Headphone output heavily distorting on C400
 

Hi all,
I have my Fast Track c 400 bought used fro some 4 years now. But I have barely used it because I bought it for possible remote recordings. Now after some time I put it on a thorough test. My setup: Windows 10 x64, C400 with 1.1.7 x64 drivers. Everything worked just fine, except one thing: the headphone output had an awful distortion when listening to any commercially released music. That is to everything where the peaks frequently reach 0 dBFs. At the same time both Line outputs sound briliantly. I connected the C400 to 4 different PC with Win 10, Win 7, installed the previous drivers 1.1.5, used different headphones (Sennh. HD 600, A-T ATH-M20) but the situation never changed. The single way to reduce the headphone distortion was gradually reducing the Software Return volume. But that of coarse reduces the Line Output as well what I don't like at all. And with acceptable distortion the headphones volume was rather low.
Has anyone expierenced headphone distortion when listening to quality full scale recordings (Pop music) with C400, C600, or other AI from Fast Track series? I guess that my C400 has got simply some electronic fault. It could not be a driver's fault, because then anyone would blame them for that?
I used different DAWs for this test as well: Nuendo 6, Sony Vegas 12, Sound Forge 11, VLC player, switched from Windows Classic drivers to ASIO drivers. Nothing helped
I'm sorry for my long post!:-)

Maris

Re: Headphone output heavily distorting on C400
 

Sounds like the headphone output is shot. You could get a new(er) interface(and I would avoid M-Audio as they are mostly crap IMHO), or get a headphone amp:o

Re: Headphone output heavily distorting on C400
 

Yes, I think you are right. The headphone output is shot. But I don't think that M-Audio USB AI are crap. On the contrary- most other are crap. And why should Avid choose M-Audio as a partner?
And yes, the right solution is to attach a headphone amplifier to the secondary Line Output.
Most of the USB Stereo AI I have had my hands on have had all sorts of issues. I think the best and most reliable are M-Audio, Focusrite, Steinberg, Presonus, TASCAM, Audient. My next AI will be M-Audio again! :-)

Re: Headphone output heavily distorting on C400
 

which one is good from here?

Re: Headphone output heavily distorting on C400
 

DT-770 Pro all day long and HD-25 plus or normal HD-25 MK2 another given.

Re: Headphone output heavily distorting on C400
 

To Pluginer; you should have started your own thread about headphones.

To Maris; Avid's choice to partner with M-Audio was more likely about dollars than quality. Having owned and used several items from both manufacturers, I still stand by my comment(sorry):o