Hey all,
I purchased a Fiio K11 R2R recently after my USB DAC that I had used for 10 years finally broke down. My headphones are AKG K701 and Sennheiser HD650. My original intention was to buy the K11 as a simple all-in-one solution, but I found the amp portion to be bit subpar (I might get a Balanced cable for 650 and give it another try though) so I tried it as a DAC only, first using the Line Out to my old Fiio E09K that I still have around. But the thing I noticed here was that K11 output was crazy loud, with even mere 9 o'clock on the dial on the E09K being super loud on LOW gain... I looked up the K11 specs and did read that the line output for it was a whooping 2.7 vrms, which is apparently significantly higher than most USB dacs which typically output 2.0 vrms. My questions here, since I don't know much about audio electronics was - is using the full power on Line Out in this case harmful at all to the headphones/amp at all? Why did Fiio choose to have the power output to be so overpowered?
I did try the Pre-Out as an alternative over the LO and used 80 on the K11 volume dial and got a bit more play on the dial (around 10/11 o'clock on dial) and the sound also seemed overall cleaner with no clipping (I think I heard some clipping on the LO), so I may go this route for now... would this also be the safest way to go for my headphones/amp/my hearing?
TIA!