Samson S-phone 4-channel Headphone Mixer/Amplifier Reviews

I purchased this Samson S-Phone Headphone amplifier. Initially it worked like a champ; plenty of volume, excellent tone control and more than enough headphone outputs. Unfortunately my unit failed after 5 months of minimal use. A pulsating buzz came from the headphones, all (indicator) levels peaked and there was no programmed output on the headphones. Luckily the unit is under warranty, but it will take 4-6 weeks before I get my unit back. I gave it a 3.0 rating because it works excellent, but the repair time in my opinion (from Samson) is unacceptable. The long repair time tells me either they really do troubleshoot to the PCB (board) level or they receive a lot of repairs under warranty. Either way it shouldn't take 4-6 weeks to repair a simple headphone amplifier.

This is our second one. Great for the studio. The individual channel inserts are very helpful. Clean sound.

Since it is really vital to keep the noise down in my neighborhood, I needed a headphone mixer that would allow a live band to rehearse without having to have a loud bass rig and multiple live monitors for vocals. This unit works really well for everyone as long as they have decent headsets.. Plenty of power and, through use of a 1/4" snake from my board, I can feed each person their own mono mix. I would recommend this unit.

This review will be simple, as most reviews are positive, as I think they should be. It's a fine unit for recording bands. I just want to make audio guys/pros/semipros aware that there is serious crosstalk between channels on my unit, so it would not be in the least bit useful for controlling multiple projects/rooms/speakers at the same time.

For example, when using the front aux inputs, you can have a separate stereo feed running into each of the 4 amps, combined with the main feed from the rear. If, for instance, you wanted 3 different users to be hearing only themselves and the main feed, this unit would be trash...they would be distracted by hearing the other user signals in the mix via crosstalk. Serious design flaw.

For bands or studio monitoring where there is only one mix happening at once, it works just fine, as the difference in db is, at my guess, around 20-25db difference, and masking will make the crosstalk effect negligible.

Also beware that you have to run a stereo feed into the front aux port or you will only get sound in the left phone.

Great unit for the price. I also highly recommend the OSP HPA-400 (recently rebranded) found on ebay for $100 if you have a cuemix setup to run prior to the amp and you are on a budget.

Cheers.

I needed a very quiet volume control for my headphones and monitors. This fit the job perfectly. I need silence when working with subtle arrangements. Just finished a short film score and I could hear the breathing of the actors instead of amplifier noise. Thank you, Austin Moss.