As very few or you may remember, I posted a thread a week or two ago about these new Audeze headphones I got. They were from 2015 and now I think discontinued or close to it so they were available used for 399 off the list price of 800. They are all metal, which is nice, since I have broken many pairs of plastic over the ear headphones.
Now the trick is they come with a lightning and a 3.5mm headphone jack cable. I'm a n00b and apparently lightning is impossible to amplify and there are NO amplifiers that cater to lightning audio input (although a few will do micro usb audio input now).
So what you have to do is use the headphone jack cable, then plug into a portable DAC/amp. The cheapest powered portable amp I could find was the Fiio Q1 which is also replaced now with a gen 2 unit so the older one isn't too expensive. Then you need to (thanks for the suggestion!) get a usb 3 to camera adapter from Apple (or on Amazon).
So the arrangement is headphone plug into the amp via 3.5 mm cord, then micro usb plugs into the amp, then into the Apple adapter, then the apple adapter plugs into your phone's lightning jack.
If you have an iPhone 7 or later that has no headphone jack, this is the solution you want! The Q1 is pretty small, but time will tell if this solution is at all portable.
A phone simply doesn't have much power to offer high end headphones and these headphones are GREAT (precise) but not very loud without an amp.
Again thanks to the user who suggested getting the Apple adapter on here! Now my shit's loud.
The cable should have been loud enough, it's made for that headphone and also corrects its planar fuckery. Also the volume issue would be from the cable having a weak output.
John Roberts
I think planar headphones simply need more power than a phone can give. It isn't bad, it is crystal clear with the lightning cable, it just isn't fully loud and the bass isn't super deep without an amp.
Camden Murphy
It's more about the cable than the phone. Class D amps are very efficient, a proper chip hp amp can power very inefficient headphones with milliwatts of power.
Josiah Nguyen
>tfw you were arguing with this user one to two weeks ago Well good for you user, sounds like a shitshow of cables though.
Jayden Rodriguez
>needing to power an external amp from your phone to be able to listen to music
Awkwardness of the setup aside it's an excellent way to kill your battery life. Truly a marvel of Apple engineering. Think different.
Ethan Reed
Are you dumb the amp is self-powered
Isaiah James
Well I'm not sure about the jargon, but I don't know why it wouldn't just be that it needs more power.
I bought the cheapest powered portable amp I could find on Amazon.
I figured maybe it wouldn't be enough to get an amp that didn't have its own battery (those start at around 25 dollars, mine was 60). This one has a 1400 mAh battery.
I'm not sure why they would sell an 800 MSRP headphone with a shitty cable. I doubt that's the issue. It just needs a small amp for more power. It WORKS fine without the amp, it just isn't that loud.
mm it isn't so bad. portable amps have come a long way since I last bought one in 2011 or so. It is pretty light. Cables are a headphone cable from the cans to the amp, a micro usb to usb a to the adapter, and then the adapter which ends in a male lightning cable.
Interesting thing is that somehow I think it sounds a bit LOUDER even when plugged into my phone than when not using the Apple camera adapter and plugging it into my laptop's USB port directly. The opposite is true without the amp. Without the amp it is much louder to plug in directly to the headphone jack of the laptop than I think to plug into the phone's lightning port.
Josiah Ortiz
Well the camera adapter has a charge port so theoretically I should be able to charge the phone while listening. Better check if that works. Thanks for reming me.
The only way that amp is "self powered" is if it has its own battery inside it. And even then the charge control circuitry for the battery may very well treat your phone like a battery bank and use it to charge the amp's battery anyway. Whether it does or doesn't do that depends on the sophistication of the charging circuitry and if and how it communicates with the phone.
That all assumes the amp is battery powered to begin with which it's almost certainly not. My Fiio E10k isn't so I'm assuming this Fiio Q1 or whatever isn't either.
Ethan Adams
Addendum. I checked it's spec sheet, it is battery powered but my point about it charging it's own internal battery off your phone still stands.
Mason Robinson
It has a switch where you can turn it from charging to not charging, so I think that isn't a problem. I made sure to at the least get an amp that had its own battery for this reason.
Brody Kelly
So the Apple USB 3 to camera adapter that I bought has a male lightning jack on one end and a female lightning and female usb a on the other end. Definitely works to charge the phone with the headphone amp on and listening to music. The Fiio Q1 itself has a charge switch that changes from whether it works as a DAC (I think) or whether it charges, and in either position of the switch the phone still charges with a usb a to lightning cord plugged into the camera adapter.
Now, of course, this may be different when walking around because I probably won't have it plugged into a charger, although I do carry around a portable power brick, so that is possible. The lightning cable that came with the headphones drains the phone battery pretty quick anyways.
Blake Kelly
bump
Mason Gomez
what's the amp for? are you deaf, or trying to become deaf?
Jordan Price
I'm gay (as you may have noticed from my purchase of lightning-cabled headphones) and I like a lot of noisy fucking techno/dance music. Also I sort of figured you really couldn't drive a planar headphone setup well without an amp, and I am right. I had a cheapo pair of triple driver in-ear headphones before this and they were louder than the Audeze cans are without the amp.
Jackson Cox
t.someonewithshitty headphone can
Gavin Harris
Thanks again user! I just sampled taking this setup outside. It weighs a fair bit but it works and now I actually have proper LOUD BASS-Filled headphones.
Best sound since I've had Westone custom in ear headphones years ago.
Jace Myers
Just use ANYTHING but an iphone.
Asher Lewis
>losing iMessage
I don't think so user
Michael Lewis
A part of me almost feels sorry for you, but then I realize that you apple people do it to yourselves and I no longer do.
Kevin Phillips
What features that I actually would use could I not get on Crapple?
Anthony Hall
Usable audio. Plug this thing in a V30 and it will power it just fine.
Landon Young
V30? Audio on any phone is terrible. The whole point is bypassing it.
Blake Wood
Nice advertisement. But my HD600 do sound better, are built better, and are far cheaper.
