Fiio A5 Portable Headphone Amp Review

[DivineCurrent]

Any suggestions on how to best use the HD540 with a portable setup? Thanks!

(I’ll keep the A5 in any case, considering it’s so neutral.)

Wow the 540 huh, that’s a nice vintage Sennheiser you got there!
So I think you’d be hard pressed to find anything as clean and powerful as the A5 for portable use. I use it with my hard to drive Hifiman HE-500, and it powers them perfectly.
i think the issue you were having with the Q3 is the output was too high for the A5, so you need to lower it to a normal gain so it doesn’t distort, which you perceived as being warmer.

 

[Hi-res-user]

Wow the 540 huh, that’s a nice vintage Sennheiser you got there!
So I think you’d be hard pressed to find anything as clean and powerful as the A5 for portable use. I use it with my hard to drive Hifiman HE-500, and it powers them perfectly.
i think the issue you were having with the Q3 is the output was too high for the A5, so you need to lower it to a normal gain so it doesn’t distort, which you perceived as being warmer.

Yes. The HD540 is amazing in that it is musical and clear. It has no “Sennheiser veil” at all.

Right now I turn the knob on the Q3 to max (normal gain) and adjust the knob on the A5. Is that an optimal way? Thanks!

 

[DivineCurrent]

Yes. The HD540 is amazing in that it is musical and clear. It has no “Sennheiser veil” at all.

Right now I turn the knob on the Q3 to max (normal gain) and adjust the knob on the A5. Is that an optimal way? Thanks!

Yes that would be the most optimal. According to the old Fiio A5 specs, the A5 has an input sensitivity of 5.6 V on low gain, and 1.15 V on high gain. So you should use low gain on the Q3 if the A5 is on high gain and lower the Q3 volume if you hear distortion/clipping.

 

[Hi-res-user]

Yes that would be the most optimal. According to the old Fiio A5 specs, the A5 has an input sensitivity of 5.6 V on low gain, and 1.15 V on high gain. So you should use low gain on the Q3 if the A5 is on high gain and lower the Q3 volume if you hear distortion/clipping.

Thanks for the info. The following is off topic, but may be useful to some. I use a sort of “sticky gel” pads to stick the iPhone 7, Q3, A5 together, a more elegant way than using rubber bands. I bought the stick gel pads on eBay for cheap. Also, I have an LG V30. Its built-in DAC and amp seems to be able to drive my HD540. I use a little Fiio E6 with the LG V30 and the HD540 to add a little more power. The little E6 sounds clean to me as well.

 

[Hi-res-user]

Sorry for being off topic again. This evening I plugged my AKG K240DF into the headphone jack on my Onkyo HT-R510 AV receiver, a pretty old receiver. The receiver was driven by the Fiio Q3. I selected “direct” on the receiver. To my surprise, it sounded pretty good to my ears. That made me wonder whether I still want to buy another desktop headphone amp (I have an O2). The downside of using a receiver is that the receiver becomes warm after it is used for a couple of minutes.

 

[grahamterry1000]

Based on this review, I bought a used A5 on eBay last year for around $50. So far I have enjoyed using it with the following:
On the input end:
Fiio Q3 (normal gain)
iPhone 7
(Jellyfin on the iPhone)
On the output end:
Sennheiser HD540 (600 ohm).

I put the A5 on high gain, and I like the clear, and neutral, sound. But when I put the Q3 on high gain, the sound appears warmer than I like, so I set the Q3 at normal gain.

I’m not sure whether this tandem of Q3 and A5 allows the HD540 to work to its full potential. I prefer a portable setup so that I’m not “tethered” to where a desktop setup is. That is why I decided to use the Q3 and A5.

Any suggestions on how to best use the HD540 with a portable setup? Thanks!

(I’ll keep the A5 in any case, considering it’s so neutral.)

Hi Just bought an A5 which is sourced from iphone 12 using the lightning phono dac adapter to Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro 80 ohm headphones. Volume not as loud as I was expecting especially given I have had to switch both phone and amp up to full volume and switch gain on. Is there a setting I need to know about on the phone?
Thanks