headphones - quality loss when splitting?

[KiNeSiS]

ok, my missus bought me an amazing electronic drum kit for my b'day - and i just got hold of some Roland RH-200 headphones which in my opinion are the mutz nutz (but i spose they should be for the $$$)

anyway, i wan't to be able to plug my other set of headphones in also, but when i run it through the splitter setup, the quality is drastically reduced...

standard setup #1: RH-200 (3.5mm stereo /w 6.35mm supplied adapter) -> V-Drums - sound quality superb!

splitter setup #2: RH-200 (3.5mm) + Other Headphones (3.5mm) -> 2-1 splitter (3.5mm all round) -> aftermarket 3.5mm-6.35mm adapter -> V-Drums - sound quality pap!

the splitter is just a radioshack one and the aftermarket 3.5mm-6.35mm adapter was just one i found in a box somewhere, so the quality of these two components may not be up to much...

my question is, if i get a good quality (gold plated and all that jazz) twin 3.5mm - 6.35mm splitter, will the sound quality be what its supposed to be, or do you always loose quality by splitting?

EDIT: basically, will a good quality version of this (if i can find one) do the trick?

 

[StevieDvd]

Unless you have a faulty adapter the quality won't be affected to the degree you say by the adapter itself.

The headphone out socket of the source is not expecting to have such a high load as you are giving it with 2 headphones, if the headphones are both low impedance ones it may work needing the volume up more, if they are different you'll find it almost impossible to drive both of them at the same volumes.

Are the other headphones on their own OK?

Check the impendance of each headphone on the packaging (or the internet).

For example Sennheiser HD650 are 300 ohm and most equipment would have difficuly running two of these together.


Steve

 

[KiNeSiS]

oh ok, well my Roland RH-200s have an impedance of 65ohms... whereas the Sony MDR-V150s are 24ohms...

this is not recommended then?

 

[StevieDvd]

If the Sony sound alright on thier own then the impedance mis-match is more likely to be the cause of the quality drop than the adapter.