Desktop DAC/Headphone Amp Combo Under $150

[egothrasher]

Are there any good recommendations for a DAC/Amp combo for under/around $150. I would prefer in one device, but two devices are also a possibility. Going to be using on a desktop, and will be eventually used with a He4xx. Won't be upgrading past those headphones for a while, so don't need insane power but would like to future proof a little.

Thanks!

 

[Kouioui]

Welcome to the forum. I'll throw the $150 Amir recommended FiiO K5 Pro dac/amp into the ring based upon my positive experience with it. Wide selection of input types and plenty of power for the 4XX or 6XXs. The dac chip is a newer design than used in the Atom dac and digital volume control instead of an analog pot. My K5 has been in use for 12-16hrs a day for 9 months without a hiccup. I'm sure others will tell you to spend more for various reasons or find faults that don't exist in what they're using but if you're locked into that amount to spend K5 Pro should do the job just fine.

 

[MadMan]

$150 is an awkward budget It's enough to get moderate-performance combo units like the FiiO K5 or iFi Zen, but just $50 more gets a *huge* step up to a separates combo like Schiit Modi 3/JDS Atom DAC/Topping D10 + Schiit Heresy/JDS Atom. These combos would give you near-SOTA performance (from an audibility perspective, if not a measurement perspective, but clearly better than the <$150 combos) and could remain your go-to setup for a long time.

You could also get something like an Apple Dongle https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...pple-vs-google-usb-c-headphone-adapters.5541/ to use as a DAC which has decent performance, just low output voltage, but is very inexpensive. With one of the above headphone amps, you'd simply need to use high gain or a higher volume setting, and you'd probably be ok.

 

[DChenery]

If you can stand the delay, (its on pre-order for September delivery) I would highly recommend the Drop O2 + Grace SDAC DAC/Amp. An acquaintance had one and we did a sighted comparison with my Topping DX3 Pro V1. Neither of us could discern any difference using HE-400i and HD-660S headphones for the "evaluation".

 

[egothrasher]

Ok thank you for all the great suggestions. I'm new to all this jargon and technical stuff, so let me write as how I understand it so far.

Your typical headphone, cheap ones, are usually impedance. Like 25 Ohms and lower. It's when you get above that 25 ohms that you start needing to power the headphone, thus the amplifier. So, when looking at amplifiers, is it just as simple as getting the one with most mW? Like for example the schitt magni. At the low end, 2.8 W at 18 ohms, and 215 mW at 600 ohms, highest I've seen so far. I'm not looking to buy any sort of high end headphone anytime soon, so the Schitt stack is looking pretty promising, although it is $200 for the magni/modi.

 

[MadMan]

You can also consider E1DA 9038s. But you need to buy a balanced HP cable for that. My opinion is given here. It is a DAC+amp and weighs 10g (or so).

Unfortunately that device cannot *must be used balanced-only, the manufacturer says it will be damage if converted to single-ended. The single-ended version does not seem to have come out yet

 

[NDC]

If you can stretch to $200 - the Topping D10S + JDS Labs Atom might be a great little combo. That said, it is a third above your stated budget, but if you're looking for essential transparency I'd say it's definitely worth it!

 

[Blake Klondike]

If you can stand the delay, (its on pre-order for September delivery) I would highly recommend the Drop O2 + Grace SDAC DAC/Amp. An acquaintance had one and we did a sighted comparison with my Topping DX3 Pro V1. Neither of us could discern any difference using HE-400i and HD-660S headphones for the "evaluation".

Great thread— does anyone have any thoughts about the Drop O2 + Grace SDAC with hd800 and hifiman x-Edition? Objective info about the drop unit is hard to come by. Would I notice a difference in performance between that and, say, a JDS combo?

 

[ReaderZ]

If you can stretch to $200 - the Topping D10S + JDS Labs Atom might be a great little combo. That said, it is a third above your stated budget, but if you're looking for essential transparency I'd say it's definitely worth it!

Second this, the jump is pretty big.

 

[fxavier]

I suggest to buy a good dac first and use dac/amp dongle for the headphone in the mean time.

 

[gowla]

Schiit Fulla 4 and Questyle M12 could be worth looking at