LX83 and Headphones

[duaplex]

Hi Guys

This may seem like a silly question.... I am looking into buying headphones for use with the LX83 AV. Can this Av drive the Sennheiser 650 HD well enough to do them justice or will i need a Headphone Amp? Essentially i want to play games, watch movies and listen Music (FLAC). The manual says the output on the Pioneer can produce simulated surround for headphones, sounds like a bonus. Although it also says it cannot produce back surround sound? Confusing!

These are the sets i have narrowed it down to

Senn 650 HD

Beyer DT880

Grado SR325i

Thanks in adance guys

 

[Chewy]

I'm sure the LX-83 will have no problem with driving these headphones. Whether it would sound as good as a dedicated headphone amp is another matter. That will surely depend on how much you might spend on the headphone amp. My guess would be that the Pioneer might be able to hold its own against budget fair, but as you climb the hi-fi scale a dedicated amp will outperform it.

I'm interested in getting some headphones too, and have always looked at the Senn 650, so let me know how you get on and what you decide?

 

[duaplex]

So I decided to call Pioneer as I could not find anything in the manual or on the Net to answer this. I went for it and asked if it could drive headphones up to 600Ohms. The first reaction by pioneer was of surprise and they said this question has never been asked before! (Well this was only one guy)

So of he went to ask the engineer. The engineer said that it would have no problem driving headphones of this calibre, although you may have to turn the volume up. Now that to me is not driving them properly if you have to turn the volume up on your AV.

so then I decided to call a dedicated hifi headphones retailer. I spoke to them about my needs and the choices above. They told me to immediately forget about the Senn HD 650 because it will require a headphone amp. They essentially advised me to go for the DT880 as they are semi open back and will provide great detail and bass for movies and games. Music is great too. But they had warned me that the Beyers require a good burn in time of 50 hours.

The Grado is fantastic too, however these are completely open back so everyone will hear what you are listening to and they are not as detailed for games and movies, not saying they are hopeless, just not as good as the Beyer. If it’s for Music only you cannot beat the Grado, so it depends what you want them for.

So it leaves me with one clear winner at this stage. He did also mention that the DT880 is as close are you are going to get to the Beyer T1.

Headphones that are up to 250 Ohms will not need an Amp; you are only going to slightly add to the quality at this stage. Unless you buy a power hungry Senn HD 650 then you must get an AMP to drive them properly.

The problem we have is trying to get a demo, its fine going into a store and hearing them, but we need them hooked up to an LX83!

Hope this helps, I tried my best J

 

[duaplex]

By the way, you have a great setup there. I was close to buying M&K too at one point

 

[Chewy]

Hi Duaplex, Great report back! I must admit to not having looked into the technical side of the ohms rating etc, so this is incredibly useful to know. A headphone amp might be the way to go then, if your average top end AV reciever can't drive them well enough. I know this adds to the budget, but given that What Hifi's award winner is only £255 list, it's a fairly reasonably priced upgrade as these things go (assuming this is also sufficient to drive all the headphones). I'll be interested to know which headphones you go for. For me personally, sound leakage isn't important, they will be for late night movie and music listening when the kids and other half are in bed upstairs, so it would all come down to out and out sound quality, with the bias towards movies. Let me know if you get to demo any of the headphones, I'd be interested in your feedback. Yeah, thanks for the comments on the set-up, it has taken a long time to upgrade to this point. The MK's are simply awesome, I can thoroughly recommend them if you ever consider changing speakers again. My system is 90% for movies, and in that aspect I don't think there is a traditional hifi style speaker that can compete (without spending significantly more). My next upgrade has got to be to seperate processor and amp, but at this point that's likely to be divorce material! Cheers, Gareth

 

[duaplex]

Hi Gareth,

I am going to drive over to a store and try them out! I know the Amp you speak of because I was looking at the same one I too would like to upgrade to the Graham Slee Novo and that will be enough to drive the headphones. I was doing some additional reading and the opinion is divided it seems on headphone amps. Some claim to be running their 600 ohm DT880 off an iPod with no need to crank up the volume...! So by that logic we will be fine with the LX83 as we have a heavyweight in the AV world with a great DAC. However others disagree and say that the amp is needed and all headphones react differently. These people swear by them and so do major headphone retailers (of course).

So because there is a divide in opinion and nobody can be sure how our LX83 will behave, here is what I suggest. Buy the 600 Ohm headphones and try them out on the LX83 or indeed whichever you like (250, 32 Ohm etc.) and if you find that it’s sounding muddy then at least you can either return them or you can invest in the Novo Headphone amp which will make them sound better. This way we can be sure one way or another and know if it’s hype or for real?

It’s also important to remember - if the source is no good then no headphone in the world can make the music sound better or movie. In my situation I have the PC connected to the LX83 where I play FLAC files. If I was playing an MP3 then it would be hopeless in comparison. Granted like you movies would be my primary concern and our LX83 will simulate the diffuse surround field in the headphones. So go for Semi open or Closed for movies. You will get the better base as opposed to fully open. Imagine open headphones and cupping your hands around them, it produces better bass

Lastly about Ohms - the higher the better. The higher the Ohms the more smooth the oscillating waves are and technically you have purer sound that was the advice I had been given by the headphone specialists.

My God I feel like an expert and I don’t even own a pair!!

Cheers Huseyin