Hello, I just joined, primarily for the audiophile products. Looking at purchasing the NHT C3 speakers for our new living room. Space is about 15 feet wide by 33 long and they will fire long ways. Space is just for general listening, music room with all equipment is downstairs, so hoping they will fill it with sound nicely. Cheers.
Mar 18, 2024
If you have a good DAC already, the X7 is perfect. If this is your first foray into audio DACs and amps, the X1S is a good first purchase for an all in one.
If you're satisfied with the Micca then the X1S would likely be perfect. If you plan on getting more headphones like Fostex TH-X00 or planar magnetic headphones, the X7 would have the power to make them sing via balanced out.
The optical port on the Micca is an in, not an out.
If you aren't thinking of picking up things that have high thresholds or high ohm ratings (beyerdynamics has 600 ohm headphone variants, and a lot of fostex/Denon headphones can take up to 2 watts [2000mw] of power). I have Audeze LCD-2 that are planar magnetic headphones and recommend at least 1 watt and can take up to 10 watts of power.
If you don't see yourself getting headphones like that, the X1S is a better deal all around. You also have to make sure the headphones have a balanced plug, so you'd have to buy balanced cables for your 6XX, I am buying balanced cables for my LCD-2, the Fostex TH-X00s on here need to be modded (or re-wired and re-terminated) to use balanced plugs. So that's an extra cost to keep in mind as well if they don't come with a balanced plug option (XLR 4-pin usually).
Like I said, unless you really want to get more headphones that require more power, the X1S is sufficient. If you don't want to get the $400+ headphones on here or other higher end headphones not on here (Audeze, Oppo, Hifiman, used Denon) you'll be just fine with the X1S.