Balanced Headphone Drive
You may have heard something about 'Balanced Headphone Drive' lately. Many headphone afficionados will tell you that balanced drive is the ultimate nirvana of headphone listening, the cat's meow of cans, the creme de la creme of personal audio systems. HeadRoom invented reference balanced-drive headphone systems with our original BlockHead Balanced Amp nearly a decade ago and we've made even further strides in 2009!
Balanced Headphone Drive is an amplifier scheme that uses two wires to deliver equal and opposite audio signals to each side of the headphone driver coils. When properly done, a significant increase in audio performance is heard due to the doubling of slew rate and voltage swing power; the reduction of some distortion components; and virtual elimination of crosstalk at the headphones due to the elimination of the common ground. The end result lends an extremely expansive quality to your headphone listening experience, as well as very transparent and refined musical detail, tight rich bass, and perfectly pronounced mid-ranges. Indeed, many listeners tell us this is the closest headphone listening has come to not sounding like headphones at all!
How Do I Get a Balanced Headphone System?
First, you MUST have a balanced headphone amp and your headphones MUST be recabled for balanced drive to XLR left/right connections. Balancing headphones is typically an aftermarket procedure (performed here at HeadRoom by our in-house recabling experts), which changes the headphone connection from a standard 1/4" jack to stereo left/right balanced XLR connections. You may purchase a brand-new set of reference headphones recabled for balanced drive, or you may send in your existing headphones to us to be recabled for balanced drive operation. This procedure is only available on a limited number of worthy headphones, so visit our list below to peruse our Balanced Headphone selection.
Learn More:
Read our FAQ to learn more about the basics of a balanced headphone system.
Visit our Article Series to dive in to our technical explanation of exactly how balanced drive works.
See Available Products by perusing the listing below. Our Selection Guide will provide more specific recommendations. Don't see what you need? Some limited custom configurations are available, see our custom page for more info.
