I think Moondrop S8's are OK.

3.5 stays in fine for me. That'd have to be a really heavy cable for it to have problems staying in. And it is less likely to break if yanked.

Those sure are some of the graphs of all time.

There are perhaps dozens of chifi IEMs released every month. Just don't pay them any mind.

XS are definitely one that needs a proper amp and dac. As to what to pick, that depends on budget and preference. A Schiit Magni and Modi stack would be a good starting point if you just want something simple.

I definitely wouldn't describe XS as laid back or lacking soundstage, so I think you're on the right track.

Right now I'm using a Teac UD501 and a Magni Heretic and getting pretty great results. I'm actually pleasantly surprised at how good it sounds considering I bought the Heretic as a temporary solution; it has tons of clean detail and good control over the bass.

Planning on going way overkill and switching to a Purifi speaker amp for my setup since I'm driving Stax as well, although I can't in good faith recommend going that route since it's an easy way to end up with blown headphones :P

In the case of the Abyss, he both measured it wrong and it's also just a bad headphone, intentionally compromised to produce a certain coloration (which to many people is enjoyable, I suppose).

It's also a bit tricky to gauge what constitutes "correct" measurement because the Abyss headphones are intentionally ported, meaning even perfect seal on rig produces some bass rolloff. Even so, the distortion there is still unacceptable for the price, that much I agree with.

Another example of him measuring wrong is any of his Stax reviews. You'll see that his Stax plots all have extreme rolloff in the bass, which just is not the case when properly fitted on a human head.

It's known in the community that the contour of Stax pads makes it hard to seal properly on traditional measurement rigs which do not have malleable human skin. They're designed this way to avoid needing any clamping force, preventing pressure and damage to the delicate diaphragm.

Despite having this explained, Amir hand-waves it away by claiming this is also how he hears them on his head. Which is within the realm of possibility of course (and is a fair criticism to make that the headphone is not suitable for some head shapes), but is not representative of the real performance of the headphone in normal circumstances.

Then there's his Stax amplifier measurements, where he argues with Kevin Gilmore after being told that his measurements are totally wrong due to using an incorrect load, forcing the amps to drive something they were never intended to.

It's a common theme for Amir to double down on his incorrect takes and try to discredit people who criticize him.

I've noticed that even a lot of his less questionable measurements end up being incomplete, and he basically just measures whichever plots he feels like at the time, instead of providing a consistent test suite to compare different amps with. Just look at how many times someone in the comments has to ask him to make a 32-tone FFT, for example.

Then for the longest time he never bothered to get a balanced 32 ohm load, making it impossible to compare balanced with single-ended amps from his measurements. It would've been as simple as soldering two resistors to an XLR connector, but he never bothered.

It's lazy and unacceptable for someone claiming to be "scientific".

I wouldn't care as much if it weren't for his large following, so the misinformation ends up being propagated far and wide and defended by people who understand even less about audio gear.

I think the Xbox requires some kind of authentication chip for USB audio devices, which is why there are separate Xbox and Playstation models of many gaming headsets. You'll wanna get one of the gaming-oriented DACs mentioned here that specifically have Xbox support.

The other option is optical out from either TV or HDMI splitter, and then connecting just the microphone to the controller. But apparently that can have issues with in-game voice chat being routed to the controller instead of the HDMI output, not sure if there's a workaround or fix since I don't have an Xbox.

It doesn't show up in FR, that's the point. The detail and separation sucks, theres no dynamics or stage. The only people I see call it good are the ones who are already biased based on the measurements and don't have much listening skill.

Fwiw, the noise floor isn't the only problem with the DAC. There's some weird clock drift or buffer issue that makes it literally pitch shift up and down every few seconds, and it's very much measurable (and audible if you play a tone)

Hard disagree. Quarks DSP has better FR but almost no technical ability to speak of. And the DAC in it is super wonky and hisses .

>quarks dsp

lol that one's so disappointing. Poster child for "good FR =/= good".

Lol, the volume knob on my ud501 feels nicer, yet the ifi micro sounds a lot better anyway (used as an amp)

I take my XS or ananda with the Go Blu on walks outside.

I really like Bluetooth receivers because half the convenience of wireless to me is not having a cable attached to the phone itself, not necessarily the absence of a cable entirely. Dedicated Bluetooth headphones tend to compromise on sound quality so this is a nice alternative.

Used to have a Qudelix, but I recently got the Go Blu because the volume knob is way more useful to me than the EQ features. Sounds a bit better too.

If the headphone's tuning is so egregiously wrong that I have to do wide >5db adjustments, then maybe it lets me hear what the headphone is doing better.

Usually though, no. You're just changing the input signal, not how the headphone driver reacts to that signal. Sometimes the headphone even gets worse with EQ because it brings out more distortion.