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  #1  
Old 12-16-2024, 01:16 PM
kuene kuene is offline
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Default Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

I really want to get a pair of Beyerdynamic DT 990 Pro (250 ohm) headphones. But I'm reading conflicting things about how they will work with the MBox headphone amp. The DT 900 PRO X are 48 ohms, but I dont like them as much and they are 100 bucks more.

Anybody have any experience using the 250ohm DT 990s or another similar ohm headphones with their MBox?

Thanks!
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Old 01-16-2025, 10:45 AM
kuene kuene is offline
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

If anyone is curious, I ended up buying the 80ohm DT990s. While the Mbox was able to power them, it really required me to crank the levels too much. I opted for a rather inexpensive headphone amp with SPDIF input - and I now do my headphone mixing via that setup - which is plenty powerful and leaves me two headphone jacks still open on the MBox studio for tracking.
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Old 01-16-2025, 11:17 AM
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JFreak JFreak is offline
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

Sorry I missed this earlier.

250 ohm should not be any kind of a problem. That is why there is a volume knob. I am using Sennheiser HD 650 for checking the mix, and those are 300 ohm.
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Old 01-16-2025, 02:46 PM
Darryl Ramm Darryl Ramm is online now
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

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Originally Posted by JFreak View Post
Sorry I missed this earlier.

250 ohm should not be any kind of a problem. That is why there is a volume knob. I am using Sennheiser HD 650 for checking the mix, and those are 300 ohm.
But what interface or headphone amplifier are you using? Have you tested a HD650 on the Mbox Studio? I use the same HD 650s often off a Grace headphone amp/monitor controller and I have no experience with the MBox studio or its headphone amp. I would hope it was engineered to drive something like a HD650 well, but so many headphone outputs have issues, sure some are subtle.
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Old 01-16-2025, 03:09 PM
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

The problem with you and me is we can read specifications.

mBox Pro has 120 mW power into 32 ohm. My interface is Apogee Symphony mkII can do 80mW into 600ohm. That difference is not so much when we know what kind of scale decibels have.

THE big difference between mBox Pro and Apogee Symphony mkII is dynamic range. Former has 102dB and latter has 121 dB. That is the only significant difference.

Prove me i am wrong
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Old 01-16-2025, 03:59 PM
smurfyou smurfyou is offline
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

I used Beyer 770 250ohm with an old Mbox 3 Pro and it drove them just fine. I'd hope they wouldn't skimp so much on the MBox Studio. It's really not a big deal to drive high impedence headphones nowadays.
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Old 01-16-2025, 05:23 PM
Darryl Ramm Darryl Ramm is online now
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

Janne, the specs you quote don't tell us a lot. 120mW into 32 ohm does not tell us the output impedance of the headphone stage, or their limiting output voltages, or the harmonic distortion and noise as you increase the output level to handle harder to drive headphones. etc.

The issues the HD650 face is they have a higher impedance than typical, it's nominally 300 ohms, but varies from that and has some phase things going on that all make it harder to drive i.e. it wants a low impedance headphone output, as low an impedance as possible. The spec that Avid does provide does not necessarily just extrapolate to driving high impedance headphones, it's not necessarily as simple as just multiplying stuff.

The HD650 also have moderate sensitivity, which means more output voltage needed at the headphone outputs. (The B880 are nominally ~7dB less sensitive than the HD650).

So high impedance and moderate sensitivity together mean one of the challenges for driving HD650 type headphones is the headphone output amplifier voltage rails need more than just a few volts, that's hopefully more likely an issue only with low price/quality battery powered (i.e. 2 x 1.5V batteries) devices that don't have high quality DC to DC converters to provide good rail voltages. It is hopefully not an issue on any well designed mains powered devices.

As Smurfu say nothing should be hard nowadays in driving these headphones, and I expect Avid to get this right, but there are occasionally products that don't. So I think all three of us are saying the same thing in that we expect or hope the headphone output in the Mbox Studio can drive these headphones OK.

I suspect well designed quality devices not to have gross problems, but it still occasionally happens, and when it does for main powered devices I expect issues like unpleasant harmonic distortion with increasing gain to maybe be more common an issue.

Again I hope Avid designed the headphone output well here, but I just don't know for sure, have not seen any details of a circuit or have any idea who designed this for Avid and most importantly I've just not listened to an Mbox Studio headphone output on a HD650, or any other headphone and if I had one I'd A/B it against my other headphone amps. Until then it's "hope" and "expect" doing the lifting here.

The OP ended up using an external amp for loudness reasons, but we don't have all the info about what they are doing. Please watch our for hearing damage from high SPL levels with headphones, and watch out for the bass rolloff on open back headphones lulling you into thinking they are quieter because you are not getting as much of a bass thump. If you are listening in a noisy environment try out a good pair of IEMs, which can give stunningly impressive audio and sound isolation.

I do wish that at least for pro and prosumer gear vendors would spec headphone output better. If Avid have then sorry I missed it. I'd love to see vendors make sure they do provide good support for low impedance/low sensitivity headphones. At a minimum just some comment about "designed to drive high impedance headphones" and better give a max typical headphone impedance value as well. Or even much better go all out and give noise and distortion measurements at high SPL with hard to drive headphones, maybe a couple of data points. I'd also love to see all headphone outputs offer a decent crossfeed support (yes even if you can do it on software elsewhere).

Last edited by Darryl Ramm; 01-16-2025 at 09:35 PM.
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Old 01-17-2025, 11:36 AM
kuene kuene is offline
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

I'm not driving the 80ohm 990 Pros that much louder than I could with the MBox studio amps, but I just like the sound better with the external amp, a FX-Audio DAC-X6: very cheap, pretty good sound, and has switchable inputs between COAX, Optical, USB. The external amp setup does 2 other things for me: Lets me use the other usb/optical inputs for other sources, and frees up MBox headphone outs for tracking - which I use different headphones for. I'm sure I can/will use the stock headphone amps for mixing at some point. I honestly don't think the MBox would drive 250ohm 990 Pros to their best performance, judging by how it handles the 80ohm (compared to how it drives my Sony MDRs or Grado SR60s)
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Old 01-17-2025, 12:08 PM
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K Roche K Roche is offline
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Default Re: Anyone tried using 250 ohm headphones

Quote:
Originally Posted by kuene View Post
I really want to get a pair of Beyerdynamic DT 990 Pro (250 ohm) headphones. But I'm reading conflicting things about how they will work with the MBox headphone amp. The DT 900 PRO X are 48 ohms, but I dont like them as much and they are 100 bucks more.

Anybody have any experience using the 250ohm DT 990s or another similar ohm headphones with their MBox?

Thanks!
M Box no and 990 no, I do have a pair of Beyerdynamic DT 770 Pro @ 250 ohms and my Carbon HP amp output drives them fine. But I do not know how the M Box would compare
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