I've decided I want an amp that has a more substantial footprint and weight than my JDS Labs Atom, one that doesn't want to move so much when I plug in headphones. I miss my Schiit Asgard 2 and Audio-GD NFB-11 in that regard. I also liked the size of their volume knobs better. Atom is very wide in diameter, but narrow in depth.
THX 789 look like a good choice. Plus, because of the SE RCA passthrough, I won't have to turn on the headphone amp to run my desktop speaker amp (it has its own volume control).
Don't really care if it has balanced output as I don't want to use balanced cables with most of my headphones. I'd be happy with a single-ended amp with unbalanced connections with similar performance to the Atom. Budget <$500, but less is better.
Any other suggestions? Thoughts about the THX 789 for its single-ended use as an Atom replacement?
THX 789 look like a good choice. Plus, because of the SE RCA passthrough, I won't have to turn on the headphone amp to run my desktop speaker amp (it has its own volume control).
Don't really care if it has balanced output as I don't want to use balanced cables with most of my headphones. I'd be happy with a single-ended amp with unbalanced connections with similar performance to the Atom. Budget <$500, but less is better.
Any other suggestions? Thoughts about the THX 789 for its single-ended use as an Atom replacement?