Post by kauai82 on Jun 13, 2017 14:01:32 GMT -5
I have a question that I am sure that the Lounge members can help me with. I recently bought a Schiit Audio Asgard 2 headphone amp and after some hesitation sent it back to Schiit due to the feeling that I need to up grade my DAC first and then think about a headphone amp. As you can see from my signature I am talking about my music room system. I currently have a SMSL M6 DAC/Headphone amp as my digital analog converter. I should mention that the headphones I own are Hifiman 400 planers and hard to drive. The XSP-1 headphone amp is not powerful enough to drive them. I now hookup my DAC this way.
Dell Desktop -> M6 DAC/Headphone amp-->XSP 1 Gen 1, analog 3 input--> XPA 200--->>>Speakers .
When I first got the Asgard 2, I hooked it up this way.
Dell Desktop --->M6 DAC/Headphone amp -->XSP 1 Gen 1 analog 3 --->>XSP 1 processor out to Asgard 2
This worked except that I have a home theater incorporated in to the system (see sig ) and my sub was still getting a signal from the XSP-1 and still making sound when I listened to headphones.
I then hooked up the Asgard 2 this way and it worked, but I had to use the Asgard 2 preamp outputs to go to the XSP-1 and had to set the volume control on the Asgard 2 to 12 o'clock to get the volume to where I normally listen to my system at.
Dell Desktop --->M6 DAC --> Asgard 2 Headphone amp --->>XSP-1 input 3-->XPA 200---> Speakers.
In this configuration when I listened to headphones I kept the XSP-1 off and everything was fine with the headphones. When I listened to the speakers though I as I stated above I had to run the signal from the DAC through the Asgard 2 and it's preamp outputs to the XSP-1. That put the headphone amp in the signal path when I listened to my stereo speakers plus my sub in a 2.1 configuration. I did not notice any degradation in the SQ in this configuration, but I figured that if you put more components in the signal path you will get more unwanted distortion or colorization of the sound. Is there a better way to hook up headphone amps in my system than what I did ? Should I be looking just at DAC-Headphone amp combinations like I have now ? Any input would be appreciated. Matt
Dell Desktop -> M6 DAC/Headphone amp-->XSP 1 Gen 1, analog 3 input--> XPA 200--->>>Speakers .
When I first got the Asgard 2, I hooked it up this way.
Dell Desktop --->M6 DAC/Headphone amp -->XSP 1 Gen 1 analog 3 --->>XSP 1 processor out to Asgard 2
This worked except that I have a home theater incorporated in to the system (see sig ) and my sub was still getting a signal from the XSP-1 and still making sound when I listened to headphones.
I then hooked up the Asgard 2 this way and it worked, but I had to use the Asgard 2 preamp outputs to go to the XSP-1 and had to set the volume control on the Asgard 2 to 12 o'clock to get the volume to where I normally listen to my system at.
Dell Desktop --->M6 DAC --> Asgard 2 Headphone amp --->>XSP-1 input 3-->XPA 200---> Speakers.
In this configuration when I listened to headphones I kept the XSP-1 off and everything was fine with the headphones. When I listened to the speakers though I as I stated above I had to run the signal from the DAC through the Asgard 2 and it's preamp outputs to the XSP-1. That put the headphone amp in the signal path when I listened to my stereo speakers plus my sub in a 2.1 configuration. I did not notice any degradation in the SQ in this configuration, but I figured that if you put more components in the signal path you will get more unwanted distortion or colorization of the sound. Is there a better way to hook up headphone amps in my system than what I did ? Should I be looking just at DAC-Headphone amp combinations like I have now ? Any input would be appreciated. Matt