Headphone Amp

[The Engineer]

My headphones right now don't get too loud, and i can't rock out! if you know what im sayin, so what's a good headphone amp around $100 or so to jack up my levels? and I'm using an e-mu 1212m soundcard.. and also what cables would i need in order to achieve the proper signal flow?

thank u

[SRR]

I would suggest a Behringer mini-mon and a used Behringer XL 4700.

http://www.fullcompass.com/product/284198.html

http://www.fullcompass.com/product/251984.html

(they are cheaper then what prices are shown if you call in)

Mini-mon will take the sound out of your sound card and do several things with it, one you can feed a headphone mix to a dedicated headphone amp, and two you will be able to control the volume of your monitors, have multiple monitors, or you can add a sub, it provides a mic to talk back to the headphone mix if your tracking room is in another part of your house, their is a headphone amp on this thing, but I don't like how it sounds that much, but would be usable if you just need to power one set of headphones etc, etc...design was stolen from Samson's C-Control, but for a third of the price, not bad....the basics of it is just a line level volume control, and a matrix switcher.

The 4700 can be had used for around $80, this provides up to four separate mixes if you have enough analog feeds from your computer, or it can just use one main stereo feed (from the mini-mon in this case) and power upto 12 pairs of headphones, I would never try twelve but the capabilities exist to do so.

Baring that, the presonus HP-4 is a headphone amp and a volume control for your monitors, and thats it, no bells no whistles, but if that is all you need then it is probably the better buy.

[punkin]

Line out levels isn't going to cut it. You'll need some active device to pump it up. The HA4700's are popular, I'm not familiar with this Behri product but it's even cheaper, http://www.musiciansfriend.com/produ...ier?sku=182040. I'm using the Mackie Big Knob

[OhSh1rt]

I can't express how much I love the mini-mon, it's almost unhealthy, I have mine going out to a headphone amp that I can't find anymore, it's a behrigner as well.



-jeffrey

[gcapel]

I got an OZ Hm. It is nice and loud. 4 channels with either an isolated mix or a main mix for all channels. Volume control on the main mix and on each channel. It rocks and I got it for like 120 on ebay. Rane makes one almost Identical that is probably the same quality.

[homestudioguy]

I have a Berry Injure HA-4700 and it is quite loud AND it is rack-mountable.

[travelin travis]

Originally Posted by OhSh1rt

I have mine going out to a headphone amp that I can't find anymore, it's a behrigner as well.

It disintegrated. Where does the shit go? We want to know.

Presonus HP4. Fits your budget as it's only $99.

You can run a 1/4" cable directly from your 1212m's outputs to the inputs on the HP4, no need for special cables/adapters.

You can get a lot of gain without any noise whatsoever using the HP4.

[Mises]

Rane HC 4.

If you pay more than like $50, your getting ripped off.... but the "retail price" is $200+ something dollars. Retail price is BS*... you can get them way, way, cheaper if you know where to look.

Guitar Center blows these things out on super special deals every once in a while. A couple years back I bought literally 20 units from G.C. for about $40 apiece and sold them off for roughly $100 - $150 apiece on E-Bay and to my friends, and ended up making like $1500- $1700 dollars.


Rane headphone amps. For the money, theres few if any better headphone amps out there on the market which are its equal (for the money).

Very low low noise floor. Extremely solid units that last for years. No ground loop problems like Behringer has. Behringer stuff ground loops up the rear end. Rane never does in my experience.

Also, you can run a Rane headphone amp for like 12 years straight, never turning it off, and the thing will almost never break. Rock solid, 'industry workhorse' stuff.

I have multiple Behringer headphone amps because it has a specific feature that I like which the Rane doesnt have, because its really good for doing headphone foldbacks for multiple musicians cues..... but other than that its a piece of crap. Rane all the way.