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vavent_ OP t1_j95br5i wrote

I already own it for 2 months, but the image has made when I only received it from the postal service. I bought B-stock for 399$ + 80$ import taxes and shipping, it's the first DAC/amp that I have bought new and not used, which means that I will lose much value if I decide to sell, but I was ready for this because you can't sell end game material. I'm in this hobby for 1.5 years, I had iFi Zen Dac -> Topping dx3pro -> Asgard3 + Modius -> Mojo, and now JDS Labs Element III

For whom can it be? I wanted small(because my desktop table is rather small), beautiful, with a BIG KNOB, powerful amplifier. It is a bit expensive, but you can find older elements for 250$ and 150$ respectively

After reading a million reviews, with different POV, after testing without volume matching and not blindly my different DAC/amps vs apple dongle and between each other, I understood that I don't hear enough differences with multiple DAC/amps, without proper testing I can't objectively say who is better, so I decided to lean more on the practical side, I can spend more time with headphones and on my life instead of testing DAC/amps, so I have gone for a beautiful minimalistic design and HUGEEE volume knob for excellent comfort and enough power for most headphones on the market, that's all that I want from my chain

I love my Element to death and don't plan to buy anything else for desktop use until it will break, then without spending time on any reviews would buy the next Element iteration which would be called something like 'Element X'.

Edit:I don't know why my image after uploading got skewed to the left, can't fix this

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covertash t1_j96msrn wrote

Congrats! :)

> I'm in this hobby for 1.5 years, I had iFi Zen Dac -> Topping dx3pro -> Asgard3 + Modius -> Mojo, and now JDS Labs Element III

Out of curiosity, what headphones do you use with the Element?

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vavent_ OP t1_j97eszf wrote

Thanks! I'm using HD600 and LCD-X and Arya in recent time, will write about them in future posts

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mckenny123 t1_j98cil2 wrote

For Arya you would probably consider a bit more powerful amp ...

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kikirevi t1_j98zch5 wrote

Yeah I heard the Arya need a powerful amp, but idk if that’s true. What are the benefits of getting a more powerful amp?

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mckenny123 t1_j9fawd0 wrote

More volume, more headroom, less distorstion, more base and probably treble ... So yes

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kikirevi t1_j9h2he7 wrote

Ah that sucks; I was really loving the element 3 but if Arya is that power hungry, do you have any recommendations?

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mckenny123 t1_j9j949k wrote

Topping L70 would be a good budget start. You can drive the most cans with it. Also Arya.

If you want to be absolutely sure than you can buy Topping A90. It is ver very powerful amp.

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NaniDaddy t1_j96zcab wrote

Hey I'm actually in the market for a new amp/dac and i've been sick of the experience that I had with my Monolith THX AAA AMP/dac unit. Do you have any thoughts to share for the DX3PRO and JDS ELEMENT 3? The price difference is almost double of one another but I'm curious if the sound/build quality would justify it. I've gone through 3 rmas on my monolith and my first amp/dac unit from mayflower electronics lasted for 4 years until the audio started producing some popping noises.

For my use case I switch between having my speakers plug in to the dac and my hd660s.

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vavent_ OP t1_j97z11o wrote

Well, if the price is in consideration, then something like a used Element II(250$~) would be a great choice, as I know, Element III has options for you to switch between speakers and headphones by pressing the knob or button at the back of the device, the main killer feature is a BIG knob, it's so good, that after using this knob, you will not want to get back to other devices, I can recommend it definitely for build quality and user experience

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MistaHiggins t1_j973rwp wrote

> Asgard3 + Modius

This is what I have right now and have been considering the Element III. Do you recommend the switch?

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vavent_ OP t1_j97zzxe wrote

If you looking for some sound quality improvement, then definitely not. It depends on what you want from the chain. I don't have much free space on the desktop table, so I decided to go all in for B-stock Element III. It has everything I wanted for simple use with a laptop and connecting my headphones to it, user experience is great, have zero complaints about it

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