Schiit Magni Heretic Headphone Amp Review

[Bob from Florida]

Here is a link to a post by Jason - Mr Schiit if you will. Scroll down to his post from 2019 regarding hate for Schiit.

Why is Schiit hated by ASMR and Reddit?

Does anyone have any insight into why Schiit is so polarizing? On SBAF their products are fairly universally praised and widely recommended. On HF...

www.superbestaudiofriends.org

It certainly sounds like a mea culpa or good marketing by admitting fault with customer service and steps to correct things. I have personally purchased the following products from them.
Original Bifrost - upgraded at home twice with new DAC boards - no issues. Not currently used.
Mani - worked fine with MM, not so well MC - my brother uses it with a Shure V15 now.
Saga - no issues other that one of the LED's for input selected stopped working.
Modi 3 - works perfectly. Now on my son's system.
Modius - AKM version, currently in use.

These were all relatively inexpensive and I have not really had any complaints that needed customer service. Perhaps I was just lucky or Jimster480 was just unlucky. The new Magni with the ESS DAC module is very tempting for a new headphone station I am considering.

 

[Lupin]

I wasn't aware of the negative side to Schiit's reputation until now. I never saw much negativity on SBAF

SBAF is super pro Schiit.
Not praising Schiit at least every other post or ask critical questions related to anything Schiit will get you banned within a week.

 

[mc.god]

I had a single experience with shiit magni 3+ and it was really bad, luckyly solved with a refund of the item by shiit europe and refund of the returning costs by paypal, so with no loss, bat surely dsappointing.
I can say i'm happy that shiit items are hard to get in europe so I'll not be tempted of trying another one in the future.

 

[Blake]

I'm not a fanboy or anything, but just to offer some (mostly) positive experiences:

I started with the original Fulla about a decade ago and just kept going as better products from them came along, I think mostly out of habit. I was happy enough with prior products, so why not buy another? I imagine that first Fulla measures terribly by today's standards, but I didn't know the difference at the time and it served my purposes. This is my current inventory, which is honestly too much, but they were all relatively inexpensive!

Fulla
Fulla 3
Modi 3
Modi 3+
Magni 3+
Magni Heresy
Magni Heretic (black)
Magni Heretic (silver, just purchased on sale, so it hasn't actually arrived yet)

Okay, I didn't realize I had that much until I just typed it out!

The only serious trouble I had was with the second Modi, which actually started as another Modi 3. For some reason the USB input stopped working. The optical still worked, but not the USB. I think it took maybe two weeks round trip, but they sent it back to me with a Modi 3+ board. No issues with customer service.

My Magni 3+ and Heresy have developed the common problem of generating static when turning the volume knob, but I've never cared that much about that and haven't bothered to do anything about it. (I'm also not using them right now anyway. My two Heretics are replacements for the older two in order to have some voltage protection.)

YMMV, of course. I will say that, if I have a need for another amp, I'm interested in the JDS Labs Atom 2. Checking out their website and comments here, I like their design philosophy. I was thinking about buying one before the current Magni sale hit.

 

[TinEaredOne]

I just purchased a Schiit Heretic, which I couldn't pass up for $59. To my ears, it is a detailed, clear amp that adds layers to the music my Vali 2 tends to smooth out and blend. Very nice separation of instruments both through my Schiit Gjallarhorn and Energy RC-10 speakers, as well as through Hifiman HE-X4 headphones. The dac is a Schiit Modius AKM. Having purchased seven Schiit products, the only one to come close to disappointing me has been the Magni 3+: just not a big fan of the sound. How the Heretic sounds this good for this little money amazes me.