I want a DAC and awesome headphones for my PC! What is the best?

[Anonymous]

I recently auditioned both the Senn 650's and the Grado 325i's.

In terms of sound the Senn's are far warmer and relaxing, whereas the Grado's are best described as more exciting. I would go with whatever you prefer.

For me i could deal with either re the sound. I did however find a huge difference in terms of comfort and build quality. The Senn's are a classy looking/feeling high end product and are supremely comfortable. You can literally forget you're weearing them. The Grado's look and feel like you made them yourself, and do not have the same comfort of the Senn's although i'm told that over time you get used to them.

For me, when you're spending this kind of money fit and finish are important, and as such i had to go for the Senn's. I've had them for a few moths now and i think they are fantastic. The scale of the sound they produce is remarkable, although i agree with other posts that can can be a little slow. Despite this i would recommend them unreservedly. Especially, if you can find them on line at a discount.

I got a brand new pair from a household name website for only £180 which is an absolute bargain.

 

[idc]

ajharris:
I want a DAC with a headphone amp in it that will work with my PC via USB.

As hedgehog suggested with the MF X-CANV8, you should also look at headphone amps with DACs in them. That helps to widen the search.

 

[Anonymous]

Personally I am EXTREMELY SATISFIED with my setup:

Sennheiser HD650 +Cambridge Audio DACMAGIC and +GRAHAM SLEE SOLO SRG (Studio Reference Green) with its PSU1, connected via USB cable and ATLAS Equator MKII interconnect cables.

DAC MAGIC does a great job with iTunes compressed music but it adds little to my WAV files ripped using EAC and played with Foobar2000 software using ASIO Driver,

In both scenarios Sound is AMAZING, the headphones are really comfortable, open and accurate still warm enough...... if it's your first experience with high end Cans, you will spend hours and hours discovering details you never heard before in addition to unwanted sounds and noises in the background of the Studio or theatre where the recording took place. Because they are comfortable and they produce a warm and "relaxed" sound you can easily spend hours listening to the HD650 without feeling any discomfort, In my opinionI don't think this would be possible with forward and fast attacking cans. They might sound more interesting and engaging for half an hour but I could not listen to an entire CD using one of those.

A Piece of Advice avoid importing electronics from overseas, because like everything these components might need servicing or may come defective so you will have to send them back for reparation, this happened with an eccentric Audiophile Friend of Mine who refused to buy a Graham SLEE like mine to drive his HD650 instead he went for an American Tube amplifier. Note that this Tube amp ranked N1 on a very respectable Audiophile website whereas my Graham SLEE Solo came in the 6 or 7th place , knowing that the number of amplifier reviewed was above 25 all of them costing more than 400£ and the result.... My Friend had to wait for 6 months for the boutique manufacturer to deliver and then what? One of the Tubes gave up after 24 hours of usage but the package included some spare tubes, however after 2 weeks we noticed a distortion in the left ear, till now we don't know if this is caused by the amplifier or the CD player., hope it's the later otherwise my friend will have to send back his 1000USD amplifier to the states.

By the way after buying my Graham SLEE and the HD650 I read an article stating that Sennheiser used Graham SLEE Solo amplifiers to demonstrate the high performance of what was then their flagship headphones and here I am talking about the wonderful HD650,

It is worth mentioning here that my favourite type of music is JAZZ, both instruments (i.e. Guitars, saxophone, cymbals, piano...) and human voices Sound detailed and warm through the HD650, Guitars are sparkling yet not bright, Bass is tight, accurate and more than enough for my taste, I don't know about other headphones, but Dave Brubeck's TAKE 5 Drums Solo sounds awsome and in one of Defected "in the House" Dance tunes the Bass was HUGE and precise even at deafening volume. in addition to my Jazz Library Thanks this sound system I rediscovered my PINK FLOYD, LED ZEPPELIN , WHITESNAKE and other old school Rock & Blues CDs.

Hope that was helpful

 

[Anonymous]

I don't have that much cash.

 

[Anonymous]

Look Online,

you can find brand new HD650 for 230£ (including delivery) , Look on ebay for almost new amplifiers , or get the Graham Slee Solo for 361£ without the PSU1 which you can buy separatly (this what I personaly did) if you have your music in Losless format you can delay paying 150£ for the Dac Magic.

Unfortunately good sound come at a high price , but in my opinion this is a very long term investment (between 5-10 years) ,and a difference of 200£ extra will not make such a difference,

On another note I should let you know that the Graham Slee SOLO will need to work (burn in, break in , warm in, whatever they call this...) for 3 to 4 days before you can start enjoying the sound which is quite frustrating, the difference is Huge, not a psychoacoustics thing, 2 of my Audiophile friends confirmed that , they listened to the same track on the day the amplifier was delivered and later on they came back the next weekend and auditioned the system and this time they were really amazed .

 

[Anonymous]

Just ordered a Beresford Caiman, £250. Now to look for some headphones, I will probably go with the HD650's