[MM1990]

From reading the posts here there seems to be no consensus as to whether the AK380 amp is a worthwhile addition to the AK300. It either only adds volume, or it improves SQ and widens soundstage!
Is balanced output in particular improved or not? My phones are easily driven (around 30ohm) but I still need 120 - 130 for adequate volume.

I believe the AK380 Amp is discontinued and I have the opportunity to buy at £350 (rrp in the UK is £499). Worthwhile or not?

Any advice much appreciated.

That would be something I am interested in to know as well

 

[Gerryhatrick]

I doubt that we are going to get any more info on 380 amp plus 300. I posted this question on the AK380 forum as well (where there is a bit more (conflictingy) info).

Did get one reply, but it concerned 380 amp with or without 380, not the same thing at all of course.

https://www.head-fi.org/threads/ak3...atched_thread_reply_messagetext#post-13864838

 

[Gerryhatrick]

Taken the plunge and ordered a used AK380 amp from Amazon for £300. At that price I reckon on getting my money back if I decide to sell.

 

[Cherubian]

From reading the posts here there seems to be no consensus as to whether the AK380 amp is a worthwhile addition to the AK300. It either only adds volume, or it improves SQ and widens soundstage!
Is balanced output in particular improved or not? My phones are easily driven (around 30ohm) but I still need 120 - 130 for adequate volume.

I believe the AK380 Amp is discontinued and I have the opportunity to buy at £350 (rrp in the UK is £499). Worthwhile or not?

Any advice much appreciated.

I have both AK300 and amp. The sound characteristics with/without amp is pretty much the same, with maybe a slight improvement in soundstage. Still sounds smooth/analog as a bare AK300 (which I like). The main advantage is way higher output power (7,6 vrms I guess) which is great for more demanding headphones. However you can't go wrong with 30 ohm ones either.

As for the SE vs. balanced, balanced is definitely superior in terms of sound quality with AK players.

 

[Gerryhatrick]

Hi - thanks for the response! As I said I went ahead and bought the AK380 amp from Amazon, it arrived today - faulty!!! No signal from either balanced or SE. So it is being returned. I got it for £300 and from your advice and that of others I would not spend more that that, so chances are
I will stick with the AK300 as it is. It is pretty good on it's own!

 

[kel77]

Hi - thanks for the response! As I said I went ahead and bought the AK380 amp from Amazon, it arrived today - faulty!!! No signal from either balanced or SE. So it is being returned. I got it for £300 and from your advice and that of others I would not spend more that that, so chances are
I will stick with the AK300 as it is. It is pretty good on it's own!

Did you activate the amp from the top drop down menu? The LED on amp will then light up showing it is turned on.

 

[Cherubian]

Hi - thanks for the response! As I said I went ahead and bought the AK380 amp from Amazon, it arrived today - faulty!!! No signal from either balanced or SE. So it is being returned. I got it for £300 and from your advice and that of others I would not spend more that that, so chances are
I will stick with the AK300 as it is. It is pretty good on it's own!

Hope you activated the amp in drop down menu Anyway you should be fine with AK300 only with 30ohm headphone.

 

[Gerryhatrick]

Hope you activated the amp in drop down menu Anyway you should be fine with AK300 only with 30ohm headphone.

Yes I did activate the amp. LED comes on tried high and low gain - zilch. (I had tried the amp before on loan so I knew how it worked).No problem with the return).

 

[reginalb]

The eq on the ak300 doesn't seem to work over Bluetooth. Anyone know how to use eq for this via bt?

Did they ever fix the EQ at all? The Q value adjustment didn't work when I owned it at all. Their EQ implementation was, at that point, pretty bleh. I wanted to check release notes to see if they'd ever fixed it, but their download site doesn't seem to list AK300 firmware updates any more?

 

[Arghavan]

My AK T1p headphones has a spike in the 10K region and sadly the AK300 doesn't have this freq band on it's EQ.

 

[stoobot]

Absolutely astonished that there isn't more love for the AK300! Very much in the honeymoon period but the difference between the AK70 and the AK300 is night and day! There's so much more warmth and depth in the 300, almost valve quality warmth - by far the most analog sounding DAP I've used to date.

Only used the SE output so far into Orions and Rosies, but really looking forward to digging my balanced cables out. Was really surprised how much more low extension it puts out through the Orions, which are usually pretty light in the low spectrum.

Blown away!

 

[ceiji]

Sorry if its been answered before. Does AK300 drive an LCD-2 directly without an amp? I am looking for a DAP that has enough power to drive LCD2 directly. Appreciate any help

 

[Arghavan]

Sorry if its been answered before. Does AK300 drive an LCD-2 directly without an amp? I am looking for a DAP that has enough power to drive LCD2 directly. Appreciate any help

I don't think it will. You can try AK Kann though.

 

[SBranson]

Can you load the micro SD card through the AK300 or do you have to load the card separately? Just wondering if I have to get a micro SD with the SD adapter or not.

Thanks

 

[MickeyVee]

Yes, at least on a Mac - plug in the AK300, Android File Transfer sees both the internal and Micro SD as separate devices. Choose and transfer.
I would assume that it would be similar on Windows.

Can you load the micro SD card through the AK300 or do you have to load the card separately? Just wondering if I have to get a micro SD with the SD adapter or not.