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Since I needed a headphone amp, I guessed that this would be a great project to build, so I started to look around and straight away found a few variations on the classic Chu Moy design. The only trouble (for me) is that none of the projects were designed for VeroBoard, so I had to learn how to translate a schematic to a VeroBoard layout. That is no doubt an easy task for everyone else, but it was quite a challenge for me, I don't mind telling you! Tangent's website helped me no end. In fact, this whole thing is based on his headphone amp guide!!

Initially, I built a tiny battery-powered amp to allow me to use my Sennheiser HD-600's with my Ipod. It worked a treat and I was patting myself on the back all night long :-)

Then I decided to  build something more substantial to use with my hi-fi. Instead of using the prescribed components, I tried a few variations and found that the following combination produced a pretty outstanding headphone amp!  Bear in mind that this is being judged against some damned good headphone amps including the mighty Earmax which I owned!

Product Review

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Well, as I've already indicated, I'm extremely happy with this amp. The HD600's can be surprisingly difficult phones to drive and satisfying volume levels aren't always easy to achieve with amps like the Earmax.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not condoning ear-damaging levels! What I do like though, is to have the volume at a level which is loud enough without stressing the amp in any way whatsoever.
 

So, for the initial listening test, I plugged the amp directly into the output of my Cyrus CD7 and played Track 8 of Bob James & Earl Klugh's "Cool" album, entitled Handara. It's a track that I know extremely well and I've used it many, many times over the years as my "test track". Of course the headphones used were the superb all-rounders - the Sennheiser HD600's

The music began without a significant departure from what I would expect if listening to the track through my B&W P6 speakers apart from the obvious lack of relative bass. Although it's ridiculous to compare great speakers with great headphones, it's not easy to avoid doing so in reality!

In all fairness to the HD600's the bass is  there, but you just can't feel it in the same way that you do when listening to big floorstanders. So, that aside, it wasn't long before I was grooving along to "Handara" and tapping fingers and feet to the music. The pace, rhythm and sheer musicality of the CD7 wasn't lost through the amp - quite the opposite - the music flowed through with fantastic timing and punch! In particular, the big caps seemed to tighten up the bass and open up the midrange to an extent where I was starting to doubt whether I was gonna take these phones off my head!
 

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