I am looking into getting a pair of Hifiman HE-560's, But i don't want to spend loads on an amplifier and DAC. I know that the HE-560's need quite a bit of power to drive the Ortho drivers, My budget for this would be around £350. That is about $520 but if its a USA company and they don't have a dealer in the United Kingdom then i have to some what incorporate the import tax and shipping.
I was wondering about the May Flower Electronics Objective 2 amp, Which Logan seems to recommend but how well does it drive orthos? The same question applies to some of Schiit's equipment like Asgard 2 and the Valhalla 2 and some of the lower stuff. The Hifiman EF-5 looks pretty good.
Any advice and recommendations would be greatly appreciated!
Note i will be using them for listening to music on my computer as well as gaming, but i also will use it for listening through my Vinyl Hifi system.
According to this sheet the Hifiman HE-560 would use 100 mW and 44.7 mA at 2.2 V RMS to reach 110 dB, which is well within the O2's specs. Pretty much any amp from Schiit will work as well.
Epiphany Acoustics is a distributor of the O2 in Britain and Head 'n' Hifi is a distributor in Switzerland.
The Objective 2 is designed to be as transparent sounding as possible, the frequency response of the amp itself is +/- 0.7 dB, so it will reproduce whatever is inputted 99.9% accurately.
The newer (HE-X00 series and later) HiFiMan planars (orthos) are actually pretty easy to drive. I can use my HE-400's on my LG G3 with no issues. It's not quite as loud as I'd like in every situation, but if you're in a quiet room at home it's not an issue. I'd find out if you actually NEED an amp before you buy one.
EDIT: Oh, and my O2 can drive my HE-400's loud enough to make my ears bleed on high gain. It's got PLENTY of headroom for orthos, and it's pretty much as clear as you can get.