CMOY or Objective 2 DIY amp for Sennheiser HD58X

[jyalpert]

New to the hobby. Have a pair of HD58X on the way. I'd like to be able to play around with them including EQ. Source is a 2019 Macbook Air, built before Apple put the high-impedance capability into the machine.

I really don't want to spend a lot of money on an amp, but I do have experience soldering stuff, am an engineer, etc. Looks like I could build a standard CMOY in a matter of minutes, but the JDS CMOY and O2 both look like bit much more involved project, maybe an entire afternoon.

Wondering if anyone can comment on:

- Is the simple CMOY circuit going to provide a big enough power boost for me to be able to EQ this headphone well (it has a peak at 350ohm in the bass region)?
- Is the JDS CMOY kit a major upgrade from the simpler plan? Why?
- Is the JDS O2 kit a major upgrade from the CMOY? Why?

Thanks!

 

[staticV3]

Source is a 2019 Macbook Air, built before Apple put the high-impedance capability into the machine.

Your 2019 MacBook Air is perfectly capable of driving high impedance headphones, despite what Apple may imply.
It can drive 100Ω headphones, 500Ω headphones, and 4000Ω headphones.

The higher the impedance, the less current your MacBook has to output, the less "work" it has to do.

What Apple calls "high impedance capable" just means higher output voltage.

Before you build (or buy) anything, please try plugging the 58X directly into your MacBook. Chances are it'll drive the headphone just fine.

If you are missing volume straight out of your MacBook, then an external Amp is worth considering.

 

[jyalpert]

Thanks!

I am definitely planning to try it plugged straight into the Macbook, and then also straight into my AVR to see if there is any difference.

...Building my own amp also just seems kinda fun, honestly.