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Asus headphone amp reviewed

Wish it did Dolby Headphone for my gaming and movie usages.

I'll use it for music though. But otherwise I might as well get an better amplifier for my STX.
 
I've never really liked the whole "resampled" sound I've heard from higher end DACs. But I gotta admit its a pretty nice all in one solution.
 
Godmachine said:
I've never really liked the whole "resampled" sound I've heard from higher end DACs. But I gotta admit its a pretty nice all in one solution.
Click to expand...

The interesting thing about that problem is it has to do with how the "clocks" work on them. Outside of the $1k + range, the only DAC I know of which doesn't do any upsampling is the Schiit Bifrost. The downside there is that there is clicking when you change sampling rates, since it has to adjust.

I agree that changing the sampling rate is silly and it introduces unwarranted distortion in the sound more often than not. Still, this Asus product warrants a test drive...someday...

Cheers,
 
Damn this is expensive...I was looking at a Maverick...a Schiit Bifrost....now this. WHAT TO DO WHAT TO DO?
 
Keep in mind the Bifrost DOES NOT resample. This is quite different from the majority of DAC's out there as almost all of the sub $1000 ones do resample.

So if you want a pure signal through and through than the Bifrost is what you want. However some people like resampled sound so another DAC would be a better bet.

Honestly the Xonar One looks incredible. It's not the best design in terms of all metal and great tactile feedback from the knobs but the sound is supposed to be great.
 
EPOQ said:
Damn this is expensive...I was looking at a Maverick...a Schiit Bifrost....now this. WHAT TO DO WHAT TO DO?
Click to expand...

Audio-GD stuff is also very nice.


This looks really nice and sleek but for the money you would be better off with a Dacmagic and one of many amps depending on which headphones you plan to use.
 
I'll put it this way. I don't need a headphone amp. I just want something good to drive a pair of higher end balanced studio monitors. Internal sound card isn't cutting it. What's the better buy?

http://schiit.com/cart/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=0&products_id=11

This is looking like it will shape up to be nice for my needs, but it's not out yet, no pre-order, and the price isn't fixed yet (and it's expensive at their current potential price point of $750)
 
I don't use monitors so you might wanna start your own thread asking about what to get.
 
I've just seen some reviews of the Essence One with users saying they didn't feel it was a huge improvement over the STX internal card, that kind of turns me off to it just a bit, but you never know until you try it for yourself I guess.
 
Review said:
ASUS uses an Alpha pot to control the volume for the headphone out section. The way it is integrated means that there is a channel imbalance occurring every second step, effectively halving the resolution of the volume pot. The volume imbalance is around 1-2 dB which makes it noticeable through the headphones. Since the imbalance is present throughout the volume control's reach it is an extremely annoying bug, especially when you are using high sensitivity headphones.
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I just don't get it. How much are you supposed to pay before they engineer away problems like this? 1-2 dB channel imbalance on a $550 interface? C'mon man. Whenever I see things like this (and they all seem to have quirks of some kind) I just say to myself "wait for the ODAC + O2 instead". Another thing is the gain. TPU says that you shouldn't use this with highly sensitive headphones. Asus should have made the gain variable, with a switch. The O2, as a $150 headphone amp, manages to do this. I think Asus should do it too.
 
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ODAC + O2 Ftw when you are talking about great entry level audio parts.
 
Yeah looks like I'll personally be waiting for the ODAC or the Schiit Gungir.
 
EPOQ said:
I've just seen some reviews of the Essence One with users saying they didn't feel it was a huge improvement over the STX internal card, that kind of turns me off to it just a bit, but you never know until you try it for yourself I guess.
Click to expand...

It's pretty difficult to quantify how much better it is than an STX in dollar amounts, but I made the jump from an STX to the Essence One and it's much more pleasant to listen to with my HD650s and Beyer T1s than the STX was. I found the STX very fatiguing to listen to where I can listen to the Essence One all day.

IMO for the price the Essence One is incredibly hard to beat.
 
jdk said:
It's pretty difficult to quantify how much better it is than an STX in dollar amounts, but I made the jump from an STX to the Essence One and it's much more pleasant to listen to with my HD650s and Beyer T1s than the STX was. I found the STX very fatiguing to listen to where I can listen to the Essence One all day.

IMO for the price the Essence One is incredibly hard to beat.
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A friend of mine just informed me that he just ordered one so I'll get to audition it as well. Its got some stiff competition compared to my Schiit Valhalla and my HD650's (dream combination I might add) so we'll see.

I need a new DAC though. I would like to stick to my "Schiit" but we'll see.
 
Hmmm 650 and the T1 are two good, different cans to judge by. I would go with your experience in this case. Every ear is different though.

Still, asus is doing probably the best job in terms of new soundcards and innovation.

How are the Asus drivers now? I am using the Unity drivers on an old xonar DX1.
 
Lots of people seem divided on ASUS drivers. For my STX I find them perfectly fine , however there are a number of users that are not very happy with the frequency of updates from ASUS.

I can't really complain though.
 
XacTactX said:
I just don't get it. How much are you supposed to pay before they engineer away problems like this? 1-2 dB channel imbalance on a $550 interface? C'mon man. Whenever I see things like this (and they all seem to have quirks of some kind) I just say to myself "wait for the ODAC + O2 instead". Another thing is the gain. TPU says that you shouldn't use this with highly sensitive headphones. Asus should have made the gain variable, with a switch. The O2, as a $150 headphone amp, manages to do this. I think Asus should do it too.
Click to expand...

No kidding. For that price, and as large as it is, they should be able to just knock an Alps RK27112 in there and have no problem regardless of the design, since those things have stupid good channel tracking. Of course there are other ways to deal with it as well, but When you are talking high price classes the "just use a better component" is a valid way of doing it.

For the price Just get a Headroom Micro Amp with a DAC built in. Headroom's stuff is a bit overprice in my opinion, but it works well. Not going to have up to 2dB of tracking error on the volume knob throughout the range for sure :p. It also has switchable gain, crossfeed, and all that, and is a regular USB Class Audio device so no extra drivers are needed.

I think you can do better for the money, but if an all in one package from a big name that is supported is your thing, the Headroom would be a much better choice from the look of it.
 
Got a chance to listen to the Xonar one for a few hours today and I've got say that I come away from it impressed and not so impressed. The sound quality is quite good across a range of music genre's and I like seeing that my audio data is bit locked and which sample rate its currently running at.

One thing that I do not like amount DAC's like this is the the resampling of music. I like a pure sound through and through as its been that way for decades. Some people say it doesn't degrade or effect the sound but I believe it does personally so I'm not a fan. However despite that its quite lush and not a let down by any means.

I didn't get a chance to test the balanced ports as I do not have any balanced cables so I can't comment on that. I didn't like the Volume knob , it felt like it was maybe 30 cents worth of plastic and that's a real let down considering its not a cheap unit at all. The body construction was also a bit of a let down , more plastic. When you start paying those kinds of prices I want as little plastic as humanly possible , I've always felt this way about quality equipment in general. Will this bother everyone else? Depends if you care about that or not personally.

Overall while I find its a very good DAC and good amp I don't think it'll be dethroning any kind of "champion" that's been well established. Its a nice step up but overall I think there are better options.

I'd give it an 8/10.
 
How about the channel imbalance problem? Did you notice it?

I get where you're coming from about the enclosure and the plastic. When you're paying $550 you want something that exudes quality. IMHO (H stands for humble ;)) the actual material doesn't matter as long as it's not flimsy. Ideally, it should be matte plastic so it doesn't attract fingerprints, and it should be scratch-resistant so it lasts a long time. Or just make it metal and all these problems are solved.
 
To be honest I really didn't notice the channel imbalance , it wasn't easily apparent to my ears. Now that could be just me or in fact its over exaggerated in severity. But my listening experience was pleasurable.

After reflecting some more on it I think if I had another opinion on it that it would likely be value. I think only a very small window of people will notice any significant difference from an ASUS ST for instance. I think its biggest advantage is probably the balanced output. But there are others on the market that offer the same but are better overall values and those tend to have key features that audiophiles consider important.

I really hate cheap construction. It really makes no sense that in a market where components easily top over $1000+ dollars that anyone even in the $550 range would be using plastic knobs for volume pots. I know that ASUS has to produce the Xonar one on a mass scale but the Xonar "feels" just cheap. My Schiit Valhalla feels like what a tube amp should , heavy and built like a tank but also very sleek and not an eye sore to look at. ASUS has to remember this isn't a sound card that goes into a computer to be hidden away , its a "console" that sits a top a desk and therefore design and feel are equally important to the group they are targeting.
 
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Godmachine said:
I've never really liked the whole "resampled" sound I've heard from higher end DACs. But I gotta admit its a pretty nice all in one solution.
Click to expand...



Umm... where did you get the idea that all high end DACs Resample? When it does that its usually advertised as feature but I dont remember seeing them that often. For example my Stello DA100 (actually technically midfi) has toggleable resampling, 192khz resample and bypass.

Majority of DACs still Oversample which is completely different thing and has nothing to do with resampling. Basically what it does is push the noise that comes from the conversion far away into the treble regions where it can be filtered away without harming the actual sound. Thats the reason why NOS DACs (old and obsolete tech for a reason) roll of at treble regions, its the filtering that causes it. This is also what some people perceive as "natural sound". To my understanding Bitfrost is not NOS Dac, or atleast it doesnt mention it in the website, so that means its oversampling.

Or atleast thats how I understood it. There are plenty articles on oversampling if you google it.
 
MaZa said:
Umm... where did you get the idea that all high end DACs Resample? When it does that its usually advertised as feature but I dont remember seeing them that often. For example my Stello DA100 (actually technically midfi) has toggleable resampling, 192khz resample and bypass.

Majority of DACs still Oversample which is completely different thing and has nothing to do with resampling. Basically what it does is push the noise that comes from the conversion far away into the treble regions where it can be filtered away without harming the actual sound. Thats the reason why NOS DACs (old and obsolete tech for a reason) roll of at treble regions, its the filtering that causes it. This is also what some people perceive as "natural sound". To my understanding Bitfrost is not NOS Dac, or atleast it doesnt mention it in the website, so that means its oversampling.

Or atleast thats how I understood it. There are plenty articles on oversampling if you google it.
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Yea that was not what I meant , I was tired when I typed that so no not all high end DAC's resample so my mistake. According to Jason at Schiit the Bifrost does not oversample , it locks into the content frequency ( in fact there is even a slight clicking sound when it bit locks into that frequency according to forum users at Head-Fi). Schiit claims the Bifrost does not filter it , however since I don't own one I can't confirm this myself so I'm going off what forum members and Schiit claims.

To quote Schiit on the Bifrost :

Advanced Bitperfect Clock Management

The ugly truth about most DACs in this price range is that they sacrifice every single one of your original music samples to get their magic "192kHz" spec. Every input is routed through a sample rate converter and upsampled to 24/192. Bifrost dispenses with the sample rate converter and uses a sophisticated master clock management system to deliver bit-perfect data to the DAC, preserving all the original music samples--whether it's 16/44.1 or 24/192.
Click to expand...
 
Godmachine said:
Yea that was not what I meant , I was tired when I typed that so no not all high end DAC's resample so my mistake. According to Jason at Schiit the Bifrost does not oversample , it locks into the content frequency ( in fact there is even a slight clicking sound when it bit locks into that frequency according to forum users at Head-Fi). Schiit claims the Bifrost does not filter it , however since I don't own one I can't confirm this myself so I'm going off what forum members and Schiit claims.

To quote Schiit on the Bifrost :
Click to expand...



It is still oversampling DAC to my knowledge (which is a good thing), but I find their statement that most dacs in that price range upsample/resample curious... For in mid and hifi upsampler is marketed as extra feature like in my Stello, (which I keep off though, upsampled sounds brighter for some reason) a dedicated circuit that upsamples the signal before it reaches converter. I also have a cheap KECES DA-131, that is bit below Schiit Bitfrost price range, and I do not think it upsamples anything either, but I cant be sure.
 
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