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Topic: I do not need any Amplifier (Read 4700 times) previous topic - next topic
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I do not need any Amplifier

I have Cowon D2 and Sennheiser HD650.
I think I do not need any Amplifier. The sound is loud enough. But crazy audiophiles told me that I need amplifier. Why do I need it?

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #1 –
Quote from: Fool_on_the_hill on
I have Cowon D2 and Sennheiser HD650.
I think I do not need any Amplifier. The sound is loud enough. But crazy audiophiles told me that I need amplifier. Why do I need it?


You don't need an amplifier.  Some people claim that an amplifier will improve "sound quality" but there is little evidence to support such a claim.  There are some threads on HA discussing this topic so you can find more information there.

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #2 –
Maybe the reason is crossfeed in amplifier? But I use Lossless->foobar2000 (DSP: HDCD decoder->Bauer stereophonic-to-binaural (или Dolby Headphone))->Ogg Vorbis q5.4->Cowon D2 (Rockbox)->Shure SE530 or Sennheiser HD650

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #3 –
I generally agree... The main purpose of an amplifier is to.... amplify!  I don't believe any audiophile nonsense about "more open" or "less veiled" sound, or other non-scientific terminology.  I only trust scientific/engineering terms like frequency response, distortion, noise, power, etc. 

There are a couple of other potential benefits -

1.  If your device's source impedance is too-high (and I don't know about the Cowon), you can get frequency response variations due to the fact that headphone impedance varies over the frequency range.  A good headphone amplifier will have an internal source impedance near zero ohms (even though it's not designed/rated to drive a low impedance load like a speaker).

2.  If you listen at low levels, you can use the headphone amp as an attenuator.  This can (depending on the design of the headphone amp) reduce the background noise, maintaining a high signal-to-noise ratio at very low listening levels.

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #4 –
Quote from: Fool_on_the_hill on
Maybe the reason is crossfeed in amplifier?


With an occasional exception, the reasons are typically placebo and a desire to own more equipment.  People can hear all sorts of things when they are not performing controlled tests.

The output impedance of Cowon devices is fairly low and so you don't have to worry about any changes in FR due to this.

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #5 –
And Rockbox has a configurable crossfeed DSP if that is what you want out of an amp.
Creature of habit.

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #6 –
You may not “need” an amplifier, but you may want one. There is an amplifier in your player. It is either sufficient to reproduce your music fully or it isn’t. That isn’t a matter of opinion, but a fact revealed by the numbers. However, even if it isn’t fully adequate, you might not care because demonstrations of the inadequacy may be brief and infrequent. That is a matter of (your) opinion.

Years ago, I read a number of articles in various Hi-Fi magazines that demonstrated the power requirements for playing various actual music at reasonable levels. Short term power requirements, on musical peaks, can be 100X, 200X, 300X average levels. This isn’t exactly the norm, but it does happen.

This doesn’t mean that the power rating you generally see on an amplifier needs to be 300X what you expect to use, since, at least in the USA for home hi-fi equipment, that amplifier rating is the sustainable RMS output. All amplifiers have some headroom above that, a peak output that they can sustain for a short time (sometimes very short). However, for those rare bits of music requiring more than the amplifier can produce (or more than the amplifier’s power supply can deliver), audio reproduction will suffer.

In these cases, the sound output by the speakers is not “correct,” it is rather harsh as it clips, and the experience can be damaging to the driver coils. Amplifier clipping, mainly due to inadequate amplifier power for the particular use, has been cited as the main cause of speaker death (possibly even ahead of younger siblings poking something through the cones).

Another deficiency of too small an amplifier (not powerful enough for the particular job) is reduced output that does not follow the music signal level. My first amplifier was a home built tube amp that was theoretically capable of ten watts. This was one channel only. It drove a highly efficient ten inch speaker with a full range driver. A turntable was the source. I could play some kinds of music very loudly, loud enough to drive people out of an average sized room. Louder than I ever wanted to listen to except for an occasional system test.

There were a few LPs, however, that would not play correctly at normal listening levels. Sustained higher level passages would noticeably fall off in volume as they played; it was very noticeable. Recovery was quick after the end of the passage, but the musical damage had been done. In this case the problem was not what the amplifier circuit could do, but what the power supply could (not) deliver.

Headphone power requirements are much smaller than that of speakers. The headphones are right there in, or over, your ears, so there are no considerations such as the size of the listening room and your seating distance from the speakers to influence power requirements. Still, through cheap design or the intention not to allow any possibility for hearing damage liability, some small players are not capable of output that is adequate for normal enjoyment.

I say this from the viewpoint of someone who is concerned to not damage his hearing. I have listened to a couple of portable devices that just would not produce adequate loudness. This also depends somewhat on the headphones used. Another consideration is that those small amplifiers (and some not so small) may become very noisy as the volume level approaches their maximum.

On the other hand, without extensive testing to back up the impression (since I do not listen to music on any portable devices, only spoken audio material, which does not generally have a great dynamic range if recorded and mastered properly), the few not really cheapie players I’ve tried in the past few years seemed to have more than adequate driving power.

If you listen mainly to current pop and rock music, there isn’t much dynamic range. You should be able to rather quickly discover if your player can output an adequate volume consistently. Those greatly higher peak requirements are unlikely because the mastering of that music doesn’t allow them to exist. Classical and some other music may require more extensive investigation.
 

I do not need any Amplifier

Reply #7 –
Thank you very much for your answers.