Akg K400 - Page 13

Skip the DT48, it is quite the handful and even if you like it the DT48E remains a handful. (Fit, seal, amplification...!)

 

Keep the K400 and enjoy it. I would not trade it for the HD800.

 

P.S. If you are serious you can have my DT48E. I hardly use it since I prefer the open K500...

I had the K500 on loan, with K601 ear pads on them. I listened to them with both the K601 and K-400 pads.

Found them a little bit boring and uninvolving compared to the stock K-400 EP, let alone the K-400 with K601 pads which combination is hard to beat IMO.

The K400 sounds more musical, the K500 is more on the neutral side. I should play with the ear pads now that you mention it...

I still own a K400, but I've had K401 drivers in it for a while. You got me wanting to swap the K400 drivers back in now.

I temporarily switched from K500 to K400. I found out its stock cable has issues so the K400 will be recabled. Any suggestions?

The capabilities of both the K400 and K500 headphones are great when compared to modern headphones.  

I bet Mogami W2893 would be a good match. It's good and cheap. That's what I'm using with my HD-598. My current K400 has some weird brand of wire on it called "Cordial". I think it's a brand of wire sold in Europe. I bet this pair may have been owned by several other Head-Fi members Maybe not.

 

My pair seems to be too fatiguing with my setup sadly. Or it could be it's cable, but I won't go there. I may recable mine soon too since I have to use two adapters to connect it to my amp!! Who knows how badly this is effecting it's sound..

 

Anyone think the K400 has some similarities to the SA3000? Reminds me of that headphone somewhat.

Definitely copper! 

Given I am cleaning up my headphone collection the recable is postponed. If no one shows interest in the K400/K500-set I will definetily have them recabled. 

 

Tdogzthmn, the vintage gems are usually underestimated on this site. Do you know why? Most consumers of this age and generation have been brainwashed not to ask too many questions, not to dig into what came before and not to try anything else than what is new. 

 

The HD800 is still an overpriced joke in my opinion. The K701 is even worse, especially if you have gotten a taste of what came before (K240 DF, K400, K500) and good companies like Pioneer, Philips and Behringer are often ignored. 

 

Enough for now...

 

I need to try the K240 DF sometime. Sometimes my sextett sounds good and other times it sounds awful. I think I have a pair that must be bass heavy or something and have chopped off treble. I think it's probably my most hated headphone, but it mids are quite good. Hopefully the DF is way different than the Sextett.

 

If I connect my Sextett to a really warm amp, it's sound seems to degrade majorly. Don't ask me how or why, but on the E9 it actually sounds quite good. It makes no sense!

 

I know by now you think AKG is just all marketing, but you should really demo the Q701 if you can. I had the stupid K702 so many times and I kept coming back to it but could never deal with it's treble and goofy soundstage. Once I got the Q701 I got rid of my K501 (kept the K601 for gaming). I imagine there's some here that probably think I'm drinking the AKG marketing Kool-Aid, but they really do sound much better and a little different. Could be something so tiny that changes the sound a bit, even perhaps a cable. Wish I knew. I just know I can't listen to the K702, but with the Q701 it's totally non-fatiguing in every way. Maybe AKG burns it in for 1000 hours at the factory None of my gear has changed either. Maybe there could be some massive variation between pairs, but not likely.

 

At $230 the Q701 was a steal for me. I've found it much warmer and fuller sounding than the K501, but it's soundstage is way smaller.

 

I like my K400 a lot, but for some reason I keep going back to my Q701 since it's so much clearer and detailed. Mids are a little better on the K400 (and more engaging), but not by much. Now with the K702..I'd take the K501 or even K601 over it any day. Despite owning the K702 maybe 4 times I kind of have a love/hate thing with it. This Q701 seems to get the soundstage right. No idea how.

 

People can say The Q701 and the K701 are the same over and over, but I'm just not hearing it when I listen to them

 

One thing I noticed in the last year is so many companies selling $300 headphones that sound like $150 worth of sound quality. The K550 and SRH-940 was like this for me. Very rarely do I ever hear a headphone that's say $150 and sounds like something much more expensive. Maybe the KRKs and some old AKG headphones.

 

I just scored a Koss A/250 for $100 a few days ago and I just can't believe how good it sounds for a $100 headphone. Impressed me even more than the K550. Has some similarities to the K400 I think, but much brighter and more detailed. Mids might be just as good believe it or not! I don't know the history of the A/250, but I imagine it's a Koss headphone that never caught on. It's kind of fatiguing though, but might set the record for the most detail I've heard in a headphone yet. No joke!

 

Always felt the best headphones are ones that are just not popular or ignored. It's sad how a $20 bass heavy headphone gets 50 pages for it's thread, but a studio monitor that's probably the best headphone in years to come around is virtually ignored.
 

 

Once you get a taste for the vintage headphones a lot of new ones seem overpriced plastic atrocities...

 

I'm a little inclined to agree with you. 
 

 

 

 

you don't know what your missing out on

i sent mine out for another private audition. mine is re-cabled for balanced use with 4-pin XLR connector so i can use them off of speaker outputs. wonderful headphone. compared to the other akg models it gets the least attention of the bunch. i have no idea why though. it's defiantly one of akg's best right up there with the k1000.

shhhh! no one is suppose to know. now thanks to you the prices will now sky rocket and cheap person like me won't be able to find them anymore at modest prices

Dude...