Comments on Profile Post by rhythmdevils

And it's pushing a trend to put Penticcon plugs on everything, even full sized headphones. 4 pin XLR needs to remain standard! Cayin's new amps have Pentaccon outputs in addition to XLR,

If many of the best amps in the world are SE, DAPs and portables are fine with SE too. It's all just a gimmick like MQA.

In some cases where the OI is different between outputs I can see it being very useful e.g. for getting different flavours with Campfire stuff for example. Barring that, yeah it seems a bit of a waste?

Most dongles use a single chip solution which allows for BAL out without anything extra. Also portables usually run into voltage limits pretty early which is an argument for balanced. It's just that there's very little downside for balanced.

I find most "balanced" stuff to be overrated and a cash grab. My favorite ones where the Marantz SACD players that use op-amps to make the players output "balanced" when by hardware they were SE.

@Hrodulf interesting. Maybe I’m just talking out my a$$

@rhythmdevils 90% of dongles using the same 2 chips is a bigger problem, I think.

Part of my frustration is that j just got a new Chifi ortho - the Timsock TS-1024 and it’s really really good for a stock ortho but the cable is a Pentaccon plug. I just really hope the trend doesn’t catch on. This is not a portable headphone in the slightest.

Also reading how the new Diablo was designed SE but the marketing team made them put balanced out on it. So the SE out is actually more powerful than the 4.4 out. Ridiculous.

The Diablo 2 is fully balanced. But I'm having a hard time pinning down its usecase. Even if I love how it sounds.

With that said, I don't love any of the ts/trs/trrrrrrrrs jacks - they short outputs upon mating which kills amps.

@Hrodulf The Diablo 2 isn’t what it seems. See this video by @GoldenOne

https://youtu.be/YEmdwJ9DIZ0?si=3AbUunQCqIKCsdxv

I have a DAP that handles focal's & seins fine on SE, but with ZMF Atrium the bal is needed to get the best out of it. Sucks because it forces cable swaps

I picked up a hip dac 3 a while back. Real pleasant surprise btw. It has the 4.4mm out as well. I bought a decent 4.4mm to 4pin XLR adapter and just plug all my mammoth 4pin XLR headphone cables into it lol. Problem solved.

I agree with this completely. I also sort of think balanced sounds bad too, it tends to blow out the soundstage.

I dislike pentaconn or any variant of a shorting barrel plug... but at least it's not that weird square plug that RSA was pushing years ago (originally a camera connector I believe??).

Genuine question @rhythmdevils; have you experienced an IEM that benefits sonically from balanced? HD800 with my DNA Starlett has always sounded noticeably better to me with the balanced drive. Only headphone where I really noticed a difference and I'm wondering if there is similar in IEM land

@ChaChaRealSmooth I haven’t compared the balanced vs SE outs on portables enough actually. My modded ortho S-12 iem sounds best with SE OTL tube amps which is perplexing since they are ortho drivers. SS portables sound so much worse I could care less about balanced. But I can say that sensitive BA iems don’t benefit at all IME. not even with the powerful THX789 (only good with BA’s).

I heard zero difference between the balanced outs and SE outs on the 789 with Solaris and Andromeda. But I used it anyways :) Msybe less sensitive BA's would benefit.

But I still would love to see the HIP DAC 3 for example designed as all SE, using all that space the 4.4 female jack takes up vs making room for it and being balanced. I really think the SE version would sound better. But what do I know just a hunch.

I know about the power thing on the D2. It's shitty marketing but they didn't throw a hissy fit and changed it up. I can respect that. With that said, even 2W is more than most will need. I'm more annoyed about the super high gain tho. No idea where the Nitro mode is useful. Beyer T1?

Balanced hd800 sounded better from the phonitor vs Se he 800 when using stock cables for both. I guess ymmv.

@Cellist88 well the Phonitor has tons of space to make a balanced design. Potables sacrifice a ton of needed internal space for the huge 4.4mm female plug. I’m just curious if that space was used in an SE circuit if it would sound better. But the Phonitor can just make the amp bigger to accommodate bal connections and circuits so it’s not quite the same situation. <3

The problem with most implementation of balance plugs is that they’re not even truly balanced. It’s a waste. It’s for convenience and marketing as suggested above. If they’re gonna do true balance, I think XLR4 or miniXLR4 should be the way to go. Straight 4-5 poles are not really good designs for balance. If you need small…go wireless :P