I own the AKG K501s and the Sony MDR 7506 (same as V6). Until a few days ago I had not heard the HD-600s. Well, after close to 3 years on the job (!), I found that one of my colleagues has an interest in headphones, and he owns the HD-600s. Sure enough, we set up a quick comparison. Since this was done at work, we used a Sony D-25s as our source, which certainly does not do extract the best from the K-501s and HD-600s, although is a good player with a decent headphone amp.

The HD-600s and AKG K501s are very hard to drive, I had to turn the volume knob close to maximum to get decent levels.

Without any doubt in my opinion, the HD-600s are the best. It has a soundstage close to the 501s, and bass is close to the V-6. It has good detail, although I found the K-501s to have a bit more detail in the mids and upper mids. I understand now why some called the HD-600 sound "veiled", but I don't think it would be objectionable to me. Bass is good, but not as tight as the 7506s. The sound overall is smooth and detailed. Clearly the best compromise.

The K-501s clearly lack bass. But most of the classical material I listen to does not have very low bass. With this material, I found the K-501s to be slightly superior - a bit more detailed, soundstage a bit better (my colleague, the HD-600 owner agreed. He was impressed with the K-501s, especially after he heard what I paid for them). On everything else, the lack of bass was obvious.

The Sony's biggest strength was high quality bass, and a very "punchy" sound, without sounding boomy. This is my favorite can for watching movies. The major dislikes - harsh midrange (to the point of being screetchy), and overall a fatiguing sound.

Comfort-wise, the K-501s win by a fair margin. All 3 have very good build quality.

On a scale of 1 to 10, I would give the Sennheisers a 9 (superb sound), the AKG K-501s an 8 (bass clearly lacking, but very comfortable, and an excellent value), and the Sonys a 6 (sound a couple of notches below, decent value).

I am completely aware of the limitations of this "test", but I believe a better source would not change the main characteristics of the 3 headphones.

Having owned all three of these headphones, I actually agree with pretty much every one of your points, danieln. And that's driving them all from a Max I think you hit the advantages and disadvatages of each phone well.

I agree as well, although i own the 580's, i do own the rest and think you pretty much nailed it down. Good job...now lets see Neruda come jumping in to back up the 501's.



EDIT: danieln, I noticed you own a Yamaha receiver, how well does it drive the 501's? I have the volume set to 9 o' clock on mine and it sounds pretty good as well (i actually keep the bass tone set to 0).

OK, Neruda must be busy, so I'll jump in. Well, I would agree with your findings, except for the fact that I've been listening to the AKG 501s through the Sugden Headmaster, and, to my ears, the bass is not lacking. It may not be there in the amounts supplied by the HD600s (which at times can be a bit too much for my tastes) but it's definitely there.......and it's quality bass, as well. The synergy between these two components is excellent.

Hey Joe, i personally feel its lacking compared to the senn's, but the akg's definitely stand on their own, they are a fine can for the price....if only we didnt need such a monster of a headphone amp to drive them. Which leaves me with my receiver, cmoy and altoids (the latter two cannot drive the akg's at all). Hopefully, the stereophile show will have some functional amps...i'll probably drag the senn's and akg's on separate days to test them out

Thanks MacDEF .

Gloco, I also keep my Yamaha around 9, it has no problem driving the 501s. I think the 501s sound significanlty better trough the receiver than trough the D25-s.

Joe, the Headmaster is a beautiful piece. It should do justice to the 501s more than my equipment does. I have to say that there are CDs that seem to have decent low bass (e.g. Deep Forest), and the 501s play them well. But that's maybe 20% of the CDs I am listening to. On the other 80%, the 7506s reveal some bass that does not come trough the 501s. You find the HD-600s bass a bit too much at times. I think it's just right. So it's probably a personal preference thing

The AKG K501's do not lack bass. They lack "too much bass". Therefore, they lack the mud and sluggishness that other phones exibit in that range.

Could you imagine some people sitting in front of a live acoustic band or string quartet and then complaining that it was dull, rolled off, bright, lacking bass blah de blah blah?

I could...

And there would be nothing wrong with that, but that has nothing to do with the AKGs

I don't know why I let myself get sucked into this....

This all depends upon what you're looking for.

If you want the Nth degree in realism then for 90% of the material in my collection of CDs, the AKG-K501's are absolutely superior. For the other 10%, the Sennheiser HD-600's take the cake. The Senny's advantage is in the bottom octave and the AKG's win for everything else.

If you want fatter bass, but not necessarily better accuracy or realism, then you may prefer the HD-600's for everything. That's ok with me, that's ok with you. Let's just call a spade a spade.

Your preference may be heavily weighted by the type of music you frequent. I listen to a great deal of acoustic instruments (non amplified) String bass, piano, violin, guitar, various percussion instruments, woodwinds, brass, voice, etc. They all are reproduced much more naturally and realistically by the AKG-K501's.

If your main diet is electronic or amplified music, then I can easily see how your preference would lean to the HD-600's as their sound would tend to be more exciting when reproducing those venues.

Happy listening!

Quote:



Lol.

I've sometimes thought the same thing -- except with the HD600 being superior to the K1000 in acoustic music, and the K1000 possibly being better with the electronic/amplified stuff.

Well, when there is an argument like this, we should let measuring instruments decide - they should be objective, right? And I remeber seeing some charts where the AKG K-501's bass response drops like a rock below 60 Hz or so (maybe MacDEF did those charts? I forget). Even kwkarth admits to using a sub with his K's. Yes, I think the K501s are great headphones, but they lack bass objectively. Some might like their sound as it is, some might not, but that's what the measurements say.

If the HD600s have a small weakness I would also say it is with electronic and amplified music. Now that may also be a weakness of the K501, I have no idea. The only time I've ever felt the HD600 lacking was with heavy guitar and kick drum driven music (such as Nirvana), or with Electronica featuring mucho low bass. Its slight laid-backness and lack of the lowest bass frequencies prevent it from being perfect for all music.

The bottom octave of the HD600 is missing so I'm not quite sure how it ever got the rep for being too bass heavy. Perhaps the midbass is slightly elevated. I hear nothing with a 25 Hz test tone on HD600, yet I do hear it on my HD570, so I know its not my hearing. Also at 50 Hz it is down a bit compared to my HD570 which loses nothing at 50 Hz (and in fact is a bit stronger at 50 Hz than at 100). That is why I've never had any desire at all to try K501. Any less bass than HD600 is far from what I would call desirable, since a large part of my listening includes low bass. The HD600 could stand to be a touch more forward, but it does so much so well that it doesn't bother me at all. If the K501 is indeed a slightly more forward HD600 with less bass I could see why it would be great for a lot of music that lacks bass anyway.

Quote:



Definitely not. Not unless those measuring instruments are human ears, which are all different. Measurements don't tell you what you hear.

Well, there are some things that can be measured (and for the rest there is Mastercard - sorry, couldn't resist). I believe that the presence of a sound at a certain frequency can be measured. That's why you see for speakers measurements such as 50 Hz - 20 KHz +/- 3 db. While in no way the only measure of the quality of the sound coming from that speaker, it clearly shows that the speaker can produce sound in the given range without significant deviation. Same thing should be true for headphones. The charts I mentioned above showed a dip in the lower frequencies for the K-501s.

Quote:



Oh I agree. Assuming that the speakers are set up properly in an ideal listening room that does not affect the speakers sound (no such thing), one would hear what the measurement "hears". But the measurments don't tell you what you would actually hear, since there are all these other factors entering into the equation, like shape of ears, the pinnae, the pads on headphones, the size of ones head.

I have played a lot of music with low bass information through the K501 and it's there. It may not be as "present" as a V6 or HD600 or Grado, but it is there, and IMO in proper proportion to the rest of the spectrum. We shouldn't hear bass at the same level as midrange anyway, since we don't actually hear that way. Our ears are naturally more sensitive to the midband. So when people say it lacks bass, it's not. They are just hearing"too much" midrange in proportion, which is what they are suppposed to hear.