[ExpatinJapan]

This is to replace our long message chats of general conversation, meet ups and head-fi  stuff.
 
(Not to be used for Gaijinpot style life in Japan musings and complaining about life in Japan ha ha)

 

[Currawong]

I visited Bakoon (Japan) the other week. Was interesting. We tried out his new DAC (5 man yen or so) and a prototype phono stage. The latter blew away the former. I should have realised that a SATRI circuit would be perfect for a phono stage.

 

[ExpatinJapan]

Met some friends for dinner on Saturday.
One them had remarked he wanted to get moar Bass on his headphones (some cheapo gamin headphones) whilst connected to his phone(Galaxy), I offered to sell him a FiioE11 that I have just lying about for ¥3000 (plus a L9 LOD just in case for future proofing).
 
He and some others tried my Fostex hp_p1 set up and were quite impressed, funny as my ears are better now and I can only hear the short comings these days (The murkiness is as Currawong has put it probably due to the opamp selection, another head-fier mentioned the bass opened up after several hundred hours, it did open up but to murk I think) looking forward to getting my Hifi-m8 to hopefully fix that.
If not I may sell my ATH-ESW9 and pick up the ATH-ES11ltd edition.
 
He has since written with the wow factor of using his first portable amp, ah I remember that.
My ipod 4th gen(?), with basic LOD and fiio E5 with sennheiser earbuds and crappy mp3s, I was sooo happy.
 
Those were the days.

 

[Currawong]

The opamp on the line out might be different, as the HP-P1 seems to sound better when using an external amp. I'm bringing it with the Pico Power next month to battle off with the M8. That reminds me, I need to ask Michael to bring spares.
 
I'm planning to go to e-earphone on Sunday at 11am and I thought we could have a mini-meet there as well, as I want to get around as many companies as possible on Saturday. That would be a better time, I reckon, to compare portable gear and anything else.

 

[ExpatinJapan]

Does the line out bypass the amp function? or is just via S/P dif output?
I tried the line out with few basic portable amps but couldnt tell much difference at the time.
 
Can you post a picture of your Fostex/Pico combo please with details of cables outputs and inputs please.
 
Sounds like the Hifi-m8 will be finished for shipping late May all going well.

 

[Currawong]

 
The line out definitely bypasses the amp. I forgot what I saw when I took it apart, but there were different opamps in there. Cable are ADL (don't feel it makes any difference) and a Norse mini-to-mini.

 

[gkanai]

I'm borrowing Currawong's AudioQuest DragonFly. I just had a new HRT microStreamer delivered, and I have the ODAC/C5 or O2 combo. So hopefully we can do a blind test at the May festival.
 
Borrowed AnakChan's M-100 and I have to say that I'm not looking forward to returning it. For all it's weaknesses wrt colored SQ, it's quite an amazing overall package. The problem is that I already have a bunch of similar headphones...

 

[ExpatinJapan]

looking good Currawong.
 
I think you may have seen these pics of the Fostex insides.
 
 

 
 
 

 

[ExpatinJapan]

Looks exciting!

 

[AnakChan]

I mailed iBasso & they told me to ask Hibino. I hope no silly exclusive Japan distributorship that we have to buy it from Hibino only.

 

[Currawong]

Could be worse. AKG/Harman told me to talk to the local guys about the K712 and K612. I asked them at the show about it and they told me that it was the first they'd heard about them! Total, utter fail.

 

[Currawong]

We had a mini-meet today. Posted here:
 
Fukuoka Japan mini-meet
 
I invited to our forum one of the members who came today, bayac (Paul) whom some of you have met in Tokyo.

 

[bayac]

Hi guys. We had a great time at Currawong's place today.
It's too bad I didn't have much time to hang out with you guys at the Tokyo Festival this time. Hopefully I have more time in the fall.

 

[ExpatinJapan]

i went to Fujiya Avic yesterday to buy some ATH-ES10 (i wanted to try then with the ESW9 lambskin pads vs the ATH-ESW11) but they were out of stock-waaahhhh.
 
But I went with my 2.56 year old son, and he pointed out my ATH-ESW9 headphones in the window amongst all the headphones `Papa no, papa no`, a proud moment for any head-fi father haha.
 
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In other news OMG! Beats tattoo (not mine!).
 

 

[AnakChan]

I just picked up a 2nd hand ES10 from Fujiya on Sunday (for someone overseas)!

He recognizes your headphones. That's awesome!

i went to Fujiya Avic yesterday to buy some ATH-ES10 (i wanted to try then with the ESW9 lambskin pads vs the ATH-ESW11) but they were out of stock-waaahhhh.

But I went with my 2.56 year old son, and he pointed out my ATH-ESW9 headphones in the window amongst all the headphones `Papa no, papa no`, a proud moment for any head-fi father haha.

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In other news OMG! Beats tattoo (not mine!).