casual 6000 dollars

Well aware. I own Audeze planars, which have far better bass both stock and with EQ than HiFiMan.

Those look like the stock tips that the Tansio Mirai Sands comes with out of the box. I've been curious about the S8 before I got my Blessing 2 in late 2020. I was convinced they weren't worth it when the B2 does at least 90% of what the S8 does for half the price. Still tempted to try it though.

I tossed mine in my move, seems like I could have sold it by the way people are lamenting it's omission.

Can I get the source, that price is a steal

Totally fine to think that! I tried EQing them beyond just boosting the 2k region and they just do too many things that bug me to outright recommend them. I don’t hate them though, I feel “meh” about them. They aren’t particularly offensive for the money but I certainly won’t buy a pair.

The detail bit is really what I can’t say I agree with—they have hyped air which does make things easier to hear, especially combined with the lack of dynamics to lessen contrast and thus make the delta between loud sounds and quiet background sounds smaller. But when a transducer lacks that dynamic contrast, it emphasizes things that shouldn’t be as obvious in real life, like conversations in a crowd during a live session. That technically is detail, but as a result, you miss nuance. This in particular bugs me in instances where the speed of the decay is unnaturally fast, as is the case with the XS. For example I hear a saxophonist playing a run, it’s fun to hear the pads of the keys press against the instrument and naturally trail off; with most planars, you can hear the pad hit the horn, but because they’re so “fast,” you don’t hear the trailing decay as cleanly as you do with a dynamic headphone. The compression makes the actual pressing of the key’s pad making contact with the saxophone easier to hear, but you then wait for a decay that ends too quickly. It’s a surface-level sense of detail.

It was pay day today so pulled the trigger on a HiBy FC4 DAC Dongle. The audiophily continues 😅

You can also tell from the vent pattern on the back, the A pads have 4 holes, and B pads have many holes. B pads deliver more bass and warmth in the lower mids (as well as maybe a little more upper mid presence).

I personally like the sound, some people say they sound bloated. To be fair, there does seem to be a degree of unit variation, one sample crinacle measured seems to be a fair bit bassier than the other, so it's possible my pair is a leaner sounding set.

OP: states his perfectly reasonable opinion

R/headphones: https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/original/001/472/891/015.png

Given how thoroughly you reviewed the headphones, I would love to hear your review of the amp. I am assuming that’s a Fiio. Would you mind?

are my new DT 770 Pro 80 ohm broken?
whenever i listen to music and turn up the volume the bass gets really distorted (example of song mumford and sons - woman). same results on both my integrated audio soundcard (some Asus Supreme Fx thingy) or my focusrite solo 3rd gen.
the onboard soundcard should power headphones up to 600 ohms and focusrite up to 200 ohms if i'm not mistaken, so what might be the cause?
do i need an amp/dac for it?

I’m realizing I might just have big goofy ears and they’re resting right on the drivers, pushing them into my head. As for the band, I’ll look into the nugs stangenchev suggested! So maybe I just need deeper cups? But I don’t want it to ruin the sound… maybe audio is pain

I don't think the Zen DAC has this functionality. You'll just have to turn off the speakers and unplug the headphones as needed.

I think I may be using the A pads in that case, gave em both pairs a good squish and the ones I’m using feel much softer.

Most usually not from a power perspective, and there's a lot of misunderstandings going around. Watts are voltage × current, and some headphones need proportionally more of one or the other. That's one of the reasons why it is generally good to leave some headroom when specing a setup just based on wattage. Then some people take this argument way too far and draw the wrong conclusions.

Depending on who you ask, and there are credible people on both sides of the argument, some headphones may sound nicer on certain amps. But then we get into the weeds of equipment that don't claim full transparency to the source and do introduce colourations. Also, you might need to consider the question of whether or not it's good to listen to recordings using equipment more perfect than what it was originally made with. Yadda yadda... We can go on forever.

Fundamentally, if your idea of listening is to replicate the source file as accurately as possible (according to current standards of analysis), then a THX amp is all you'll need for everything apart from the most ridiculously demanding headphones.

“The mids have been put in the background” that’s doesn’t sound good

[removed]

Hifiman Susvara

Gimme the loot! Gimme the loot!

Joshua made a later comparison video against the Meze 109's that the Sennheisers had better timbre and vocal body. While the Meze 109's had better detail highlights and fun sound signature... etc etc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBlSV9ITMtk

For anyone reading this I highly recommend watching the full review.

Anyways, can't wait for a price drop for everyone looking into the S2's. Nothing like a headphone that becomes more accessible for everyone else and hearing good reviews on a headphone you've been enjoying for a long time :)

Also regarding EQ'ing the 660S's, I might give it another go, but basically the gist of it was to give the 660S the Oratory1990 treatment and then modifying the treble to sound more accurate. The Oratory1990 makes the 660S sound grainy and worse than the original sound. Halfway into listening the S2 as a reference I just sat there and got carried away with the music lol

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You're Kyle? I just read this review as it was suggested to me, and was surprised. Despite countless people calling the xs their budget end game you absolutely hated it. I have them myself, and with a touch of eq they are outstanding especially to someone who doesn't want to spend any more than that on some cans. Even without eq they are very well balanced tuning with plenty of detail and great Soundstage.

You could swap over the drivers but I have no idea about the entire earcan

Does anybody know if earpads that would fit a sennheiser hd598 or hd599 would fit a pc38x headset?

Yeah they should work just fine. Only potential issue is that on the earlier Magnis without the negative gain mode you're going to have very little useful range on the volume knob with sensitive IEMs, but you can just reduce the volume a bit on your computer.