Originally Posted by
slackman 
Well, part of why I had such a strong anti HD800 reaction is because I waited on buying them for a long time and had big expectations.
I though it would be a departure from the Sennheiser sound (which indeed I don't like as it's a very colored untransparent sound to my ears).
I was just really dissapointed when I got it. And i had expected a neutral, frequency flat, natural, transparent sound. And the HD800 is anything but.
I went on to search for HD800 out of the Lavry DA10 headphone amp, and found that it should sound perfectly OK. And the thing I'm hearing is not an amp thing I could tell, it's simply how the HD800 sounds. Also the K1000 which is harder to drive sounds amazing out of the DA10 headphone out.
But it's true what you say. I don't fancy the Senn sound. But it does say something that the HD800 has a strong sound, it's not a chameleon, it's a colored phone that does the "hifi stereo in a room" type of sound / eq-ing. It allmost sounds to me like they put a microchip in the HD800 with some processing.
And yes, the HD800 does remind me a lot of the HD650 in the bass and some other parts of the sound. The lower trebble beeing the biggest departure from the HD650, which gives the sound a different balance than the HD650. Sure almost everything (but not all) on the HD800 is an improvement over the HD650, but still I can really still hear the HD650 "sound" in it.
I can't reproduce your perception, but of course accept it – different ears hear differently, escpecially with headphones (keyword HRTF). The HD 800 doesn't sound perfectly neutral to me as well – no exisiting headphone does –, but is closest to neutrality and most realistic of the headphones I've heard.
Well I'm not alone in thinking they have some similarities in some parts of the sound to the HD650.
I've read other comments that the HD800 do have the "Sennheiser sound" in some way.
I really stand behind my impression that the HD800 is not very source sensitive, more source sensitive than the HD650 yes, but that's not saying much in my book.
Your statements come across as if your perception be the valid one, whereas others are wrong.
I consider something like the K701 to be more source sensitive / transparent than the HD800. And the transparency of the K1000 is on a whole different level far beyond the K701 and HD800 to me.
I own both, and the HD 800 is clearly more tranparent to my ears. I've heard the K 1000 extensively and don't consider it superior in terms of transparency, at least not clearly so (too long ago to really judge). Why is it that I like the HD 800 much better than the K 1000, and this although transparency and neutrality are my main concerns? Doesn't that prove that the HD 800 is the better headphone? 
The bass of the HD800 is not realistic to my ears. It doesn't have the integration with the mids and a realistic impact to me.
It sounds like a pleasant boom boom to me with a warm refined color, but it imposes this color on all the bass things I played through them, not something I want. Again very very different from the K1000 which to my ears has a perfectly integrated bass which sounds different depending on the song and has an impact, dynamics, naturalness and speed/control/decayon another level. HD800 bass sounds like hi-fi bass to me.
I couldn't disagree more. The bass on my HD 800 is extremely well defined and dynamic, far from a boom-boom bass, and perfectly integrated in the whole spectrum. In turn the K 1000's bass was too thin to be realistic, but it was certainly very controlled, and I liked it. I suppose it's its lack of the lowest bass which gives the impression of a superior control (a well-known phenomenon), but for me it wasn't just a positive experience. I couldn't live with this characteristic.
What also made the HD800 hi-fi sounding to me was that the mids are recessed to me in comparison to the bass and the lower treble. I mean purely in level, not that voices are far back in the soundfield or anything like that (they aren't), but the level of the mids is lower from flat in comparison to the bass and the lower treble. The higher treble is also lower in volume compared to the bass and the lower treble.
Perhaps my mind makes a slightly different perspective of things, I've read reviews that say the lower trebble is too high in volume with a 6db bump and that they found this the most disturbing part of the HD800. I heard not the lower treble as bumped, but the mids and high treble as notched. I guess that's the same thing from the opposite perspective.
To my ears the midrange isn't recessed at all. But it may be a matter of earpiece placement, since it allows for a wide variance. When centered, the mids seem a bit recessed to me indeed. To my ears the biggest deviation from neutrality is from a peak around 6 kHz. The upper treble is not recessed at all, but may appear like this after the 6-kHz peak. I have found a modification that drastically reduces the peak (perceivedly).
Focus is not precise but a little bit blurry, I found this disturbing, and one more reason to make it hi-fi sounding to me.
Not at all to my ears.
About breakin.. well even if I gave that the benefit of the doubt.. it's described as giving the HD800 a more relaxed sound... Not fixing my issues.
You never know before you try. Giving up on a headphone before it's broken in is a gross fault in any event. My pair took 200 hours to sound good.
Please compare the HD800 with a K1000 yourself and then think again if you can call the HD800 natural or transparent etc.
And one last thing. With the K1000 I had a few tears rolling with some music. Yet with some other music I couldn't listen to it as the flaws were too obvious (for instance Voyager gold record - murmurs of earth - Valya Balka song, very old vinyl record, bright recorded song with lots of distortion on the song, and then ripped from vinyl with some distortion, the K1000 shows all the flaws so well you can't enjoy the music anymore).
With the HD800 sure i hear the flaws, but it imposes it's color/eq curves on the song which doesn't make it too bad anymore. But again, the other side is that it won't let me hear the truly great music. Listening to Philip Glass - Koyaanisqatsi (second recording) on the K1000 is amazing, magic, so involving.
The HD800 can't do it, it's own strong color is so much in the way and the sound never becomes real.
I fully accept your preference. But I don't share it and your perception. Don't make the mistake to consider your own ears the measure for everybody else's! I think that's what you're trying to do with the repetitions of your personal findings.
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Edited by JaZZ - 7/1/10 at 3:34am
