I am curious if I would benefit from a budget amp like the Monolith Liquid Spark for general mixing use. I generally have no complaints about the volume level I’m achieving with this combination, but I have noticed that I’m having a difficult time perceiving subtle dynamic characteristics like compression, especially in the airy high frequency areas that is complicating the translation of my mixes. I’ve never used a headphone amp, so in one sense I don’t know what I’m missing, but I acknowledge that this may simply be a limitation of my listening skill and headphones in general. What do you think?
Julian Krause tested the SSL 2 along with its headphone output. Assuming the headphone output on the SSL 2+ is the same:
it’s output impedance is low enough to not change the frequency response of the 6XX,
So the amplification is good enough.
I think you would benefit the most from EQ. I suggest the preset from oratory1990: https://www.dropbox.com/s/qs4hs92tvfbwr04/Sennheiser HD650.pdf?dl=0