Cayin iHA-8 Fully balanced high-end headphone amplifier

Cayin Audio presents its new, tiny but mighty Class A headphone amplifier that packs a punch. With the iHA-8, the tube genius returns to the transistor world, delivering almost 20 watts of Class A power in a compact desktop format.

Despite its small size, the Cayin iHA-8A plays big and brings your music to life with the same dynamic and lively fervor that its bigger brothers in the Cayin range have already demonstrated.

The 75-watt power supply, the discrete FET design with Class A bias voltage and the enormous operating voltage of the optional Hyper Mode make it possible to drive any low-impedance headphones.

The iHA-8's newly added 4.4mm headphone output makes it a member of Cayin's new desktop family, along with the iDAC-8 and iDAP-8. If you want to connect IEMs, the electronic volume control with resistor ladder keeps noise to a minimum. These precise controls maintain the signal-to-noise ratio and channel balance down to the lowest level of the iHA-8's ALPS-controlled encoder.

Transparent at any volume setting, at both low and high levels, with near-perfect channel matching, this Cayin mini sound wonder reveals details hidden deep within your music.

With this linearity, you'll hear everything that goes in and comes out amplified. To support the outstanding signal-to-noise ratio of the two high-tech NJR MUSES72320 volume controls, Cayin relies on old-school Class A bias and high operating voltages. The latter can be raised to over 30 volts by pressing the Hyper Mode button on the iHA-8.

The FET voltage and power amplification of the iHA-8 brings a tube-like square wave function to the drawing board to reduce distortion. In doing so, Cayin keep the individual transistors in their sweet spot and ideal operating range to achieve the best open-loop linearity. They don't rely on the miracle cure of negative feedback to correct errors because there are so few of them.

The iHA-8 relies on a novel type of gain control that is only used as part of the feedback loops around the amplifier's output stage. Excessive open-loop gain is something Cayin absolutely cannot be accused of here, allowing you to crank up your volume control for the best dynamic performance. This in turn benefits the iHA-8's performance. Cayin's input stage - where the bulk of an amplifier's sonic signature is defined - is based on Toshiba's ubiquitous 2SK209 JFET. These JFETs, known for their low noise as drivers, serve another purpose: they allow Cayin to directly couple the iHA-8's output stage.

The frequency response is therefore virtually flat, ranging from 10 Hz to 80 kHz, plumbing the depths of the bass so that the phase response remains within the human hearing range - for fast bass, excellent dynamics and impressive precision.

The iHA-8's input JFETs are connected in parallel to provide the current required to adequately drive the large capacitances of Cayin's 24 Vishay MOSFET output devices. The resulting wide bandwidth preserves phase and adds spatial cues, imaging and treble ambience.

The iHA-8's many power transistors are mounted on copper rails, while the chassis has better heat dissipation compared to its predecessor. This heavy hardware allows the MOSFET buffers to stay cool and operate at a constant temperature. This way, they are able to handle most current while withstanding high voltage - useful when you think of Cayin's Hyper Mode.

The high number of output transistors provides immense current for good reason, to take advantage of a typically oversized Cayin power supply with a 75-watt toroidal transformer at its heart, 50,000 uF filter capacitors, ultra-fast rectification and end-to-end voltage regulation - even in the iHA-8's output stage.

All this results in Cayin's ultimate voltage source, once again capable of powering the AB1266 Phi TC from ABYSS Headphones, the LCD-5 from Audeze Headphones, Dan Clark Audio and the HE-6 and Susvara from HIFIMAN at low cost. But crucial optimizations in the signal path mean this giant also wears ballet slippers to augment any other real-world load.

Whether it's Fostex, Focal, Final Audio, HEDD Audio or ZMF headphones, there's nothing the iHA-8 can't handle... even IEMs like Subtonic Audio's Storm. Make the Cayin the centerpiece of a desktop headphone rig powered by your own iDAC-8, HIFIMAN's EF500 or Matrix Audio's Mini-I Pro 4. It's that good.

When stacked together, the iDAP-8, iDAC-8 and iHA-8 form a fully balanced head-fi system that requires a footprint of just 24 x 21.5 cm.