Outstanding value, rich, full, clear, clean sound. No outstanding coloration.

I'm still looking for one.

I've used my X-CANv2 for approximately 2 weeks now and I am completely in love with it. I listen to a wide variety of music and I've yet to find something that does not sound outstanding on this amp.
From Sarah McLachland and James Taylor to Nine Inch Nails...the presentation is flawless. The vocals tend to be very forward in a pleasing manner.
It powers my Sennheiser HD-570s with ease. I rarely have to turn the volume knob more than 1/3 the way.

My one complaint is not with the unit itself...it's with my CD player. I hear every jitter now... it misses not a single detail.

Anyone looking in this price range and does not buy an X-CAN is nuts. I'd gladly have paid another $1-200 for it if I had known it was going to be this good.

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Sound,appearance,size.

Mains lead flimsy.

I bought this amp as I did not want my choice of amp tied to only those with headphone sockets(I listen mainly at night in my flat and I have to consider the neighbours).What I did not expect was how good it would sound.It is probably the biggest leap in sound quality that I have noticed.At present I have an Arcam 10 amp and my ambition was to own a Krell 300i,but now I am seriously looking at valve amps in the same price range.Only reservation is how long do valves last? One review said about 4500hrs and that would be only six months if you leave it on all the time as is usually recommended,another said turn it off when not in use to prolong valve life.Although they might not sound so good transistor amps sound easier to own.Anyway if you listen to headphones this amp is a must buy!

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Sound quality

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This is my second review for this little amp and it is just an update because in the last I expressed a worry about how long the valves would last. Well the amp hasn't been switched off now for over 18 months and there have been no problems. P.S. I have noticed that despite giving this amp a glowing report, my last review only had 2 stars, this was my mistake as I really meant to give it 5 stars.

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In a system consisting of Meridian 508.24 CD player, either Straight Wire Maestro II or Kimber KCAG interconnects and Audio Power Power Pack II power enhancer the Musical Fidelity X-Cans drove my Sennheiser HD-600 headphones for about a month. The X-PSU power supply upgrade was also utilized. If you are considering auditioning the X-Cans product be sure to give them at least 30 hours of break-in time as the sound improves considerably after break-in. First thing I noticed about the X-Cans is their midrange purity. Very smooth midrange.Makes listening very pleasurable and it makes most CD listening tolerable. The base although not boomy or loose is not as tight or extended as some of the solid state headphone amps like Headroom, Creek or Krell. The highs are smooth and surprisingly extended for a true Class-A triode product. Overall the product makes for very pleasant headphone listening experience with virtually no faults or serious defficiencies other than slightly weak base. Considering the product can be purchased for around $200 and the power upgrade costs $170 this product is a tremendous bargain. There are products which will give you more resolution, detail and base but you will have to spend a little more. The weak base takes away 1 star and I am giving this product 4 stars.

I'd like to know more about the design of this little amplifier, because it seems to offer, in miniature, a taste of high-end Class A tube amp audio at incredibly low cost. Is it single-ended, push-pull, etc.? Whatever, the sound is beautiful, clear and unfatiguing. Nice case, too.

Nice, rich vocals.
Good slam in bass.

Have to wait for one hour after switch on to hear its best.

Bought a pair of X-CANS after reading all the reviews.
I was a bit skeptical at first as the sound I'm getting from my Marantz CD63KI on my pair of Grado 125 is not bad in the first place.

I bought my X-CANS together with the X-PSU. I was quite disappointed with the sound at first - loss in dynamics, no bass. I then decided to let the system run-in for the next 3 days - still no significant sign of improvement.

Then I decided to listen to the X-CANS without the X-PSU, voila! The dynamics, the bass and the airiness returned.
Vocals are much richer than before.I therefore returned the X-PSU. Thank god for the home trial.

Not sure how long those tubes last but they don't seem to go too hot as compared to my tube amplifier.

Anyway, i would recommend this product to anyone looking for a headphone amp on merit of its sound qualities given its price.

... together with Sennheiser HD-600You know, I simply can't stop listening to them. Speakers, cables, amps, pre-amps... it all seems like money wasted for nothing. You have to spend an absolute fortune to build up a system which would deliver sound signals from CD to your ears with the same quality, relaxation and excitement. A whole new world.... I never thought that Rotel RCD971 could sound that great and man, what would it be like with a real high-end source ?
I use X-CANs together with X10-D and this tandem seem to be near to perfection. I am thinking of adding X-PSU for ultimate performance of these 'barrels'.
Take care with the volume control - gain is tremendous.
I agree with some other reviews below - bass could be tighter but overall it's so sweet that you will get used to it very quickly. If you are a buyer of serious headphones for serious listening, get one now.

great sound.

Bad volume control knob, problems with wiring logistics.

I do most of my critical listening through headphones. I'd
heard that headphone amps sound much better than the jack on
amplifiers. When my baby pulled down on the headphone cord
while it was plugged into the amp and messed up the jack, it was time to either get it repaired or buy a headphone amp. I chose the latter and bought an X-CANS. I picked it because I've always liked the sound of tubes. It was probably the second-best upgrade I've made to my audio system in the last 20 years (a speaker upgrade was the best).

I use it with my Sennheiser HD-580 headphones and Sony MDR V7 phones, with Recoton interconnect cables, and usually with a Recoton headphone extension cable. The improvement over the amplifier headphone jack is great - a bigger improvement than I expected. I didn't compare X-CANS to other headphone amps, so I don't know if most of the change is due to using a separate amp, or due to the tubes. I suspect that just having a separate headphone amp is the major reason for improvement.

The sound using X-CANS is great. I find myself listening with lower volumes than I used to, since I can hear details as well with X-CANS at lower volumes. I find listening less fatiguing with X-CANS, but that is probably because I can listen at lower volumes. (X-CANS can drive your headphones to extremely high volumes, as I found out when my baby turned the knob all of the way up. I use the volume knob between the 9 and 10 o'clock position.)

There are a few shortcomings and drawbacks to X-CANS, though.
First, the volume knob much too small; and there are no tick
marks or numbers to aid you. (The unit doesn't have a remote
control.) Secondly, although the unit has rubber feet and is
fairly heavy for its size, you still need to hold down X-CANS
when you're plugging or unplugging the phones.

Finally there is a wiring logistics problem (and this applies to all headphone amps). The unit has a pair of RCA inputs and a pair of RCA outputs, so you can pass a signal through the unit, and tap into that. Normally you put it inline on one of the tape outputs of your regular amp. However, this limits what you can do. For instance, my amp is typical with inputs and outputs for two tape decks, and tape 2 has a monitor. If you put the headphone amp inline with tape 1 you can't listen to either tape deck using the headphone amp. If you put it in the tape 2 output, then you can listen to tape 1 but not tape 2 with X-CANS.

I'll refer to my two tape decks as the "old" one and the "new" one. When I copy from one to the other, I usually copy from the old one to the new one. When I record other stuff, I normally use the new one, and I play back most stuff on the new one. For these reasons, it makes sense to have the new deck on tape 2, the one with the monitor. However, since I usually use the new one for playback, it has to go on tape 1 if I want to listen through the headphone amp (which must go on tape 2). So, there is no direct way to allow me to set up the headphone amp so that I can listen to the new deck, and also have it set up the best way for recording. One of those tape deck switches should solve the problem, though. Of course, you can still listen through the amp headphone jack when you can't use the headphone amp; or have a second headphone amp for the output of the tape deck; or you could put the headphone amp inline on tape 2 monitor, and run everything through the deck on tape 2.

If you are listening to only one line-level source with the headphone amp, you could put X-CANs inline between the source and your amp.

I bought the X-cans for my father, I have had only a small amount of time listening to them thought they seem to be a nice product. I was expecting more from the pure class A / Tube triod effect. The overall character of the sound was like that of very good solid state I thought, If you are looking for a warm sort of tube sound, it's not there. The sound is very pleasent, and makes for nice critical listening. I was listening through a 16 bit Magnavox CD player and AKG Electrostatic dynamics ,AKG 240 headphones, and Grado SR60's. It is not the place to say this, but if you are into headphones give the AKg's a listen they don't get alot of press but they are great headphones.

I tried the X-Cans (with and without the X-PSU power supply) head to head against the Home Headroom Headphone Amp. Both provided smooth and detailed sound through my Senn HD-580 headphones and frankly, I could not detect any substantial differences in the sound quality between the two units.
In terms of quality, the sound that I got through the dedicated amps were infinitely better than the sound from the headphone output of my Harman Kardon receiver. However, the sound through the headphone output of a Sony XA-20Es cd player was just as good as the sound quality from either the X-Cans or Home Headroom.

My only complaint with the X-Cans is that there is a loud chirping sound (power discharging I think) when I turn off the power while the headphones are still connected to the amp.