ALO annaunced new SXC recabled ESW9 and SQ5

[Sasaki]

I brought Ken's new modded cans to the Japan headphones show.
Ken san just uploaded the information for the new cans on ALO web site.

ALO Modified Audio Technica ATH-ESW9

ALO Audio ATH-ESW9


ALO Modified Audio Technica ATH-SQ5ABK

ALO Audio ATH-SQ5ABK

I brought them to the show and they got many positive impressions from visitors.

here are some of them.

SXC recabled ESW9

"Sounding great, this is not a ESW9 anymore"
"high end and low bottom is very extended"
"I have ESW9 but this is much better than stock"
"now I realize the recable really change the sound"
"I have Cardas recabled ESW9 but this is better"

SXC recabled SQ5

"I can't believe this is SQ5"
"I know stock SQ5, this is sharper and bass is not boomy"
"Vocal is so sweet I like this better than ESW9"
"stock SQ5 is not a good SQ so the recable improvement is
"SXC recabling is good match"

[KB]

Sasaki,

Thank you for sharing the headphones at the show. I really hope to be able to attend that one next year. I am working on a mod for the W5000s at the moment also, I love the AT phones.

Ken

[Headphile808]

Is it possible? The Most Beautiful HPs on the planet (ESW9 IMO), have become even more desirable. Fantastic work Ken.
Good Luck & Happy Holidays
Headphile808

[tnmike1]

anyone mind telling me how this junk keeps appearing only on this thread?? And how can it be eliminated?? Or can it??

[KB]

Originally Posted by tnmike1

anyone mind telling me how this junk keeps appearing only on this thread?? And how can it be eliminated?? Or can it??

I have deleted about 23 spam ads in this thread? So yeah I do not know whats going on. Not sure if an administrator can shed some light on why this thread is so heavily targeted for spam and if some how this can be stopped out side of me just deleting the thread.

Ken

[danne]

Anyone on head-fi that can comment any futher on the recabled ESW9?
And even more intressting is there anyone that compared it to the ESW10?
Since they are both in about the same price range.

[HeadphoneAddict]

"These ATH-SQ5 would make a great starter headphone. I am thinking these are as good or better than my old HD25-1 with APS V3 cable that I used to own ($400 total), and sound very similar to some ATH-A900 that I have that have been modified and dampened and re-cabled with silver plated copper wire by -=Germania=- (traded my $250 Proline 2500 for them). Those same ATH-A900 were once directly compared to my ATH-D1000 optical digital 24/96 up-sampling headphones before I shipped them to a buyer ($600 new, $400 used); where I found the modded A900 with a $100 Vivid Tech V1 USB DAC amp to easily match the D1000 performance! But, I wont have my APS V3 D2000 back for comparison for another 10-14 days (changing it to a 4-pin balanced plug with a SE adapter). I'm thinking about going to the local hi-fi shop in the meantime to compare them to a stock D2000 that they have as a demo pair.

What it sounds like - There is some music where the bass can seem a little unidirectional and/sloppy, and others like Jazz String bass where the sound can be pinpointed better. The soundstage is wide but not very deep, so it sounds pleasant with classical but makes it hard to pretend you are there. They are nicely detailed, and have that slight bumped upper mids that I have heard in many ATH phones, so they are fairly forward in their presentation like my Grado RS-2. Overall frequency balance is still pretty good and they have a nice sparkle to them that is slightly better than the ATH-W11R and ATH-D1000. I actually even prefer the bass on these vs the W5000 in that the W5000 doesn't have much bass. I think I may like them better than my stock HFI-700 DVD as well as a stock HFI-780 or Proline 2500."

A re-cabled HFI-780 is better though, and the PL2500 is more open and the soundstage is better but the mids are too withdrawn. Unfortunately I never did get to compare them to a stock D2000 or re-cabled D2000. If I recall the SQ5 had a slightly more closed can sound (that ATH sound) than the D2000, but it wasn't a big difference.

I basically found the the SXC cabled SQ5 to be on par with or better than some other $250 headphones and a good value. At the time KB was going to charge $250/pr and I thought that was reasonable, but for the current $150 they are a steal. I may even pick up a pair now.

[danne]

@Headphoneaddict

You dont happened to test out the ESW9 recabled version by any chance?
ATH headphones seem to be quite rough to get your hands on over here in europe, specially the ESW10.