On Tue, 16 Dec 2014 19:27:47 +0100, Gianfranco Ceccolini wrote: > AFAIK they are only popular in Japan. > > http://www.stax.co.jp <http://www.stax.co.jp/> > > It is a complete different technology. Instead of using and electro > magnetic system, like small speakers, it uses a high voltage (~500V) > electrostatic system, hence the need of a dedicated amplifier. > > You can get an used unit at eBay. > http://www.ebay.com/sch/Consumer-Electronics-/293/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=stax > <http://www.ebay.com/sch/Consumer-Electronics-/293/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=stax> > > The one I tried was from the 80’s and sounded fantastic. Good sound, that in addition is relatively neutral for studio usage, is one thing. Another aspect is that the phones are usable with "normal" headphone amps [1] and that the headphone survives a fall down on the floor. I know several headphones with better studio usable sound than the AKG I mentioned, but non of them is able to survive accidents that good as the AKG I mentioned does. Btw. I'm used to 80's consumer, prosumer and professional audio gear and I've got an affinity to some Japanese audio engineering and gear :). A lot of 80's gear from several nations IMO can't be replaced by modern gear, OTOH e.g. modern op-amps chips are far better nowadays :), some nowadays prosumer gear is better than old professional gear is. Regards, Ralf [1] Btw. I reported many issues caused by the RME HDSPe AIO on my Linux machine, but this sound card provides a good headphone output. I can't believe how good it is. For my home studio needs I don't need a special headphone amp, because the RME's amp is that good. I didn't compared it to studio amps yet, but I suspect it is as good, as many studio headphone amps are, it at least is _much_ better than most of the headphone outputs I'm used to in my home studio. _______________________________________________ Linux-audio-user mailing list Linux-audio-user@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx http://lists.linuxaudio.org/listinfo/linux-audio-user
