I have just bought a pair of high end Sennheisers HD650 headphones...will a decent soundcard power these without needing a headphone amp / dac. Are there soundcards availble with amps built in?
For sensible volume levels, a normal soundcard does just fine. If you really want a headphone amp, build yourself a CMOY Pocket amp to go with it. It'll be better than a 3rd party bit of tat, especially if it's outside your PC case.
Nope. I have a pair of HD-555's and they sounded "Okay" on my sound card, almost sounded if they weren't playing close to their full potential. After Googling around for a bit, a lot of audiophile sites recommended trying them out with an amplifier, in particular I had an old JVC amp with a 1/4" line-out on the front of it (Sennheisers all run 1/4" as standard in their audiophile line-up). I wasn't expecting a huge difference... but man was I blown away. Totally different sound, superior mid-range and bass, I've suddenly grown to really really really like these headphones, they've warmed up a lot and the sound is just orgasmic (eargasmic?) when outputting 320kbps Mp3 VBR... or even better when I listen to some newer FLAC files I've ripped. Definitely get an amplifier. However, I don't use a headphone amp, or onboard/built-in amp. They usually have pretty cheap components. Scythe makes computer doodads and whatnots, but they don't do audio - stay away them from. Even a barebones entry level reciever/amp will do you just fine. Something like this: http://www.amazon.com/Sony-STR-DE19...4?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1231100641&sr=8-4 or this http://www.amazon.com/Onkyo-TX-SR30...?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1231100641&sr=8-3# They're both under $175... and since you bought a pair of $465 headphones, you'd shouldn't cringe at a $175 investment that will make you love your headphones rather than feel disappointed with them.
build a CMOY in a tin of mints I would give you one of mine but they all dissapeard Room mates suck... Trust me the sound quality improvements are well worth the $20 bucks in parts and the hour of tinkering!
hmmmmmmmm For some reason I feel if they think have to say "Audiophile" in the product name then they're probably trying pull the wool over That's serious money for that card (Google pulls up £172.49!), an outboard DAC (eg Beresford) and a home-brew headphone amp would cost less than that and I wouldn't bet against the DAC/amp combo sounding a lot better. After all, regardless of what bits are on the card it's still living in the electrically noisy hell that is the inside of a computer case.
LOL the burr-brown isn't really an audiophile grade dac, though it is good. And Nichion caps?? Seriously unless they're blackgates don't even bother mentioning them. Though the swapable opamps is a neat feature. At that price range looking at the 0404 usb soundcard is a good bet.
The optical digital out on my m/b feeds a Yamaha DSP-A5 av amp.Perfectly good enough for my Grado SR60's.Perhaps doing something similar if your board has a digital output,feeding something appropriate.
