Do I buy one of these, OR treat my g/f to a Michelin * meal?!

Hello everyone! I recently took the plunge into the world of digital and bought a RME ADI-2 DAC fs to facilitate listening to streamed music via my new 470 ohm headphones. I have no complaints about the sound, in-fact it is fantastic. But as someone who is always wanting more (greedy!!) and also believing in the notion that separates will often be better, I was wondering if I would there would be a dedicated headphone amp that would sound noticeably better than plugging into the RME?

I have read that it is difficult to extrapolate figures/spec from the RME specific to the headphone amp, as they are often merged with the DAC. I would only want to spend about £500, would anyone have any suggestions please, or (as I have read a few reviewers say) would I not be able to better the RME?

I have looked at Lake People G111, Lehmann Drachenfels and the Music Fidelity MX-HPA, but not being in the slightest bit technical, I cannot even guess how they might compare!

Thank you in advance! Steven

 

No need for an external headphone amp.... not that asking for opinions on such things on a hi fi forum is likely to be productive as you will probably have someone else come along saying it's imperative to get one!

Many modern cans are a fairly high impedance load, 200 Ohms and up, and require only a mW or two to reach LOUD volumes and as such are so easy a load that any old thing will drive them just fine. I have a pair of upmarket Sennheisers and struggle to hear any difference between the H/P socket on my CD player, the socket on my PC or a high end single ended class A headphone amp.

 

Thank you Arkless, I had thought being high ohms (470) that would mean they would be hard to drive! The whole reason that I went down the headphone amp route, was that when I plugged straight into my Ruark all-in-one, I didn't get much volume/clarity. And then, when my friend came over and plugged in his Focal Elegia's (just 35 ohms) they were fine!

 

The high impedance makes them rather low (by headphone standards!) in voltage sensitivity, hence such cans are often not well suited to battery powered equipment such as smart phones and Ipod's etc etc as they may lack volume. However, this also means they draw very little current, so a very easy load to drive so long as you have a few Volts available ie best with mains powered gear.