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solfeggio

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  1. I have been very happy with the USB WASAPI input to the HA-1 and using JRiver Media player with a mix of high res downloaded audio files as well as legacy MP3's, but am still getting those micro-interrupts in audio once every 5 minutes or so. One idea is that these are caused by the CPU which is more directly linked to the USB ports than it is to Toslink? I am unable to get JRiver to recognize the TOSLINK connection for comparison without involving my PC's native sound card though.
  2. Since entering the question I have been for about a week now powering some Sennheiser HD 800's with the Oppo Dac/Amp no problem.
  3. Back to the original question - I am an audiophile "equipment" noob (not a music noob though) and I too am going through the throes of awakening to better sound quality on devices such as my PC. There have been incremental steps up along the way over the past two months which have finally landed me at a very nice place - Windows 7, Jriver, hi-res audio file downloads, OPPO HA-1 Dac/Amp, Sennheiser HD 800's, Cardas Clear headphone cable, Clear Link USB cable. Please don't start a rant about the Cardas and the Clear Link - at least not here LOL!. The used HD800's were probably the biggest revelation as compared to the Senn HD580's and the Fidlio X2's that I started with. The OPPO amp has a nice feature for a noob too in that it reliably selects the best playback resolution for any given audio file if Jriver is configured correctly. As is well known, the HD800's are ruthless audio monitors, but I love them for it and have grown used to their judgements. Even MP3's sound much better on them though my patience with that format has grown pretty thin, and I am now combing the internet for higher res versions of the music I like. Downloading large files can be an issue with my medium speed DSL connection out here in the countryside, but sites like ALLFLAC and others are pretty good at serving them to me through my relatively crippled network. Other sites like Bandcamp are more of a problem with large audio file downloads - at least for my connection. I had to chuckle about Charlie Parker "playing too many notes." It reminds one of what Emperor Joseph II was alleged to have said about Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro - "too many notes." Though I have very eclectic music tastes, I will admit that I got entangled deeper into the audiophile thing recently when I discovered the merits of of so called "meditation music" - binaural beat, isochronic, and all the rest of it. The high res binaural beat music files are much more affecting and visceral than the MP3 versions, and with true hi-fi cans there is a whole 'nother level of involvement, and that is how I started down this road. It has been fascinating and fortunate as it is lighting up my sense of possibilities for all of the musics that I love.
  4. https://x-rayaudio.squarespace.com/films/ 'In the cold war era, the Soviet recording industry and permissible musical repertoire were ruthlessly controlled by the State. But a secret and risky subculture of bootleg recordings arose. Incredibly, bootleggers built homemade recording machines and found an extraordinary way to copy banned gramophone records – they used X-Rays clandestinely obtained from hospitals."
  5. My first "leap" was the Oppo HA-1 DAC/Amp. Probably should have mentioned that. Well, ok there were a series of leaps - first Fiio E10k then the Clearlink USB cable, then the Oppo anp, then the HD800.
  6. I have just been poking my nose in here very cautiously as a noob, but for the other neophytes out there beginning to be afflicted with the bug I'll throw in my 2 cents here that getting a pair of true hi-fi cans like the Senn 800's which I just started using (used pair with added Cardas Clear cables) really does vault you into a new magnitude of aural possibilities. My much loved HD580's and Fidelio X2's have now been shamed into obscurity though they will come in very handy for trips with low powered devices in tow. Further quantum leaps happened last week when I downloaded Jriver Media Player and various hi-res audio files in .wav, DSD, FLAC, etc formats and began to hear what real high fidelity is on real headphones. Where does it all end? I have no idea. You can't go back though.
  7. I just started running HD 800's on the OPPO HA-1 DAC/Amp today and am very pleased. Also, using Cardas Clear cables with a 4-pin xlr connect means the 800's will run fine on the low gain setting which then gives more sensitivity in adjusting volume.
  8. It's not just the "sudafed" factor in DBT's- there are many ambient factors that will skew results from day to day including the degree of restedness in the listener, the degree of restedness in the listener's ears, the emotional state and degree of internal distraction in the listener, atmospheric pressure, EMF environment, and on and on. That's why,for instance, the results of lab studies of things like ESP can be so ephemeral. And then there is this recently developing phenomenon: Placebos Are Getting More Effective. Drugmakers Are Desperate to Know Why. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemi-Syn "The presentation demonstrated that EEG changes did not occur when the standard electromagnetic headphones of Monroe's setup were replaced by air conduction headphones, which were connected to a remote transducer by rubber tubes. This suggests that the basis for the entrainment effects is electromagnetic rather than acoustical.:
  9. Well, I like the Sennheiser "house sound" with which i am familiar via my old HD580's which might as well be 600's, so the HD800 has always beckoned, and I can EQ it in Jriver. Just when I was looking hard at used 800's they spring this 800s thing on us. Don't know if I want to spend full retail.
  10. Anyone out there successfully driving HIFIMAN HE-1000's headphones with the OPPO HA-1 DAC/AMP?
  11. I should qualify that these HP's are being run off my Windows 7 PC with an OPPO HA-1 headphone DAC/AMP, and that the HD 580's are connected with a 4-pin XLR balanced cable which seems to do a lot for the SQ compared to the original cord.
  12. Fidelio X2 with Clearlink USB cable if you are running on a computer. I am pretty much down to alternating between the X2 and my old pair of Sennheiser HD 580. They both very adequately cover a variety of music. The Fidelio's get the most use. The audio improvement of the Clearlink USB cable was a big surprise. Two reviewers of the X2"s InnerFidelity's "Wall of Fame" Full-Size Open | InnerFidelity (The X2'a re about halfway down the page) Z-Review's rave: Z-Reviews Sound Demo:
  13. InnerFidelity's "Wall of Fame" Full-Size Open | InnerFidelity
  14. DSD not required https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infrasound On 31 May 2003, a group of UK researchers held a mass experiment where they exposed some 700 people to music laced with soft 17 Hz sine waves played at a level described as "near the edge of hearing", produced by an extra-long-stroke subwoofer mounted two-thirds of the way from the end of a seven-meter-long plastic sewer pipe. The experimental concert (entitled Infrasonic) took place in the Purcell Room over the course of two performances, each consisting of four musical pieces. Two of the pieces in each concert had 17 Hz tones played underneath.[38][39] In the second concert, the pieces that were to carry a 17 Hz undertone were swapped so that test results would not focus on any specific musical piece. The participants were not told which pieces included the low-level 17 Hz near-infrasonic tone. The presence of the tone resulted in a significant number (22%) of respondents reporting anxiety, uneasiness, extreme sorrow, nervous feelings of revulsion or fear, chills down the spine, and feelings of pressure on the chest.[40][41] In presenting the evidence to the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Professor Richard Wiseman said, "These results suggest that low frequency sound can cause people to have unusual experiences even though they cannot consciously detect infrasound. Some scientists have suggested that this level of sound may be present at some allegedly haunted sites and so cause people to have odd sensations that they attribute to a ghost—our findings support these ideas."
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