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It's a bit warm to the touch on the bottom, but nothing that concerns me. Comparable to or slightly cooler than the temperature of the power brick. I don't know how much hotter the top is, but can't feel anything above ambient on the sides. Also, I got the Atom DAC and it's the identical...

Re: powering both off the same secondary winding on an AC transformer: Figured there had to be a good reason, and isolation is as good as any at this price point. I've got a few of those laying around, that or a 3-way hard splitter were my thoughts.

I really want to get this, I've been waiting to match my Atom amp with a DAC for a while. However, the part that's bugging me is the need for yet another power adapter. Two wall warts that hog multiple spots on a power strip each, amp wants 16VAC and DAC accepts 15-16VAC but ships with a 15VAC...

I'm currently using the Aorus Elite X570, which is a step down with the ALC1200 vs ALC1220-VB (and they don't specify the DAC chip). I know I could get better with an external DAC, but by leaving it at 70% volume in windows and using my Atom amp connected to the rear out, I'm satisfied enough...

I've got a pair of these as the sides in my 5.1 TV setup in the relatively small living room (mounted to the walls just behind the couch), along with the rest of the Pioneer 22 series for the other locations, going on 5 years now. They are set at 100Hz crossover, same with the center, and the...

Something else a dedicated DAP does is let me listen to my music at work. I'm not allowed anything with WiFi, cellular radio, microphone, camera, or any installed removable media onsite, so it's either a barebones DAP or using the company provided internet-facing computer with whitelisted...

In the living room, it's close to 40% speakers (5.1), 40% AVR, 20% TV. For the computer, it's 0% DAC so far (using motherboard integrated), 25% amp, 75% headphones (for the most expensive pair). If you start factoring in CDs, DVDs, Blu-rays, streaming subscriptions, the desktop computer, the...

It's possible it could be related to the motherboard. I haven't used other cards in that specific slot, but the symptoms (card still completely recognized by the computer but something in the output stage died) didn't make me think it was interaction with something at the computer connection...

I had two copies of this card last year (yes, that's a bad sign already). Using my AKG K612 headphones (120ohm / 101dB sensitivity), I did some basic listening comparisons between using the SBZ headphone outs and my onboard Gigabyte implementation of ALC889 (including the onboard going through...

I'm also curious about what sort of alternatives there are to an AVR if these all keep measuring so badly (however, even with bad measurements I still enjoy the sound in my living room, so it's not a high priority to replace it). My use case is similar to @ZeDestructor in that nearly all of my...

I'll add a few that haven't been mentioned, in the electronic genre since it's a bit less represented so far: Hybrid - Wide Angle (link to YouTube upload of the full album, though of questionable quality - seems to be Opus 160kbps). Electronic but with significant orchestral backing, and has a...

For a data point, I had an Onkyo TX-NR636 for a while until the temperature sensor started acting up (reading below freezing and shutting down due to thermal error, in my living room...), and while troubleshooting and trying to repair it I snagged a copy of the repair manual. Looking at it now...

I was thinking about how to blind test headphone cables correctly and think there may be a way, though it requires a third cable in the system that is believed by all participants to be transparent. Make a box with a tiny pigtail that goes to the amp, and a jack for the 'control' cable going to...

Based on responses in this thread from much earlier this year, the "better than x%" is live updated with total respondents. 30/32 for me at a normal volume with headphones and a relatively quiet room (>94%, 0.9sec). The 1/64th step was the "difficulty threshold" for me, but I found as I went...

I'm impressed, looks like the D10 has a solid competitor. I'm still going to wait for the V2 of the KTB with the fixed ESS hump since I'm looking for a budget "future-proof" DAC that I can put in a custom low-profile enclosure behind my Atom amp to never look at and forget about (so I don't...

For the headphones, the spec is 37 Ohm and my measurements of DC resistance are within reason of that. They're planar magnetics, so the impedance is basically flat with frequency, and cable or even amp output impedance doesn't really matter. I did measure the cables though, and the one I made...

I used 24awg stranded hook up wire I had on hand from other electronics projects. I saw some recommendations to use various mic cables and all that for headphones, but I wanted to sleeve and braid each wire individually so it seemed like a waste to buy specially twisted and grouped cable when I...

Yep, I saw you already said that, I repeated it to make it clear to others that trying to harp on that and dissuade you from doing the mod based on that aspect doesn't make sense. I didn't understand what the goal was at the top of the thread, but after some clarification in both directions we...

Zek: Music1969 wants to re-terminate the cable with the correct size plug for the source that's most commonly used with those headphones. Eliminating the extra contact resistance and bulk of an adapter can't hurt anything. While it's not going to make an audible difference, it doesn't cost...

I second those brands. Switchcraft is also solid, but is more "professional" (works great, just doesn't necessarily look pretty) and is used in many guitar cables and the like. DigiKey Listings for 3.5mm TRS Plugs - filter out the CUI probably, they span the range of "radioshack rubbery crap"...