Using a headphone amp as a pre-amp?

Basalt · 16th November 2007, 05:55 AM

Anyone here have any experience using a headphone amp as a preamp? Good idea/bad idea? Anything to watch out for (too much gain, impedance matching...??)

SamL · 16th November 2007, 10:24 AM

AMB's M3 and B22 headphone amp can be used as preamp as well as small speaker amp. The B22 is very well received and is rated highly as headphone amp. Not sure how it will fatch as preamp.
AMB has a very good build details on his site http://www.amb.org/audio/ and you should find most of the answer there. If not, you can reach him over the headwize forum.
http://headwize.com/ubb/forumdisplay.php?fnum=3

Have fun,
Sam

Gordy · 16th November 2007, 10:44 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Basalt
Anyone here have any experience using a headphone amp as a preamp? Good idea/bad idea? Anything to watch out for (too much gain, impedance matching...??)

In essence a headphone amp is a preamp with a slightly beefed-up power supply and output stage.

With the vast majority of headphone amps they should work perfectly well as preamps. However two provisos...
1) Some have a silly amount of gain and hence you might not have much usable volume control range.
2) Conventionally wired headphone amps share the output negative connection between left and right channels, and as such the maximum channel separation can sometimes be limited. In reality you may not notice this.

Nordic · 16th November 2007, 12:29 PM

I'd say 80% of commercial equipment shares ground....

angchuck · 19th November 2007, 10:55 AM

yes, i have built a few pre-amps and the M3 is still the one to beat overall.

16th November 2007, 05:55 AM	#1
Basalt diyAudio Member Join Date: Oct 2007	Using a headphone amp as a pre-amp? Anyone here have any experience using a headphone amp as a preamp? Good idea/bad idea? Anything to watch out for (too much gain, impedance matching...??)

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16th November 2007, 10:24 AM	#2
SamL diyAudio Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Wgtn	AMB's M3 and B22 headphone amp can be used as preamp as well as small speaker amp. The B22 is very well received and is rated highly as headphone amp. Not sure how it will fatch as preamp. AMB has a very good build details on his site http://www.amb.org/audio/ and you should find most of the answer there. If not, you can reach him over the headwize forum. http://headwize.com/ubb/forumdisplay.php?fnum=3 Have fun, Sam

16th November 2007, 12:29 PM	#4
Nordic diyAudio Member Join Date: Sep 2005	I'd say 80% of commercial equipment shares ground....

19th November 2007, 10:55 AM	#5
angchuck diyAudio Member Join Date: Dec 2005 Location: Silly'pore	yes, i have built a few pre-amps and the M3 is still the one to beat overall.

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