Hegel H95 Review (Streaming Amplifier)

[VoRAT]

Funny I was thinking the exact same thing about you? How interesting

I made my point clear in my first post - I asked the poster a simple question, which got deleted. I’m happy to stick around, been around forums for almost 20 years, on and off. I’m just trying to understand his thought process on his purchase.

 

[Larry B. Larabee]

Disgruntled H95 owner here. I must admit that I bought into the Hegel PR garbage of distortion free / pure / clean sound. SoundEngine2 feed-forward nonsense. I even convinced myself the DAC was good!

I auditioned 5 different amps at my house (including a 'perfect' class-D with enormous amount of global feedback) and after lots of effort decided that I liked the H95 the best. Disclaimer, I am a sucker for all-in-one solutions, I even use the headphone output on this thing.

Anyway, after reading this thread I can no longer listen the noisy hunk of junk in my rack.
I hate it everything about it now, funny how your brain works. It's on eBay already.

The question is what the hell I should get now. I spent so much time landing on the H95, can't go though the audition agony/expense again.

Giving up on music is probably the correct answer.

// Annoyed Hegel customer

Conclusions
Let's quickly agree that both the DAC and headphone amplifiers are junk. They are better off leaving both out. You can do better with hundreds of products that cost the same as the shipping or tax of the H95. I watched one video where the youtuber said he preferred the sound of Hegel DAC to his Chord Mojo in some ways. Wonder what he thinks now.

I guess the above quote had alot to do with swaying your opinion about what was a perfectly satisfactory purchase at the time.
Amir listens to some of the products tested. How he determines which one is worthy seems capricious. If any product needed a subjective evaluation it's something like the H95 to further prove that it, in fact, sounds like it measures. Of course, I gather that it has already been shipped back.

L

 

[diddley]

If you like all-in-one, the Cambridge EVO line looks good, with Hypex innards and streaming software that goes with just about anything.

Amplifier SINAD list ASR + 3rd parties

List Name,THD+N (5W, 4 ohms),SINAD (dB) (5W, 4 ohms),Power (W) (1% THD+N, 4 ohms),Price (USD),Source Topping LA90 (stereo, bypass, low gain),0.00009%,121,90,800,<a href="https://www.l7audiolab.com/f/topping-la90/">L7 Audio Lab</a>,Suggestions, corrections and more info here: Topping LA90 Discre...

docs.google.com

 

[AdamG]

I made my point clear in my first post - I asked the poster a question. I’m happy to stick around, been around forums for almost 20 years, on and off. I’m just trying to understand his thought process on his purchase.

That’s not how I read your first post. You made several insulting comments and attacked the guy. Why I deleted your first post and warned you to back off the aggressive personal attacks. I don’t normally do this, but making an exception in your case. You have one last remaining chance to prove you are here to become a productive member of ASR or just here to Troll and stir the pot.

 

[VoRAT]

Disgruntled H95 owner here. I must admit that I bought into the Hegel PR garbage of distortion free / pure / clean sound. SoundEngine2 feed-forward nonsense. I even convinced myself the DAC was good!

I auditioned 5 different amps at my house (including a 'perfect' class-D with enormous amount of global feedback) and after lots of effort decided that I liked the H95 the best. Disclaimer, I am a sucker for all-in-one solutions, I even use the headphone output on this thing.

Anyway, after reading this thread I can no longer listen the noisy hunk of junk in my rack.
I hate it everything about it now, funny how your brain works. It's on eBay already.

The question is what the hell I should get now. I spent so much time landing on the H95, can't go though the audition agony/expense again.

Giving up on music is probably the correct answer.

// Annoyed Hegel customer

Why do you suddenly dislike the sound that you were happy with?

 

[UzbcuRA]

Sorry that you spent a lot of time and effort deciding to buy the H95 and now feel cheated by their marketing. You aren’t the first and won’t be the last.

The problem is that once one gets a bad impression of something it is hard to forget it. That is why marketeers do so much damage control when faced with bad publicity. That being said, I would suggest letting all of this discussion drift far into the rear view mirror. Then see if you can go back to enjoying your music. The Hegel isn’t state of the art with regards to measurement. But it isn’t horrible either.

Hard to unsee this review though. I feel offended by Hegel, portraying themselves as a reputable company with many years in the audio space. When in fact they are just a clever PR company hoodwinking suckers like myself dropping huge bucks on poorly designed / marked-up garbage.

I can't explain how a review like this can nullify months of research, auditioning and listening, but it does. Just the sight of the amp now offends me deeply.

I've already boxed up the H95 (and my speakers), on eBay as I said.

Very disappointed in Hegel, their distributors and myself for being such a gullible idiot. It just goes to show that you can never trust your ears, you'll end up being fooled.

 

[UzbcuRA]

Why do you suddenly dislike the sound that you were happy with?

Need to ask my therapist that I guess.

 

[BDWoody]

It just goes to show that you can never trust your ears, you'll end up being fooled.

You CAN trust them, if you do a bit of work to isolate just the ears.

Without controls, you are right...can't trust the results.

 

[VoRAT]

Need to ask my therapist that I guess.

Thanks. All I need to know.

 

[dshreter]

I dont understand the technical terms used and how these impact sound.

So, if we used an external DAC with this is this amp any good?

If we used a different amp that measures well with the same power specs (60amps) would I be able to hear the difference? )”(or is this better performance just a spec number?)

Thanks!

EDIT: Amir should test other hegel amps especially the ones higher in the line to see if the trend is similar - it would be really helpful to a lot of purchasers considering the asking price and reputation of the brand!

The amp should sound distortion free if it is not driven to too high levels and the line out is used for a subwoofer and not an external amp. It appears to be low value for money compared to alternatives.

 

[UzbcuRA]

Conclusions
Let's quickly agree that both the DAC and headphone amplifiers are junk. They are better off leaving both out. You can do better with hundreds of products that cost the same as the shipping or tax of the H95. I watched one video where the youtuber said he preferred the sound of Hegel DAC to his Chord Mojo in some ways. Wonder what he thinks now.

I guess the above quote had alot to do with swaying your opinion about what was a perfectly satisfactory purchase at the time.
Amir listens to some of the products tested. How he determines which one is worthy seems capricious. If any product needed a subjective evaluation it's something like the H95 to further prove that it, in fact, sounds like it measures. Of course, I gather that it has already been shipped back.

L

I don't think he needs to listen / re-measure anything. It already proven to be a very very poor DAC and head amp (like you said), bested by $10 dongles.

That leaves us with a $2000 mediocre-at-best amp, not exactly deal of the century. I don't buy the 'but wait, its got our patented soudengine sound, loved to numerous youtubers' argument at all.

 

[Everett T]

The amp should sound distortion free if it is not driven to too high levels and the line out is used for a subwoofer and not an external amp. It appears to be low value for money compared to alternatives.

What is the difference if it is a sub or a dedicated amp? Does the sub not have an amp?

 

[UzbcuRA]

EDIT: Amir should test other hegel amps especially the ones higher in the line to see if the trend is similar - it would be really helpful to a lot of purchasers considering the asking price and reputation of the brand!

Reputation of the brand is now gone. I'm sure this thread will climb high of google results rapidly and hopefully put a sizeable dent in Hegel's finances. They have a lot of work ahead to climb out of this hole.

 

[dshreter]

What is the difference if it is a sub or a dedicated amp? Does the sub not have an amp?

The sub would be used in combination with the speaker outputs. Where audible levels of distortion showed up in the review was when measuring the line outputs while the amp was being driven to clipping levels. Assuming you were not listening at clipping levels, the output feeding your sub should work fine.

 

[diddley]

Reputation of the brand is now gone. I'm sure this thread will climb high of google results rapidly and hopefully put a sizeable dent in Hegel's finances. They have a lot of work ahead to climb out of this hole.

It hit number 3 in results Hegel H95 review search.

 

[VoRAT]

Anyway, after reading this thread I can no longer listen the noisy hunk of junk in my rack.
I hate it everything about it now, funny how your brain works. It's on eBay already.

Is it the one in Italy or Japan? Maybe post a link as someone might be interested.

 

[Doodski]

It hit number 3 in results Hegel H95 review search.

I got it at 6th in line. I checked the price in Canada they want $2300.00 I can think of a lot of things I could buy for a stereo for $2300 and they don't have the name Hegel on the front.

 

[AdamG]

Is it the one in Italy or Japan? Maybe post a link as someone might be interested.

This is not the space for that. This is a product review thread and if @UzbcuRA wants to advertise this sale he should do so in the proper thread. Additionally he does not yet meet the minimum requirements to post items for sale. https://www.audiosciencereview.com/forum/index.php?forums/audio-equipment-for-sale-or-to-buy.29/

Let’s stay on topic please.

 

[VoRAT]

@AdamG247

Crystal clear, chief.

 

[pozz]

Also, I think there are two different ways to look at the results. One is to judge them from the "audio science merits" point of view, where all key metrics should be as good as possible, never mind will they improve the sound in a way that is detectable to humans, or not. From this point of view, the H95 appears to be a rather mediocre product and the touted "SoundEngine2" fails to provide measurable improvements.

The other way of looking at it is from the consumer point of view, where the measured results should be good enough taking into account the restrictions of human hearing capability. I don't claim to know where the line for "good enough" is, but I suspect that the H95 is not quite the abhorrent disaster some forum members paint it to be.

Are you sure? That's a weak dichotomy.

Here's another perspective: the role of electronics is to offer operating range. The narrower the expected range of use, the more compromises. At some point a user will do something that will affect their listening experience.

The H95 doesn't have a lot of output in the power stage, the line out saturates and the headphone amp is terrible. So it won't be hard to make it hit its limits.