Audiophilia

[Hempire]

how about on herbs? =D

[Sforza]

how about on herbs? =D

Herbs will make me love everybody and everything around me, including shitty headphones

[Shintetsu]

How long was it since you bought your last portable set? I'm sort of looking for an option B, construction headphones are scary.

I might just drop them and cry on the spot tbh

[Sforza]

How long was it since you bought your last portable set? I'm sort of looking for an option B, construction headphones are scary.

The last portable set before the es7?
March, with Mark in Japan. The ATH-FC700s (which I'm now selling to Mark).

What are construction headphones?

---

Another thing I wanted to ask you guys btw, at least those actually reading this thread still

Do you prefer strong bass or more rounded but less powerful bass? It's because you have to choose between something that'll make your head vibrate or something that has more definition and clarity, but doesn't leave much of an impact. Oftentimes it'll make you think, "wow this headphone has really weak bass!"

Also, do you prefer bright mids or neutral recessed ones? Meaning music that'll just jump at you and make you go O__O or sound that you'll get used to slowly, but doesn't sound as fatiguing after a while? It's usually more evident in female vocals and guitar portions of rock recordings.

[Mjting]

more well rounded bass.

dunno abt the second.

[Grim]

*technical review*

*reads technical review*

Wow, shiny headphones!

On a general note, I think its safe to say AT really makes their headphones for other music genres aside from rock. Grados, on the other hand, seem to gravitate toward that specifically.

Another thing I wanted to ask you guys btw, at least those actually reading this thread still

Do you prefer strong bass or more rounded but less powerful bass?

Also, do you prefer bright mids or neutral recessed ones?

I prefer rounded bass and bright mids for headphones. Since the cans are going to be placed so close to my ears I'd like to hear the clarity of the music without having to turn the volume way up. SQ over SPL all the way. It's weird though, my preference starts to change a bit for speaker/subwoofer systems.

[Sforza]

There's a lot of ways to describe mids, some headphones are more forward sounding than others, some seem to have two levels where the highs are bright and the lows tend to roll off steadily towards neutral. For example, the Grados have incredibly bright, articulate mids.

I'm still unsure about the ES7s, since they have really forward and less articulate mids compared to one of my other headphones (which I haven't reviewed here yet), but they have sparkling (?) treble and a powerful bass presence. They're the exact opposite of the Shure SE310 IEMs which tend to deviate everything (bass and highs) towards the middle range. It's not like they have a bad midrange, it's just that the midrange is very narrow. Impressed by the sound staging and how they almost sound like open backed cans though.

They're probably my most "FUN" sounding and mass consumption headphones, but for technical listening I'd probably use something else with a darker sound signature. The Grados are a little too bright for me sometimes too, thought I do like the way they reproduce sound almost all the time.

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Gave my small collection of headphones a side by side comparison tonight. If asked to divide best set of cans by genre:

ATH-ESW9 for classical, jazz, acoustic, country, folk
ATH-ES7 for Hip-hop, Electronica, Trance, Dubstep (people should seriously give these a listen after about a hundred hours burn-in)
Grado SR-80 for most pop songs, rock
Shure SE310 for bringing around everyday

I think the key difference between the two ES series phones is the wood back on the ESW9. All The other headphones are just a bit worse in every aspect.

[Shintetsu]

@Jake: I thought the kind of headphones that can be folded are called 'construction headsets'? Or that's just me being dumb, meh.

I guess I'm sticking with them na lang. >_>

[Sforza]

I've recently been spending a lot of time in the discussions over at www.headphiles.org -- it's a Filipino community for headphone enthusiasts. English speaking, well moderated, majority of members are tech geeks too, even more so than RR in some cases.

I'm pretty easy to spot there. My name is also Sforza. My avatar is:

[Sforza]

I just got a new tube amp/DAC I'll post a review after about 50 more hours of burning in.

Current set-up is ipod -> LOD -> FiiO E5 as preamp -> Mp5 - > ATH-ESW9 (wooden portables)


The tubes look quite nice when the room is dark.

[NiX]

Maitreya's bro has the same amp.

[Sforza]

It's really worth it for the price

Edit: I have 2 more amps on the way though T_T

[Grim]

Ooh shiny!

[Sforza]

After using a tube amp with wooden headphones, I find myself liking the Grado sound signature less and less I think it has more to do with the stuff I listen to (jazz/classical) because the Grados are hella bright (like the sun!) and the highs are almost painful to listen to on some songs. Another issue is listening fatigue because the foam pads tend to sink in towards the ears.

However, I still really like them for rock. That's about it though.

[Sforza]

The ugliest headphone ever It's extremely good quality though, and has very wide, natural sound staging.



Picture thread on head-fi

and...

The Secret Scam of Cheap Earbuds
http://gizmodo.com/5617200/the-secret-sc...ap-earbuds

Those cheap earphones you keep buying year after year? The ones with the cool designs? They all kinda sound the same, huh? There's a pretty good reason for that: They actually are all the same earphones.

In the world of gadgets, earphones occupy a decidedly weird space. Few categories can boast mind-numbing variety (both in price and quality) that headphones offer. Every year, companies like Sony trot out a phalanx of multi-colored ear candy at CES, each with various frequency responses and designs. You can pay as little as $10 for a standard pair earbuds, or drop as much as $2,000 for a pair of custom molded in-ear monitors. The space in between these extremes is even becoming crowded, with offerings designed specifically for running, yoga, juggling chainsaws—basically any activity you can conjure up that can be done while listening to music. And that's not even getting into traditional over-the-ear (or on-ear) cans.