Actually the Ventus can be used for balanced input, or it can be setup as an ordinary non-inverting or inverting amp with SE input.

When setup as a non-inverting amp the input impedance can be very high. 100K (set with a resistor) would be fine.

The supply rails should be 15V.

Do you understand the purpose volumite? ;)

The Ventus is designed to drive headphones even 16ohm headphones. :)

Hi Bill,

You are correct. Placid BP or LCBPS would both be solid choices for power supply here.

Also a dual 15V secondary to get +/-15VDC out of the bipolar supply is exactly what you want.

Very glad to help. Have fun!

Cheers!
Russ

Forgot to add,

BTW, having fun is exactly what I am doing. Thanks for providing a product and service like this to us hopelessly addicted DIYers.

Cheers, Crazy Bill

If you are planning on using a pre-amp in front of the Ventus you would probably want to setup the Ventus for unity gain. This is pretty easy.

Hello Russ,

I'm planning to build a complete headphone system. This will be my primary music listening equipment. I have HD800 headphones. I decided to buy two Buffalo dacs for dual mono operation and two Joshua Tree for the balanced volume control. If I order a Ventus amp too, can I connect it directly to the buffalo dacs (to the JT) or should I use I/V stage? Can I use two Ventus per channel for balanced output to HD800? Is this amp class A? Is this amp a high end class device like B22 or is it better?

Thanks,
Kristóf

You could go directly out the Buffalo II to the JT and then Ventus, but I would not do so. It will not be ideal because you will be using the DAC as a voltage source, and it works much better as a current source.

I would use IVY-III prior to the JT to do the I/V conversion for your app. You can indeed use two Ventus per channel, but I can tell you from personal experience that the IVY-III can actually drive HD600,HD650, and HD800s very well all by itself. It sounds incredible.

I would also probably go with the Volumite over the JT here but that is purely your call. Either will work very well.

All you really *need* for awesome headphone use is BufII, IVY-III, and Volumite + PSs etc. Adding either 2 or 4 ventus would make driving low impedance cans (say < 100Ohms) incredibly awesome. :)

Cheers!
Russ

With stock parts it is unity gain. But that is easy to adjust to your liking.

Hello Russ,

Pkg arrived Friday, and I must say I'm impressed by the quality offered in this kit.

First newbie question.
I have no SS experience other than a cascode FET CCS in my tube circuits ( haven't actually built it yet though ), and of course they are static sensitive. Are any of the active devices in your kit static sensitive, or can I handle them w/o fear of damage.

Also, I've read all I can find on the net about the Ventus, and I should be able to figure out how to set the gain at whatever I need. I'll assess my gain structure and figure out where I need to be, do the calcs, and then ask here before I actually solder. I have great flexibility in the gain of the tube preamp, so I have the option of having the preamp provide all of the gain, having the Ventus provide all of the gain, or anywhere in between. So the question this prompts is :

In your experience ( or anyone else feel free to chime in ), have you noticed any difference in how the circuit sounds between being configured purely as a buffer or using gain. There are significant sonic differences in how I configure the tube preamp, so I have some flexibility to fine tune between the two.

I thank you in advance for your help.

Cheers, Crazy Bill

Thanks Brian

Appreciate the quick answer. That will help, of course, as I haven't a clue how to handle sensitive devices anyway.

One less thing to Google.

Cheers, Crazy Bill