Hi Neal,

Sorry for the late reply, last week was a bit hectic, but I did promise and I forgot, so sorry. Anyway, about the amp situation, I had a go in my wife Mercedes and the results were interesting. As we discussed, on its own with the 3.5mm to 3.5mm cable that I got from who knows where, my Nano struggles to produce any real volume. As for my system, I’ve got a Blaupunkt Velocity 2Go 5, so I’m good to go.

Blaupunkt Velocity 2Go 5 speaker system for both in and outside of the car. Brilliant!

Belkin cable upgrade

The first thing I did was to switch the rubbish cable for my Belkin 3.5mm to 3.5mm cable, and the results were surprising. The difference was very noticeable, and the sound was as clean cut as the design of the cable. There was also an increase in volume.

The “Royal” Amp

iPod, C&C mini crystal 6″ mini-to-mini cable into the amp, Belkin mini to mini cable from the amp into the Mercedes jack. There was an increase in the depth of bass, and the volume, however I feel it was “overkill”. The amp can pump out more than the standard speakers can handle, even with the bass switch turned to the lowest settings if you’re not careful the speakers will wave a white flag. The speakers can handle the Belkin upgrade well enough.

FiiO E5 amp

Sorry no pics the battery ran out.

The FiiO E5 amp was another good choice, but again, the speakers began to show that they’d had enough, not as much as the Royal amp.

Conclusion

The Royal amp will provide a decent increase in volume. I didn’t analyse the sound to the standard set up. All I’d say is; if you want clean bass at a reasonable level, the Royal amp will do it. Personally, the Belkin cable will be a good way to clean the sound up and add a touch more volume.

Headphones tested on my fellow Drawing and Image Making Students.

This wasn’t supposed to be a test, but with most of the headphones being around the same (UK) price range, I thought it would be interesting to see which headphones they would take home. The headphone list includes:

Portable cans

Sennheier PX100
Grado iGrado
Ultrasone iCans

Full size cans - all around the £40

Kam KHP 1500
Denon AH-D301
Sennheiser HD212
AKG K518

High end

Sennheiser HD650 - they all loved them

Headphone amp

Cmoy - Penguin Royal Amp - nice piece of kit!

Natalie

Natalie liked the Sennheiser HD650’s of course, and the Denon AH-D301. She also took a liking to the Grado iGrado’s. The Kam KHP 1500 headphones were a bit too heavy (weight) for her. Can’t remember what Natalie said about the AKG’s.

Jamie

Jamie loved the Kam KHP 1500 headphones, and spent most of his time with them. He said that he preferred the bass on his Sennheiser HD202, than the HD212. The AKG K518 were too heavy in the bass for him. Jamie didn’t think much of the Denon’s. But one surprise was that Jamie liked the Ultrasone iCans!

Lee

Lee liked the AKG’s.

Sara - a bit camera shy

Sara was content with just hammering out her music!

Take a l@@k at these beauties

It looks like tinamps.com should change to woodenamps.com at this rate. These beautiful amps will be available on EBay soon, so stay tuned. Click the image to check out what these CMoy amps will have inside.