I recently bought a pair of HD650 and have been reading through much of this thread. While I agree that a lot of the varying opinion on these phones can be attributed to things such as "quality of source and amp", "snap judgments after short listening sessions" and "personal preference" I have to wonder how much can be attributed to the condition of peoples ears. I say this as someone who suffers both hearing loss and Tinnitus after years of competitive shooting that started back before hearing protection was a priority.
My Tinnitus manifests itself as a high frequency hiss much like pre Dolby tape hiss (escaping steam for you youngsters who have never heard tape). The intensity of the hiss varies from day to day. It is something I have learned to live with and tend to ignore most of the time when listening to music. Despite the fact that I am use to listening to music "through" this hiss I have noticed that my sense of veil and muddiness with the HD650 varies with the the pitch and intensity of my Tinnitus. On my quieter days I love my HD650s.
I am sure that in a community dedicated to listening to music with headphones there must be a fair amount of hearing damage to varying extents. I wonder if with a headphone like the HD650, that emphasizes smooth refined musicality over "wow factor", if minor differences in hearing response have a greater effect on perception than they would with other headphones under the same conditions?
