In one of the interviews guys for Austria Audio said that they wanted to buy the machine that makes the driver for the K812 shown above, but Harman wouldn't agree to sell it to them. Such a machine is an expensive piece of gear, but not that expensive that only companies with billions in...

Certainly you can. But only if they have spare parts and/or want to repair it. But usually companies run out of spare parts quite quickly. For example, most of them were not available for the AKG K1000 only 5 years after the end of production. Not to mention, that many companies go bankrupt and...

I wish they could have achieved the same sound without this horrible glued piece of foam, such as with a passive filter. Or at least made it part of the earpads so that it can be replaced easily. I mean for starters it makes the earpads feel more shallow which is not comfortable for people with...

Thank you. That is what I thought. They do look very durable and long-lasting. Personally, I think for many people who listen to headphones a couple of hours a week, they will last a lifetime and will never need to replaced. I was just curious that maybe you did some testing. By the way, the...

Well, of course it obviously depends on how often and how long you use the headphones. If you wear them 16 hours every single day, it is one thing, and if you use the headphones once a week for an hour, it is another. But still, I think there is still supposed to be some ballpark number. For...

Hello, Heinz. Now having to replace the earpads and headband pad on my Sennheiser HD800, I've become curious how long is the headband pads of the Mysphere going to last? After how much time it needs to be replaced? What do you think? The cushions probably will last like forever since they...

I wonder how it happened. Probably very humid environment? Considering the serial number, this is quite an old pair, circa 1991. The magnets were never sold separately as a spare part, only the whole driver assembly. So, it is probably impossible to buy them. Unless, Heinz knows the exact...

I myself have always wondered about the pair with the white logo from that brochure. I've probably seen hundreds of pairs over the years, but never one with the white logo. How many of them were made? Were they ever for sale or it is a pre-production run? Who knows...

Congratulations! It is very difficult to buy such an early pair in such good condition. It can easily take months or even years now and cost up to 2000-3000 dollars. If the seller is really that guy who took the propotional pictures for the brochure, then he did a pretty good job. The headphones...

A moving driver of the Mysphere. The excursion is quite impressive for a headphone driver. The gold plated magnet system:

Yeah, the Mysphere is certainly one of the best headphones (technically, earspeakers, but whatever). Personally, I think that overall it is the best dynamic driver headphones on the market. Too bad they seem to be quite underrated among people here. Probably because they are quite rare and not...

It is believed that the earlier the serial number the better the sound since there were some changes made in the production process over the years to make the headphones cheaper to produce. And that is also my experience. Also on Ebay early serial numbers are usually more expensive.

Yes, one pair was 5xxx, another - 8xxx (my second pair from the post - https://www.head-fi.org/threads/history-of-the-akg-k1000.57805/post-12126078), and two were very late pairs (10xxx and 11xxx), made in 2004-2005, I believe. The 13xx pair simply sounded best (and was in the best condition...

And you shouldn't. I sold my pair with a very low serial number (1xxx) made in 1989 in like new condition, and I feel now that it was a big mistake. The price was great, but that pair sounded better than four others I compared it with. I do now have a pair of the Mysphere and it is terrific...

As far as I remember, the green line doesn't represents "good" bass by itself. It only represents the result of the research where this amount of bass was preferred by more people. Some people prefer much less, a few more. I personally feel that Harman-like headphones Dan Clark Audio Stealth...

It is exactly what I wrote - the same ancient driver a little bit updated (not necessary made better, since it takes longer to produce the old version of that driver). All those highest possible standard claims is just marketing bull.... for naïve people. The chart is above. And compare with...

You don't need to put them on the same chart to see that in terms of bass they are incomparable. ND30 starts to roll off at 50 Hz like most cheap dynamic headphones, and the Composer at 20 Hz, like probably no other dynamic headphones. Not surprising, to be honest. ND30 uses a little bit...

Is the synthetic leather used in the X-65 different from the one used in the AKG K812. I found the pleather used for the K812 to be very durable - after 5 years it was like new, only the shape of the earpads was changed.

You can see it here, how little force he applied to detach them from 7:25 and on:

It seems from this video and the other one that the magnets that hold the pads in place are too weak. Mike barely touched it and the pad fell off. Probably needs to be improved before the release.

I hope not. And I would be surprised if it has. I mean the Stealth is a closed-back planar headphones with overemphasized bass, even compared to the Harman curve (which is already too bassy for many). And I don't think any open dynamic headphones have that kind of bass. 4 dB more than the Harman...

Well, theoretically speaking you shouldn't buy it until you go to a store, listen to it, compare with similar headphones in that price range, and if you like it more than other headphones, you buy it. But I see what you mean. There is no obvious selling point for these headphones. When Focal...

I'm not trying to say anything except what I said - it is an interesting fact that guys from Austrian Audio hired a person from a competitor to develop headphones for them (or at least a major part of it). That's it. And naturally, of course, it is interesting to know on what else he worked on...

As far as I know, the driver itself is usually developed by one person ( or at least he is mostly in charge) and he is also responsible for the final tuning of the headphones. There are a few other people who are responsible for the design of the headphones, that is the aesthetics and the...

It is a peculiar message, actually. It seems that despite all those hundreds of years of experience in designing audio products that those guys at Austrian Audio brag about, they still hired a guy from outside the company to develop a pair of headphones for them, probably because they were not...