. More than raw power, I'd be concerned about sound quality. Bridged to mono amps aren't exactly a candy in my experience.

Yep, for point to point wiring you need the chassis, otherwise the thing would be a mess of huge proportions

Brooklyn Funk Essentials - Make them like it

Point taken. Thanks Deepak

Which one did you like better? Would you elaborate those differences a bit, please?

Hahahaha that'd be great. The "problem" is casing the PCBs and having something decent to look at. If I don't have the place to fill a PCB with parts, imagine to drill holes, mounting connectors, soldering wires and all that stuff which is the hardest to do when DIYing

Congratulations to both. It's a pity that having it converted to 230V operation needed "some" time to be effective. Maybe I should have waited Some regrets here...

Yes indeed, the newer 2xxx series, building quality issues apart, are an improvement over the 9xx. However to my ears they are still handicapped dynamically. It's quite clear that they can't go any louder than 95-98 dB, so when listening classical music decently recorded/produced keeping dynamic swings of 50dB or more, by pumping up the volume you can hear soft sounds louder, but the loud ones can't go higher, which I find a personal deal breaker. That's not and issue with average recordings and pop, rock or jazz, which is compressed at mastering.

LOL, you're right, sorry, looks like I need new glasses

Grawk, I was referring to the 2805 which from their introduction, were made in China. Maybe the late production 988 kept the build standards set in UK. My friend who sold the Apogees, ordered a pair of 2805. They sounded OK for a couple of days, then one speaker died. He talked to the distributor, and sent another pair right away, so that the first pair was still at my friend's. The second pair arrived and this one from the very beginning, didn't sound right in one channel. He talked to the distributor, and both agreed to let my friend open both pairs and see what was going on. He found that the first pair died because of a bad soldering. The second pair didn't sound right because a resistor was of the wrong value. Looks like they not even listened to that pair when just built. He was able to see the very poor soldering and internal wiring quality. He managed to rebuild a working pair using parts of both and redoing all the solderings and wiring. This was about two years ago, perhaps a bit more, a few months after the 2805 was released. Maybe things have changed and after this (and I bet others) fail they've improved their building quality and control. Another friend had the 988, not sure if they came from UK or China, but those sounded great and had no issues. The only "problem" with those is the frame not being stiff enough to keep the panel steady, so at high SPLs they tend to comb and make sound a bit undefined and diffuse. This is improved on the newer series using a more rigid frame. I hope this puts in clear the basis for my previous comments about the newer Quads

I'd say the second. Funnily enough a couple of friends came to my place two days ago and we were comparing the PS1 to the HF2, using the B22 and the Gilmore Reference. The HF2 with bowls on the Gilmore sounded with way less bass and impact than the PS1. Not bad, but not great either. Then using flats both came much similar. OTOH when moved on to the B22, the HF2 with flats to my ears became plainly unlistenable. Too much bass for my taste, and what's worse, muddy and tending to distorting. Moving to bowls, things fell into place and the things sounded damn good again, not PS1, they just lack the last bit of resolution, midrange warmth and treble delicacy, but to my ears, much more enjoyable than any other John Grado I've tried before. They even can sound a bit more open, I mean for stage width, than the PS1. Both are rather flat sounding though, at least compared to HD800, O2 and R10. To each one his own

Funnily enough he tried as many things as his imagination and availability allowed, but with little success. At least not as much as needed as to live safely with the Duettas