Using headphones with Rogue RP-1

@mulveling , Thank you for your input especially regarding Rogue products.                 @thegreenline , Great question thank you for asking. I too have the Rogue RP-1 and tried to run my Audeze LCD-2’s. I found the Rogue to be flat and lifeless and went to a standalone system. It never occurred to me as suggested above to use the extra pre outs. I’ve added NOS Tekefunkens, upgraded power cord, and vibration dampers underneath the Rogue and am very pleased with its performance for an entry level pre.  For now I use a Project Stream Box Ultra to a Cambridge DAC Magic 200M. FWIW I have 3 Schiit DAC’s and you can’t go wrong with their products. My intent is to use the Project , Schiit Bifrost ( currently unused) and get either a Schiit amp or go tubes with a Quicksilver. Cheers , Mike B. 

DON’T feed the A90 into the Rogue. Take the preamp output from the Rogue (one of the 2 RCA outputs on back, NOT the fixed level one) and feed that into the A90. Then plug your headphones into the A90 (or Schiit). Find a reasonable level on the A90 or Schiit (probably somewhere around unity gain to +6dB or so) and leave it there, using the Rogue for remote volume control. That should be far superior to the other way around.

Rogue has a long and annoying history of including pathetic headphone jacks as “bonus” features in otherwise very nice preamps and integrated amps. I wish they would stop doing this. Do it right, or leave it out. Ironically, by all accounts their dedicated RH-5 headphone amp is a good unit. But their “bonus” headphone jacks suck - don’t even bother plugging your headphones in.

By using the RP-1 as a normal preamp output into a decent headphone amp (of your choice) you won’t be crippling your headphone’s performance, and you’ll benefit from the remote-controlled volume (which most headphone amps lack).