Will I hear a difference

[Jason36]

I am waiting for both my X-Can V2 and Grado SR80i's to be delivered and in the meantime I have been listening to my laptop during work hours on my Sennheiser CX300II's. First of all I like these in ear phones for what they are mainly used for......use with an ipod on holiday and at the gym.....however I take it that connected directly into my laptop the Grado's should sound a hell of a lot better?

Also a couple of other questions which I have been thinking about......

The X-Can is for use with the main system at home.....however could I connect this to my laptop if I wanted (would a 3.5mm to rca cable suffice....also if I wished could I add a DAC between the laptop and X-can)

secondly...if I bought a Fiio E7 and connected it to my laptop by USB I take it I would be using the DAC section of the E7. Now if I wanted to use the E7 with my iPod via a LOD cable, would this bypass the iPod DAC and utilise the E7's or is the E7 DAC only usable with a USB cable?

Bearing in mind the Grado's are portable I was just looking into which option would be best to get the best out of my laptop listening whilst I am in the office.....i.e. a static (mainly) or easily portable solution to improve Laptop sound.

Hope that all makes sense?

 

[El Hefe]

I am waiting for both my X-Can V2 and Grado SR80i's to be delivered and in the meantime I have been listening to my laptop during work hours on my Sennheiser CX300II's. First of all I like these in ear phones for what they are mainly used for......use with an ipod on holiday and at the gym.....however I take it that connected directly into my laptop the Grado's should sound a hell of a lot better?

Directly plugging the Grado to the laptop/ipod, I would not say better sound, but definitely different. Best to be driven by a dedicated headphone amp.

Also a couple of other questions which I have been thinking about......

The X-Can is for use with the main system at home.....however could I connect this to my laptop if I wanted (would a 3.5mm to rca cable suffice....also if I wished could I add a DAC between the laptop and X-can)

I used to have the V2 and did the same using 3.5mm to RCA cable from my Tivoli Audio and it worked fine. So I see no issues doing that with a laptop. However, if you are connecting the cable via a headphone out from the laptop, you need to balance the volume on both the laptop and on the V2. For my Tivoli Audio, there was a Rec Out 3.5 mm jack, hence I only needed to control the volume on V2.

And you should be able to connect a DAC in between yr laptop and the V2. Laptop to DAC via USB and then a apair of stereo RCA interconnects from the DAC output to the V2 input.

secondly...if I bought a Fiio E7 and connected it to my laptop by USB I take it I would be using the DAC section of the E7. Now if I wanted to use the E7 with my iPod via a LOD cable, would this bypass the iPod DAC and utilise the E7's or is the E7 DAC only usable with a USB cable?

Bearing in mind the Grado's are portable I was just looking into which option would be best to get the best out of my laptop listening whilst I am in the office.....i.e. a static (mainly) or easily portable solution to improve Laptop sound.

Hope that all makes sense?

Sorry no experience with Fiio.

 

[eggontoast]

secondly...if I bought a Fiio E7 and connected it to my laptop by USB I take it I would be using the DAC section of the E7.

That is correct

Now if I wanted to use the E7 with my iPod via a LOD cable, would this bypass the iPod DAC and utilise the E7's or is the E7 DAC only usable with a USB cable?

An LOD is an analogue line out so it would not use the E7's DAC

 

[Jason36]

secondly...if I bought a Fiio E7 and connected it to my laptop by USB I take it I would be using the DAC section of the E7.

That is correct

Now if I wanted to use the E7 with my iPod via a LOD cable, would this bypass the iPod DAC and utilise the E7's or is the E7 DAC only usable with a USB cable?

An LOD is an analogue line out so it would not use the E7's DAC

Eggontoast,

If I was listening to Spotify on my Laptop would that work in the same way...utilising the E7's DAC for Playback ?

 

[eggontoast]

If connected via USB then yes it would.