Recommendations for headphones under $400?

Hi uberwaltz,

I understand you incorrectly assumed the pre-outs would allow for connecting headphones but, since the pre-outs don’t function as you thought, connecting headphones using the pre-outs is not an option.

My proposed solution, however, is centered on using your Hegel’s digital output rather than the pre-outs. For this to work you need to have and do the following:

1. You need to use an external dac or dac/amp combo that has a digital input and l+r xlr outputs. These are ’musts’ and not all external dacs and dac/amp combos have a digital input and l+r xlr outputs.
2. You will need a digital coax (S/PDIF) cable (NOT USB - coax is the H300’s only digital output connection), and a set of XLR cables to do this according to the H300’s directions.
3. Connect the digital output on the H300 to the dac’s digital input using a digital coax (S/PDIF) cable.
4. Connect the dac’s l+r xlr outputs to the H300’s l+r xlr inputs using a pair of xlr cables. This completes the DAC-Loop the H300 instructions describe (out of the H300 via its digital output and the converted digital to analog signals back into the H300 via its l+r xlr inputs.)

Quote below is from your H300 manual:
"The DAC-Loop is activated/deactivated by holding the DAC+ button of the RC8 while pressing the IN+ button. A dot after the last digit of the displayed source input will indicate that DAC-Loop is activated. When selecting a digital source input with DAC-Loop activated, the display will read BAL for a short time. This indicates that both the selected digital input and the balanced input are active."
Of course, my proposed solution above will bypass the H300’s internal dac. I would expect the H300’s internal dac to be of high quality and, therefore, would expect the cost of an external dac (with a digital input and l+r xlr outputs) that matches or exceeds the performance of the H300’s internal dac to be somewhat expensive.
Unfortunately, this is the best solution I can think of thus far for your situation.
Hope this helped a bit,
Tim

Tim, I thought the same but if you read his entire post he wants to be able to use his turntable and the digital out on the h300 will not do an analog to digital conversion to use the dac loop. 

I am now wondering if a digital to analog converter would work for this. I have no experience with these devices so I cannot say if the sound would suffer. Perhaps if uberwaltz doesn’t need the extra power of the h300 maybe selling it and purchasing an H160 could be another solution. I just got one and it sounds very nice.

Hi chrshani37,

     Ah, okay.  I somehow missed reading he uses a turntable.   I was going to ask uberwaltz what sources he was using.

     I'm amazed a hi-end manufacturer like Hegel makes its customers jump through hoops just to listen to headphones with their products; I thought they'd have a premium headphone amp built into their expensive integrated amps that's easily accessible via a front plate headphone jack.  Weird, they decide to incorporate a good but costly dac in the H300 but cut corners by omitting a means to listen via headphones. 
     Apparently, my proposed solution won't allow uberwaltz to listen to his turntable via headphones  since the H300 cannot convert the analog turntable signals to digital signals outputted through its coax (S/PDIF).    
     Because of this, I think your suggestion of uberwaltz selling his H300 and buying a H160 is a good one.  He'll be able to connect all his sources directly to it and listen via his headphones to all of them by simply inserting his headphones plug into, are you ready for this?, a headphone jack right on the front of the H160's front panel. 
     Man, it sure must be nice to be able to afford an integrated amp that allows such spectacular technology to be accessed so conveniently.  I can only hope this leading edge technology will trickle down to an affordable product in my lifetime.

Enjoy,
  Tim    

     

Actually full source list
is 2 digital and 2 analog so yea i needed some way to get the signal out of the hegel to headphones
quite an omission on the manufacturers part but seems they have "learned" as all later hegel integrated have a headphone socket.
Have to regroup and decide what is best plan to go forward
Thanks to all for their input

May just give the Hegel h160 a try as it definitely has a great built in headphone amp and majority of the features of the 300 although down in power from 250w to 150w per channel.
However with the 300 i have rarely ventured above 50 on the volume for my listening levels and I really do like what I hear so more of the same vein might work well with the bonus of the headphone amp built in...which obviously the 300 should have had right from the start!