I’ll try my luck here. I’ve been looking on and off for some time now but haven’t come up with a “proper” solution yet.
I have a Focusrite 2i2 Gen1 at home. It’s fine for recording guitars and my Kemper, but the Headphone output is lacking a bit. I’m using it as my primary Audio device for the PC.
Additionally, i have my Kemper Profiler with a seperate headphone output. That is much better. I can’t use that as a audio Device for the PC though.
So, what i’d want is a Headphone Amp (might be with DAC but doesn’t have to be) that can accept two inputs and has enough oomph to drive the 300Ohm HD600. The source can be either switchable or with seperate volume controlls and blendable. I don’t care too much.
I’m not looking into getting anything head-fi level of endgame. More in the simple and sub 100 bucks category. I’m not really a audiophile and don’t care for the last percent in optimal quality. Just a clean powerfull signal.
Also, the smaller and cheaper the box, the better.
I looked into some options (JDSLabs Atom, Schiit stuff etc.) but most Amps only offer one input and simple audio switchers that don’t degrade quality aren’t to easy to find or prohibitively expensive.
So, any tips?
I have an ART HeadAmp4, wich only does the headphone ampliefier part of the job. Am quite happy with it.
The HeadAmp4 Pro allowes 2 inputs per headphone, one main input and a secondary. Switch wise, you can only disable the auxiliary on the outputs, not the main.
Alternatively, get a heaphone amp and a desktop mixer that allowes two (or more) stereo inputs. That is how I have my setup.
Edit: Schiit Sys is just an input switcher.
Ignoring your budget, THX AAA 789. It’s the new Platinum standard, and for a lot less than everything it out-competes.
Paying attention to it… A Geshelli Labs Archel Pro.
https://geshelli.com/archel-pro
You mentioned the Atom, probably the other one to look at. People like to compare the two, the Archel and Atom. In a pure numbers game, the Atom would look to edge out the Archel but in all subjectivity it is your ears alone that make the decision. They are both at the top of their game in this monetary range, and they both have two inputs via the same mechanism, a RCA and a 3.5 on the back switched by a small front facing button.
One thing that seems to be said over and over is how the Archel is powerful and loud, loud AF actually. For high sensitivity things like IEM it is actually too much when sourced from most DACs. But for something low sensitivity like you are using, this will be a boon. I’ve seen it recommended for such uses for this reason.