Thanks @NickZ for the XLR-RCA explanation. Ignorance was certainly bliss for those 20 years!
I’ve read enough posts on this forum warning people not to use those cables, so I’m glad I double checked with Schiit.
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After looking at all the threads about jot 2 and impressions from people I know, it seems like the Jot 2 is an improvement but basically the same old schiit as jot 1. Guess I’ll be keeping my overpriced SS amp instead of buying a $2400 amp for $400. 
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Might be tough to go back to your Asgard if you’re selling it though… 
No worries drifty…I have lots of Schiit stuff here…
But thanks for your concerns!!
Happy New Year!
Dude!
Alex
What a controversial amp this Jot 2 is!!!
Some how I like this back and forth of impressions, is for sure not going to make everybody happy, probably not even the people at Schiit.
At this point sound safer to stack a Magnius and an Asgard 3 ( if you don’t mind too much schiit) for $400 than the Jot 2.
Happy Holidays people and Happy New Year!! Let’s hope for a better year, we all need it!!
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For some nothing makes them happy…
Its just the norm.
Happy New Year!!
Alex
Who has put ears on a functioning unit for more than 60 minutes and regretted their purchase or didn’t think it met expectations of a $400 amp? Pardon if I missed it. I won’t insert qualifier for optimized configuration.
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I find the whole thing quite interesting. I admit I’m still a newbie when it comes to amps (although maybe experience with 5 amps graduates me from kindergarden to 1st grade? 
), so maybe this is a little more fascinating to me than to everyone else. Anyway, everything else I’ve bought has been plug and play, and although each of the amps has been different to each other, the differences have been within a set of boundaries, and I’ve been happy to switch between the amps to get the different flavors. For me (and obviously YMMV), the Jot 2 didn’t easily fit into those boundaries, so I’ve been trying to figure out if I can expand those boundaries to let it fit in.
I don’t think the knives are out, if you’re referring to the “livestream” style comments from @bpcarb and me. On the contrary, we’re putting some effort in, in a positive way, to find the sweet spot that suits our particular listening requirements. I suspect we both like similar sound signatures, so we’re agreeing with each other a lot. We need some input from someone with a different palate to balance out our commentary. Is that you? 
I can’t remember if I mentioned it above, but I rushed into buying the Jot because I had the Burson Soloist 3XP on a 30 day trial, and given that they both have similar power, I wanted to compare them. I only needed the Jot to equal, or even get close to the Soloist and I would send the Burson back, because it’s more expensive and doesn’t have SE preamp outputs. With all my unconscious (and conscious) biases screaming support for the Jot, I was surprised that I liked the Soloist more. To me, the Soloist sounds just as muscular, but smoother, less bright, more holographic and 3D, and the tone doesn’t appreciatively change when I switch from SE to XLR outputs.
I like the Pendant more than the Soloist, but they’re so close that if someone wanted to spend $1000 to get close to a $2000 amp, I would recommend trying out the Burson amp. I love my Lyr 3 and I’m not letting it go. 
So now I’m at the point where I have a few more days to decide whether to keep the Jot 2. I like the fact that it’s different, and I think I need that difference to keep my ears fresh (I got that excellent advice from you, Alex!), so I’m guessing that I’ll keep it, especially because I’ve tinkered enough that I’m really enjoying it.
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All’s good here!
Totally understand your search for the best settings to use etc…
IMO one of the strengths of the Jot 2 is the ability to have many selections etc…
In the past gain settings were used to drive hard or inefficient headphones. Use the lowest gain possible to achieve the sound needed to drive a load well.
The lowest gain was the lowest possible distortion and to stay away from clipping.
With simpler amps it was low or high…with no real “I wonder” what the sound difference will be in one gain vs another…simple life.
You add the multiple inputs, circuits and multiple outputs and those multiple gain settings we often do get lost in all the “noise”…
TBH all the settings on the JOT2 are really close …and we are picking at straws here IMO.
But to many this is debatable and will be for a long time…
We take so much time to try to find the minute differences we get lost in the journey…
If you actually took the time to do this in a more objective manner I think the differences would be a lot less than you think. Thats me. From my experiences.
Any time u touch that volume knob in a more positive direction it gets better to most of our “brains”…
Back to enjoying the music!
A.
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This logic checks out to me!
Thanks for the heads up. I was aware of the general view that these aren’t recommended, but I proceeded to buy and try for science and to see/hear for myself. I don’t regularly have them in my chain, however.
In my email exchanges with Schiit, they tend to lean toward being conservative in their advice, which makes sense as they don’t want to be liable for any damage or endorse what they haven’t fully tested. For example, for the Vali 2, they didn’t mention the 6CG7 as a tube tested and recommended – even though several owners/users find it to be among the best tubes for the Vali 2. Lo and behold, less than 4 weeks later the Vali 2+ dropped, and the 6CG7 is now listed as an officially accepted tube (was not listed for the Vali 2 if I recall). Risk reward, Robert Frost sometimes maybe.
No knives between you and me 
.
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Tying grounds together is not a good thing to experiment with on many amps…especially a balanced amp. The amp was designed to have separate grounds for both left and right.
A,
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oh my!!
lol…
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That was just my little “Knives Out” joke, in case people didn’t get the reference. And if you haven’t seen it, drop everything you’re doing and go watch it on Amazon Prime.
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Alex was completely right that it’s very hard to subjectively compare two outputs that have different volumes and people have to take that into consideration when reading my comments. I’m not pretending to be scientific about this, there’s no blind testing, and I’m volume matching by ear.
That said, I’m listening specifically for brightness and/or too much energy in the highs (in case there’s a technical difference between the two). Out of the box, using the same single ended cables I use on my Pendant, Lyr 3 and Soloist 3XP, the Jot was much brighter than the other amps. Too bright for my taste, which may be different from others, but then I bought it for my use, so my taste rules.
I just played snippets of Funkadelic’s “One Nation Under The Groove” (from the namesake album, the 1993 Charly edition for those that want to replicate it) for what seemed like 100 times, comparing various combinations of cables, outputs and amps. The track has a lot of treble energy, which was really all I was trying to focus on, because I am sensitive to brightness, and I was “measuring” the relative brightness by seeing how I reacted to the cymbals and guitars. I even turned the volume of the SE output up so that it was louder than the XLR output, just to see how my brightness radar reacted. Again, not making any scientific claims that this was the correct thing to do.
I first listened to the Soloist 3XP to give myself a baseline, on both SE and XLR out, and then did the same thing on the Jot 2, using the same cables. The Jot was overall brighter than the Soloist, and the XLR outputs seemed brighter than the SE outputs. I tried this with my Stellia (low gain), Verite, Aeolus, 6XX (all on high gain). The differences were smallest on the Stellia and 6XX.
I also tried switching between high and low gain, and the sound was less bright using low gain, but I didn’t enjoy the overall sound on the Verite, Aeolus and 6XX. The amp seemed to be more in control of those headphones when using high gain, which is consistent with what I’ve found on my other Schiit amps.
I tried a Pangea XLR cable, first to the Soloist and then to the Jot 2, and got the same results.
At this point, I stopped comparing amps and started switching cables on the Jot 2.
I switched the interconnect from my fancy Furutech OCC copper cables to Schiit Pyst and some of the brightness went away, but it was still there. The differences were smaller but I still heard them, and I had consistent results on the same 4 headphones.
I switched to my old Van den Hul “The Second” cables and the brightness went away, so I’m guessing that the VDH cables are acting as a treble filter. The Jot 2 now sounded wonderful to me, very balanced, so I could focus on all the music instead of just the highs. The treble differences were tiny, but still there if I was actively looking for them. But what was more apparent now was a smoothness in the vocals on SE that wasn’t there in XLR. I went back and forth multiple times and heard it quite distinctly. It was interesting, the XLR output had a little more of an “etched”, very detailed character to the vocals, and the SE was smoother but still had a 3D presentation. Neither was better than the other, just different.
Using my Van den Hul interconnect cables, the Jot 2 sounds perfect. Vocals and instruments have a 3D texture that’s missing from the Lyr 3’s flatter presentation. Bass is full and controlled. The amp has rhythm, judging from my foot tapping. There’s a ton of detail in the music, much more than the Asgard 3 that I recently gave my son. My powered Emotiva monitors and sub also benefit from the detail and texture of the music.
I was looking for a solid state amp for headphones and also to connect to my monitors, and I had to choose between the Jot 2 and an Asgard 3. I’ve decided to keep the Jot 2 in my SE setup.
Since my Soloist was still in its trial period, I was hoping to send it back and keep the Jot 2, but I’m keeping both because to my ears, the Soloist sounds a little better - a tiny bit more holographic and 3D, a little smoother and it doesn’t have the brightness of the Jot. Physically, I don’t have room for both the Jot and the Soloist, so I’m going to move the Soloist to another area on my desk, to start a new fully balanced setup, as it sounded really good using my new XLR cables.
I know that it looks like I focused primarily on the highs, but that’s what stood out to me the most as far as negatives go. Everything else sounded just right, irrespective of cables, SE, XLR etc. It might be that I’m more treble-sensitive than others, in which case it will be a nice plug & play for those people. I’m just happy that I tinkered with it enough to enjoy all it’s qualities. It’s unfortunate that Schiit made that “best $2400 amp for $400” claim because it distracts you from the fact that it is a tremendous value at $399.
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I am in total AWE with your experiments!!! Great Job!
The Jot 2 for $399 is an excellent all around amp!!
It easily compares to amps costing much more…and the debate will never end.
Enjoy the music !
Happy New Year!
Alex
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Thanks, it was a lot of work. I do not feel envious of all the people switching gear on a regular basis in order to do reviews. I’m done buying for now, I love all my equipment and I’m going to plug everything back in to its rightful place and focus on the music.
One thing I’ve learned is that “better” is so subjective. It can depend on what music you like, what sound signatures you like, and also what mood you’re in. I like all of my amps. I also like the Asgard 3 that I gave my son, and I wouldn’t be surprised if I sometimes borrow it while he’s asleep.
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Care to post a list of links that have this conclusion?
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Jot 2 cabling and SE and balanced configuration options are way more complicated than the Knives Out plot.
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I was actually disappointed in Knives Out. Still enjoyed it but was maybe expecting something more. I think my expectations were too high for it given some of the buzz around it.