Currawong

Apple now have water damage markers in all their gear. However, I've heard of the markers changing even if there was no water damage. Apple are insanely anal about warranties due to many people trying to make claims due to abuse.

It'll just be a couple of screws you can carefully remove, before taking some careful close-ups showing the lettering on any ICs you find.

Yup, I'm buying a Reference 1. I got a chance to try the rare and weird Nakamichi Dragon DAC some time back, which uses the PCM1704 x4, and was totally blown away, it making my Northstar sound muddy. After picking my jaw off the floor, and after an unsuccessful hour trying to find one for less than the cost of a kidney, I tracked down the schematic, and , figured, from discovering the similar DA chips, that if Audio-gd could produce anything like that Nakamichi that'd it'd be seriously good, and decided to take the chance. It arrives next week. The delivery man will have fun: I live on the 5th floor, there's no elevator, and I have 20+ kg of gear arriving.

The Webkit guys have a policy, that no code submission is EVER allowed to be slower than what's already in there, regardless of the reason. The benefit to using it (or Safari 4 beta) will be if you use sites that are heavy on AJAX/javascript, such as Google Maps, GMail, etc.

I borrowed a 007t from Craig to try with my SR5NBs -- holy wow, now they seriously rock! I discovered by accident on my random playlist that Shpongle is indeed awesome with Stax. I'm listening to "... and the Day Turned to Night" as I write this with my above-mentioned combo -- the same one that makes jazz and classical utterley sublime. I'm going round to his place next weekend to try the Lambda Signatures after all I've read about them. I will have to see how they compare with the SR5NBs.

Home made ginger beer for the win! Actually, a friend of mine (whose father is a wine expert) brewed his own beer. The result was occasionally tasty and mostly unpalatable. It was good going though. Other friends had better luck with alcoholic ginger beer.

Yes please! I gather this will be a DIY kit?

You're supposed to have your eyes shut while listening, didn't you know? Good review though Voltron. I think you made a good point about amps being able to scale well. It would be interesting to hear impressions after about 350 hours of use, as my (albeit somewhat limited) experience suggests that improvements can come after that time.

Thanks for the link. I think I'll get some to put my headphone cables so my baby can yank them off my head more often than she already does when she's sitting in my lap. Specially perfect for the O2's.

Yes, B22 comparison most definitely please thankyouverymuch. I'm seriously tempted to get one considering how much cheaper it is for me in Japan. Then I wouldn't have the temptation to go balanced.

I bought a HF's 650s + original Zu. Decided I don't like 650s and swapped them for 600s. I'm not sure that the cable upgrade is that huge an improvement over stock though. I got better results upgrading my interconnects TBO, and they don't have annoying and noisy-when-it-rubs sheathing on them.

He obviously wasn't being serious. grawk, however, seem to suggest people who might have received any kind of kindness from, or who show strong preference towards a manufacturer, a shill.

I can't help wondering if that pisstake was very deliberately directed at me. Oh well.

I've managed to save my order by having it shipped to a friend in the USA, who, undoubtedly will have a listen, then buy a pair. He's already got $30k or so of hi-fi, another $1.4k on headphones wont hurt him I'm sure.

Damn, this is making me miss my vintage Luxman gear back in Australia.

Speaking of pads, are there thicker ones for the SR5? I stuffed a bit of material inside of mine to pad them a bit.

ATs to me, of any headphone I've listened with, sound like I am listening to a tiny speaker on either side of my head, that is, the illusion of soundstage is least present. The soundstage (maybe I should call it "headstage") was collapsed and compressed-sounding, lacking in detail and separation. At the prices the JPN series go for, it was a shock. The cabling feels cheap -- flimsy on the ESW10s and gold paint was flaking off the cheesy wood-and metal plug on the 10VTGs that I tried. Lifting the larger cans off my head slightly seemed to improve things, though, of course, losing the seal then causes other issues. So, overall, I can't help wondering what they'd sound like if they had a higher quality cable and thicker pads, whether the detail would be there and the "soundstage" improve.

I'm stuck listening with my HD-600s atm, now that my system is in synergy again. It's put me off wanting to listen with anything else for the most part. I'm pondering giving them a last chance with a re-cable or using them as funds for the HD-800s. I suspect the latter will be the nail in the coffin for them though.

I really had trouble liking the ESW10s when I tried them (but the same could be said for all the ATs I've tried). Every AT I've tried sounded to me like it seriously needed better cables and thicker pads.

I had that recently with my D5000s after listening with HD600s for a while. They sounded boomy and congested. There's also the effect of using ED9s for a while, whereafter other headphones sound wrong in some way.

Ahh, I fail, I saw the lights for what looks like the hot pin on the front, but didn't read the full spiel carefully enough. Good of him to rectify that annoyance.

I wonder if that PIC is just a fancy crossfeed circuit? +1 having a remote. -1 still not having SE out without opening it up. +1 for having more clicky rocker switches to play with while listening.

This is what I feared though, that any enthusiasm shown would be seen as shilling, something which I'm totally against. Of course, the owner of Audio-gd gave away development models of his gear as much for promotion as testing, which makes for instant fanboy creation, resulting in behaviour by a couple of people which I reckon is embarassing. For the record, I am not now nor ever going to shill for anyone -- I call things as I see them and do my best to be clear about what I know and don't know. I started out a year ago on HF with an interested in dropping a couple of large ones on a rig that would satisfy me with headphones for a fraction of the price that I'd need for a speaker rig. It seems that there are more straight-talking and experienced people on HC than HF, not to mention less bullshit (though quite a serious case of old boys' club syndrome) so I hope that, just as I've learned a lot in the past year, I can learn some more here too and build a damn good rig. Now, back to DACs: I figured as many of you guys (and the couple of girls) know WTF you are talking about, you'd find my comments (and the DAC) interesting and, as well, might make some useful comments on what you see. I wasn't considering the Ref 1 at all until I had wiped the drool off my chin after listening with the Nakamichi, and paused my search of Yahoo Auctions for one to actually hunt down the schematic. Extrapolating my experiences of the last year with all that I've read and comments I've received from helpful people around (such as HeadphoneAddict, who's comments have always been spot-on), I've decided to take a chance with this. I understand that DACs aren't all about the chip only. My sin here was posting with the assumption that if you're dropping $1k+ on a DAC that the analogue stage isn't rubbish. What is interesting for me is, many years ago, when the big multi-bit vs. 1-bit debates were raging, I thought that multi-bit CD players sounded better. Now, in the gear I've heard, the DA chips were all 1-bit (don't know about my Northstar, I should check) and the Nakamichi uses a multi-bit DA). It's as if nothing has changed since all those years ago.

I'm going to hijack this thread as well After having a listen with a rare insanely expensive Nakamichi Dragon DAC, I decided to get this when it becomes available, as it uses 8x the same DA converter the Nakamichi uses 4x of, and, not to mention, I already own gear from the same company, so have some confidence. The Nakamichi was the first DAC I tried that actually renders a piano like a piano sounds, with even my Northstar sounding a bit digital. Frankly, the Nakamichi made my Northstar and a friend's DAC1 sound like shit in comparison (yay for vintage gear). It should be especially interesting as the DSP in it has dip switches that allow the oversampling rate to be changed and the filters switched off or partially off, turning it into a NOS DAC, which should be very interesting. I shall then only require someone to leave me an O2 rig in their will and die soon so I can live the rest of my days in audio nirvana -- as long it renders damn pianos correctly!

Very nice clean and simple design. I understand entirely why you make them with a clear top. Very tempting to get one to try out one of your designs.