Wiring for headphones -- what's the best way?

I’m somewhat in your shoes. I too would like to run a cable for a headphone across the room, except I would like mine to terminate in a floor plate right by my listening chair. However, my trouble is that the installers I’ve talked to are having difficulty finding a floor plate to use, which I find very surprising. So…if there’s anyone out there that can recommend a floor plate, I’d appreciate it.

Now…in atonement for doing a bit of thread hijacking to ask my question, let me tell you what I’m thinking of in terms of cabling and headphone setup and see if this would work for you.

I’m considering running a cable from a pre-amp out or other line out connection from my pre/pro (or AVR) within the crawl space under my house. I’m thinking that any quality RCA cable should be good enough for about a 30’ run.

Then, once things are properly terminated at my listening chair (and after I find the right kind of floor plate), I plan on using a headphone amp and plug that into the receptacle. This way I'm not dependant on the pre/pro to drive the headphones over a long distance. Would doing any of this apply in your setup? I realize there's the extra expense of buying a headphone amp, but the benefits might be worth it.

I'm interested in doing something similar in my theater as well. Anyone out there successfully done something similar?

You could run RCA cables (to an RCA wall plate) and use one of these to plug your headphones in:

http://www.techcables.com/6-inch-3-5...able-p-42.html

as long as the headphone connection is plugged into the receiver, wouldn't that override sound to the speakers no matter the input? that would mean you'd need to manually unplug the headphone connection on the receiver any time you want the speakers to play, right? i could be wrong.

You could run XLR in the wall (good for long runs) to a balanced headamp by your listening position.

If I were in your position and I had thought of this four months ago:
Run rca to xlr out your my preamp's zone2 using a cable like this.

Then run xlr in your walls to where you want the headphone amp. Using xlr you will not need to worry about the 30' or interference. There are all kinds of pro wall plates for xlr, you might be able to rig one up as a floor mount.

Near your seating position place your balanced headphone amp from Ray Samuels right next to your k701s.

This plan future proofs you and gets you killer sound. Plus the volume is in an arms length, and you don't have to deal with the crummy headphone stage in your preamp.

Excellent...thanks! These plates look like just what I'm thinking about. The website doesn't show the back of the plates, so I'm not sure how the cable run should be terminated, but I'm sure I can call them and find out.

I am actually wanting to run a balanced line and use one of the nice balanced headphone amps that are out there. You must have been reading my mind.

One question...right now I'm looking at the Denon AVP which has balanced (XLR) pre-outs. They have put in a few extra pre-outs (total of 12). As I see it, after I hooked all the rest of my gear up I would wind up with at least one or two available pre-outs. However, these would be pre-outs for things like SUB and SIDE REAR...etc. If I choose a mode like Pure Direct, could I plug my headphone line into one of these, or does it necessarly have to be plugged into a line out like a tape loop, etc?

If I could simply plug into any old extra XLR pre-out, then I could use balanced cable all the way.

Thanks.

^^^^

Wireless headphones are available as well. i have a pair of Sony's that work well. You would just rest the base station near your rack and then carry the phones wherever you need them.

Fourteen years ago I wired my media room with a headphone jack wall plate that was sold by Niles at the time. With this plate, I ran speaker level output to the jack so long runs weren't a problem. You could then plug in headphones with a 1/4" stereo plug. It doesn't look like Niles makes those devices any longer which is too bad. Sounds like it's exactly what you're looking for. I did some quick Googling and didn't come up with anything. You might want to do some more in-depth searches for a speaker-level/headphone wall plate. Good luck.

I do this with a nice Sennheiser wireless set (RS 65) and it is very lacking. My wired studio cans (AKG K240DF) are much better. I vote for a wired solution, even though it is much less convenient.

Thanks for the tip about Niles plates. I didn't know about them. However, I think the info ghause posted above appears to be the best solution for my particular install. The balanced cable wall plates would be flat enough for a floor installation.

BTW, I noticed you mentioned running "speaker level output" to your jack. This may be different, but would you know if I'm using a pre/pro or receiver with balanced (XLR) pre outs (as I've described above) can I simply plug in my balanced cable cable run into an available XLR pre out? Does it need to only be a Front Right or Front Left pre out?