Recent comments in /f/headphones

minuscatenary t1_ja5dd5u wrote

Reply to How do I listen for "detail" in music? by West-Cheek-156

The way I do it is fairly simpler than what most people generally go for. I play industrial music with vocal distortion. The more detail, the more patterns you’ll identify in the distortion. The less detail, the more “smear” you’ll hear.

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arey510 t1_ja5chki wrote

Reply to Showoff your Hifiman Edition XS setup by N1x01D

Mostly use them w a RU6, Loki & ifi Zen Can but sometimes I use a Piety to switch it up. Not sure why but I havent tried them on main rig yet, Bifrost 2, Lokius & ifi Pro Signature

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jumboshrimp93 t1_ja5bq9o wrote

Reply to How do I listen for "detail" in music? by West-Cheek-156

It’s kinda hard to describe. I do think that detail can be “faked” by heightening a frequency response. Or, listening to a new headphone can make you hear new things because the frequency response is different, or “new toy” syndrome is forcing you to pay more attention than you normally would.

On the flip side, some headphones and even driver types can do things that are simply unique. For example, I compared my Focal Clear to the Sundara I previously owned, and the Sundara had that “plucked” quality to its bass that I’ve heard some describe, where it sounds like each bass note has its own little vibration or feel to it. Meanwhile, the Clear has this dynamic capability that’s hard to match, and it can come with either a lot of dynamic swing where drums have a lot of power, or something soft where you can kind of feel the air or breath of a voice or instrument. Something like that is what I call detail, because you can actually feel the driver doing something. Acoustic guitars on the Clear are amazing in a similar way, because you can sort of feel the strumming and air around the notes that’s otherwise hard to replicate.

I’ll also say that the recording you’re listening to plays a major part.

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huemac5810 t1_ja5a1ax wrote

Reply to comment by 09212 in How do I listen for "detail" in music? by West-Cheek-156

Sennheiser takes advantage of this by using the same drivers in their whole HD5x5, HD5x8, and HD5x9 lines. Each line uses the same deiver elements, the differences in sound boil down entirely to the housing. HD595, 598, and 599 get the best housings and achieve the best sound. Many would mod the next model below to get the 595/598/599 sound for less money. I've gotten my HD558 sounding better than the three top models.

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random_LA_azn_dude t1_ja59qbe wrote

Reply to Impressions from NYC Canjam 2023 by bfjones02

Interesting. With the SR-009/S running off a Blue Hawaii, they fell flat on their faces I played some drum and bass tracks. On the other hand, the SR-X9000 was far more competent than the 009/S in the bass dept (not to mention far better built) but still fell short of the high-end planars of the world. From your impressions, it seems that you were listening to the X9000's.

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No-Context5479 t1_ja59dgm wrote

Reply to comment by Mockbubbles2628 in My Endgame, these things are incredible by Mockbubbles2628

You do not want a straight line in raw frequency measurements in this specific range (1.5kHz to 6kHz)

That's the Pinna gain region and that place needs to always look like a mountain... If that area is flat in a raw uncompensated graph, that's a wonky frequency response

Link to FR - https://crinacle.com/graphs/headphones/graphtool/?share=IEF_Neutral_Target,LCD-X_(Fazor)

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huemac5810 t1_ja5960h wrote

Reply to comment by West-Cheek-156 in How do I listen for "detail" in music? by West-Cheek-156

Folks who believe it's all or almost all about FR are fairly odd to me.

Try convincing music studios of the mentality. They'll laugh at you. Sound is more than just FR, otherwise post effects beyond equalizers would be far more rare. It definitely is of great importance, but the whole story has much more going on, or music production would be much simpler.

For example, closed headphones often lack acoustic dampening materials on the inside. In studio monitors, you'll often find polyester fiberfill inside their cabinets to kill excess resonances, which muddy the sound and can give speakers a "boxed-in" sound. Closed headphones tend to "sound closed" for their lack of fiberfill inside, or sound like they apply a "hall reverb" to everything. Occasionally, some may actually have fiberglass for dampening. Equalizing the headphone can never mitigate this issue as it has nothing to do with frequency response in the first place. The Beyerdynamic DT660 (discontinued) was famous for being a closed headphone appropriate for classical music. It had dense cotton padding inside to kill excess resonances, in addition to a balanced FR. It "sounded open" rather than "closed" as a result, so it wouldn't mask and muddy music with a "hall reverb" over everything. A comparable, more modern headphone (but also discontinued now) is the Pioneer MHR5. Another closed headphone with dampening to purge internal excess resonances is the HRM7, a superb studio can.

Cleaner and finer articulation of sound is also related to other aspects of headphone design; you can't make it happen with EQ, but it can help subtly at best. I'm guessing this is affected by the voice coil and chemical treatment of the diaphragm. I have no idea. The articulation of sound is fuzzier in cheap headphones versus my HD650 and K701, for example.

Clearer, tighter bass out of a headphone is a bit of a tough job to pull off, but the kinds of modifications that can contribute would probably blow your mind. Impossible to replicate with only equalizers.

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