I've been lurking on a couple of audio & headphone forums for the past month and this seemed like a good place to avoid "subjective" answers for some more technical questions I have. I'm interested in buying a headphone for usage at home, especially during this COVID-19 situation. However, from my online research, it seems like if I want a headphone, I also need an Amp and DAC (My source will be my computer). I have some questions regarding that.
- What is impedance matching? I read about a 1-8 ratio rule, is that a strict rule?
- Different headphones have different power requirements, and it seems like the amount of power an amp can put out changes with impedance? So how do I know if an amp will work with a given headphone?
- I'm having a hard time understanding the 320 kbps vs 16-bit vs 24 bit descriptions. And then there's the 16/44 or 16/48? For example, I understand that 320 Kbps > 256 Kbps, but how does that compare to the other formats that people mention?
- What does an IEM/Headphone being out-of-phase mean? How does that sound?