What would be a good portable Dac/Amp to use with my HD6xx and Sony Xperia 1 V cell phone?
I am new to this hobby. I purchased a HD6XX and plan to use it with my Sony Xperia 1 V cell phone, that has a 3.5mm jack. I was wondering if I needed a portable dac/amp or just a portable amp and if so what would one recommend? Any assistance one could provide, would be greatly appreciated. Kind regards, Haz
Mar 7, 2024
That said... Grace is a pretty reputable company, and I have no doubt this is a great product. If I had the $500, I'd buy it without auditioning it in a heartbeat. Too bad I don't have the cash at the moment.
Really, though... I have a hard time believing this will be a "bad" product. It's definitely not going to be an item where people say "oh my god, this was such a rip-off". I can see how for someone just starting out in this hobby, they might want to compare down to the single-digit dollar value all the available options, but really... you use it for a few years, and then you move on to newer and better items.
I tried amps and dacs from $99 to $2000 in past few years and there is very little difference. Most important thing is clean signal. As long as it's clean and neutral you are ok. Go read Ken Rockwell article on iPhone 5 dac and amp. Its better then 90% of stuff out there. Its backed by measurements.
The best amp I had for money ever was objective 2. If you have basic setup I can recommend that. If you have need for more connections and features you may need to step up and spend little More.
TL:DR The dude is a salesman (which you advise against). Read here to see it in his own words, and for some more conversation about him: http://nikonites.com/general-photography/2909-ken-rockwell-facts-post23935.html#post23935
That being said, I realize that some reviewers on there are paid to talk up a product, but is that any different from amazon reviews? or Yelp? Or any other online resource? cutting through the BS is a necessary skill nowadays. I thank you and appreciate that you're warning against visiting Head-fi threads to avoid being sold snake oil as audio equipment, but I think that having the community aspect outweighs the downsides. Being able to use that along with other information to inform my decisions is not a bad approach, I think. I don't see any $1200 USB cables in my future, if that helps put things into perspective.
Before talking about biased reviews, keep in mind that most of the big time reviewers already have quite a few items already better than the product they're given as a sample - making the bias little to none. Everybody screams "bias", but in reality it's a stupid claim since whatever rating they give the product (honest or not) they're keeping it anyway.
As for myself, I have a little money saved up for the Aune X1S that came out, if I don't get to win the raffle for it. I enjoyed it more than both the Objective stack and the Schiit Stack (as well as all the portable options such as the Geek Out etc. etc.), although that is YMMV. It's a shame I don't have it at the moment to do a A/B comparison when the m9XX comes tomorrow, although I took down a lot of notes from the listening tests so I should at least be able to make some sort of comparison between the two.
So before we go "eh, he's biased", let's all remember that I have other dac/amp options, will likely not be working for Massdrop again due to the rarity of collaborations, and have nothing in the way of an honest review. Oh, and I'm a college student, so I don't go buying everything I see :D . I hope this helps!
If you can't tell the difference b/w a $99 and $2,000 amp/dacs, I encourage you to try a different headphone or CIEM. It is safe to say that the more high-end the headphone/CIEM is, the more you can tell the difference. But then, if you are satisfied with your existing headphone/CIEM (which couldn't distinguish b/w the two amp/dacs), then you are correct to not to waste money on the more expensive counterpart.
From my opinion, I found the reviewers of the m9xx to be frank and straight-forward and gave enough information that I could relate to. I'm convinced that it is a good amp/dac worthy of buying in my pursue to improving my listening experience.