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Audiophilia: Headphones, Amps, DAPs, and Empty Wallets
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Built a new pair of speakers from Parts Express. The 'Passive Aggressive' set.
These are the fifteenth and sixteenth speakers I've ever built and see the first to have an annoying high pitched hum when nothing is playing. It's not any interference from the AC power or the amp, it persists across all inputs, and it goes up and down with volume.
The build itself was a pain in the ass and positioning the crossover was very challenging to where I had to lengthen connections with MIG aluminum wire to be get everything to fit without bumping into the driver or the passive radiators.
I'm 90% sure it's a loose positive terminal because I can modulate the hum by wiggling the positive terminal outlined, but my Acousta Stuff isn't due to arrive until Saturday so I'm going to endure it until I open it up and start fucking around with the wires again.
These are a great replacement for bookshelf speakers.
I don't think I would recommend them for a first time build just because of the challenging dimensions.
I can't get rid of the hum, I double checked all the wiring, looked good. Weirdly it only hums if both speakers are plugged in, if a single speaker is plugged in alone there is no hum (it doesn't matter which one it is).
So that's very odd, but it's not present when music is playing so I don't think I'll do much more to chase it down.
Nintendo Switch friend code: SW-4012-4821-3053
That's a good idea to check, it didn't happen with my last setup but something could have gotten loose.
Honestly, they're all stock tubes from Mono price so I should probably upgrade them at some point.
Could it be the new speakers are driven more easily, this would cause them to "play" a hum which maybe the old ones didn't reveal.
That's an interesting thought.
If you turn on the amp, volume to 100%, no hum across any input (phone, auxiliary, or Bluetooth).
If you turn on the amp, play anything (across the same inputs), hum once the song is finished.
Turn off the amp and back on, no hum, play another song, hum returns.
Here's a page that looks like it has some nice tips on humming, buzzing, and ground loop isolation: https://www.audioholics.com/home-theater-connection/ground-loops-eliminating-system-hum-and-buzz
Waiting on a plug in ground loop isolator I can plug into my surge protector to see what happens. If that doesn't work I'll just live with this interesting bit of speaker character.
Also, I wish to reiterate that all of your connections (both signal and power) are all secure. Looseness in any of them or a worn outlet can cause all kinds of weird problems. The last thing you can consider is an isolation transformer for your power unless that is what you meant by what you were plugging into your surge protector.
All of the internal connections are solid, or as solid as I can make them in this small of an enclosure.
That isolation transformer for the surge protector is what I'm waiting for, yeah.
I did have to use some aluminum MIG wire to connect two parts of the crossover because there was no other way to move the coils around, keep them separated by 90 degrees, and not collide with the driver or the passive radiator without it, so that could be something.
Everything else is connected with standard speaker wire.
The hum does happen with the handful of outlets I've tried in my house, but not with other speakers.
What are you using for headphones now?
Look at what Jabra offers. I'm using their headsets for work, one at home and one in the office, and do pretty well keeping noise out from both my ears and also not letting people in the other end hear what is up where I sit.
Plus there is also offerings from both B&O worth taking a look at, however all I can say personally is there headphones sound great and are super comfortable only the model I have is not noise canceling.
PS. Not every mouse have buttons that click loudly, maybe worth considering also.
I have a Hyper X Cloud pair (sorry I completely forgot about posting this question). And they aren't too comfortable with my glasses.
I'll take a look at both! The issue is my son holds his finger like 2 or 3 inches from the mouse and taps it that way. If he kept his finger on the button it would significantly quieter.
Well, whatever, it doesn't hum when actually playing music, just a nice little piece of character.
It’ll be hard to get a good seal with glasses and over the ear headphones. However best buy usually has some of the top models from bose and sony to try on. Not perfect but you’d get an idea if their active NC could work with glasses.
7800x3D Benchmarks
EDIT: Well this was totally the wrong thread
That's exactly what I would do to provide the most options in use
I don't think a 1/4" adapter matters, as I am certain those with gear needing one are bound to already have several such adapters. However you could consider making the cable on the headphones detachable and letting people chose what cable type they want, this would also make it possible to offer different lengths (or give buyers the option of them self getting a extra long or short one).
this is definitely the plan!
I don't get how it's so cheap, if I purchased those pieces in Canada, it comes to $9700...is Adorama sketchy or something?
EDIT:
Well after reading a ton about them, the Sub seems great, the towers are good, but the others fall really short. Think I'll pass on it for now and keep the search going.
That said, once you start getting into that price range, I’d probably start looking for what kind of sound you like. Pretty sure Klipsch is a bright sound.
You're always getting screwed on some level buying speakers and it becomes even worse if it's a brand name.
If you can find out who actually made the drivers and tweeters you could get a sense of how much you're getting screwed.
I think it is safe to say the overpricing differs, plus making really good speakers takes more than just throwing some units and electronics in MDF boxes - there is R&D, in some cases lots of R&D.
With pricing it is essentially no different than with anything else we can buy, only it is worth remembering that with bigger speakers it is not only electronics it is also furniture so handling and shipping plays more a role than with physically small products.
PS. Nice ones are certainly not "ten bucks and some wood veneer", it is more good furniture finish.
Now my plan is to use the measurements to experiment with speaker placements, furniture placement and so on. The first step was just to make some measurements, here is what I found measuring first my main speakers and then my computer speakers.
Microphone placed where my head usually is when sitting in my listening chair, the speakers are a pair of vintage/okd Infinity Kappa 90 floor standing speakers.
And then with the microphone in my desk chair where head is, when sitting in front of my computer. The speakers is a pair of B&W MM-1 desk speakers.
Both graphs are dB on the x-axis, with 75 dB marked, and then 20-20.000Hz on the y-axis. I used REW as the software to generation the test signal, record and show the results.
Seeing the measurements was eye opening to me, since I did expect the curves to be flatter only one can of course not compare the curves from speakers being measured in a lab environment to what happens in the real world.
Both measurements was done in my office/media room, not a place especially optimized for listening just a sort of cozy office that also has a sofa and a soft chair to sit in.
For the floor speakers I played the test signal from my PC, fed it through an optical cable to a Cambrige DACmagic, which in turn send its signal to a ML 532H that drives the Kappa 90. And with the desk speakers it was simply an USB cable directly to the MM-1's as they are powered speakers with their own internal DAC and amp.
Thoughts?
(edit: spoiler for giant-on-desktop image)
I was happier when I couldn't tell that was going on, let me tell you.
I have albums, as in round black vinyl things that I long stopped listening to once I had audio gear better than a boom blaster. The gear simply revealed those albums were recorded/mixed so poorly it is cringe worthy, or maybe the right word is really that they were mixed with the intent of sounding best possible on car radios and boom boxes of the 1980's vintage (I'm looking at you Bryan Adams).
The issue also exists with bootlegs and the like, but there I have, mostly, been able to find better recordings.
*Okay, the actual price is perhaps relative. Being strategic and patient ie. going with pre-owned gear helps minimize the actual price.
I have a set of cheap Skullcandy earbuds that I use for work, long flights, and to work out without issue, but I recently got a pair of Samsung Galaxy Buds2 and while they're noticeably better in basically every way they also cause my ears to unleash a river of earwax which becomes flaky and sometimes painful (I'm also pretty sure they gave me my first ear infection in like 30 years). I dont know if its down to materials used (Samsung just says the body is polycarbonate and the eartips are silicon but so is ever set of earbuds) or the shape/form factor (the Skullcandys arent noise cancelling and have the little handlebar things, the Earbuds 2 are like a full in ear setup) but there's something my ears hate about the Samsung set.
I should note that the Skullcandys are paired to my work phone and I'd like a separate set of earbuds for my personal phone, I dont want to have to connect/disconnect every time I switch between phones.
I had an Audio Technica ath-m20x set I felt they were ok and decent , I did want to get one with a mic this time. I feel looking at the ones online I am just better getting those again and a mic in the future?
I had an Antlion Modmic for my M50's and it worked great. Weirdly for my setup (which the PS4/5 passes the audit through my Soundblaster) it worked really well since I could plug it directly into the PS controller when I needed to, or into my PC if I was PC gaming.
It'll be hard recommending headphones without knowing what your budget is.
You might want to post this to a sub reddit. I'd guess you'd need specialty eartips.