A lot of unanswered questions here. Maybe we should sticky this thread someplace that gets more attention. I'll do my best and hope others will chime in.

For any owners of a Balancing Act: does the amp function as a preamp via RCA?  It seems the preamp is XLR only and the RCA outputs are fixed? Or just loopouts? I have long wanted to hear my Zana + BA together.

If purr1n hasn't gotten back to you, you should be able to pm him, CeeTee or Tari. I believe we have a lot of former BA owners here and am surprised no one has answered you yet tbh.

Anyone with Parasound 1600HD ?

Very little if any myself. I believe n3rdling might have some decent Parasound experience if you can contact him.

I was finally able to try my pair with my Mjolnir (had to wait for a fit tweak AND for the cable to arrive) and there is a lot of background hiss. Has anyone else experienced this with the Mojo and IEMs? Does the Mojo simply have too much gain to use with the UERMs?

Definitely too much gain. Not designed for IEMs.

What are some good sound practices to follow to avoid snake oil? How do you guys feel with people that say that cables or solid state amps do make a slight difference even if measurements might not even support this?

Depends on what we are measuring. Different cables do measure differently if you measure the correct thing. Question is whether those measurements translate into audibility. I have had experience with cables sounding different to me but remember price is no determination of anything other than you spent more money. Some cheap cables sound a hell of a lot better than some with many more zeroes.

We'd love to spend more time and effort trying to see if we can correlate measurements to perceived sonics if there is a relationship at all. However, we have much bigger fish to fry, such as amp (SS or tube) that measure similarly enough yet sound so different.

Remember, frequency response is just one measurement among many, and those are but few among many more which are either rarely displayed or even talked about if at all. You can measure a bright cable or amp versus a warmer one and find they all measure flat in FR. That's one reason its so easy for some people to be distracted and just write things off as 'sounding' the same. I can measure two cars that have the same exact size but that doesn't tell me they drive the same.

Only real way to know for yourself  is to hear them in a way that presents the least risk to your wallet.

I'm thinking of buying SE215 to use for phone calls, but many have reported that the in-line mic cable is quite fragile.

So I'm looking for a durable, readily-available replacement in-line mic cable (preferably black to match the Shures). Any recommendations? Maybe one of the Westones? Apple and Android remotes are both fine.

Or if you have a better idea, please let me know. Thanks.

Have you tried asking joker on H-fi or Kunlun/tomscy2000 here?

I've been out of headphones for a while now, just have what I've have had for some years and stuff.

Is $250 for a PM3 a good deal?

I've heard better things about them than the PM1 or 2. If they are more clear and open/delineated than those I'd think they might be a decent buy. I'd definitely ask others. Maybe OJNeg has heard all three?

Thanks for that, I really do miss and prefer the isolation, size and form factor of a CIEM again though.

The Roxanne's look very enticing.

Was asked this today and i think it'd be cool to hear what you guys think: best bluetooth headphones? (Considering wireless perfofmance only.)

Thank you

C

Hey guys,

what's the Valhalla 2 equivalent (price and especially performance) for low-Z high current headphones that need to be taken by the balls with hands of steel? Hifiman planars, Audeze, but also D7000, TH-900 and Co.