Seattle / Woodinville (July 17th) meet impression.

Sounds like a good meet!

Wish I could have been there.  I'm looking forward to pictures and impressions.  :)

Awesome meet. A lot of different equipment this time and a lot of friendly people both regulars and new. The MOT were very friendly and had a lot of great opinions and tips. A few first at he meet were the k1000 and a real to real setup. Ill post some impressions later. Thanks to Big Poppa for setting this meet up.

Quote:

They probably still havent left the red hook brewery or they are in a state of mind that barely remembers they were at a headfi meet.

Sounds like you all had a nice meeting. With at least an LCD2 around...

Pictures anyone?

The LCD-2 is very nice, enough to let me rethink my T1. How they sound with tube amp? I could answer myself if I brought in my WA22, the laziness really got me. LCD-2 sounded great with SS amp so far.

Sorry, I did not say good bye to all ya, it was a wife thing. No wives next meet!!

Yes, pictures please!

The Red Hook Belgium

  really  r     really kicking ass!

Well there was so much unique and new gear that I only made it through about half of it. Initial impressions are,

Audeze lcd-2 -  Very nice balanced sounding can. Had a nice soundstage and the vocal presentation seemed to sit back a little further on the stage than being forward. I have a small head so I found them to be comfortable. They reminded me of a open version of my LA7000 with tight bass good. I would have liked the bass to have a bit more body but it was still enjoyable as is. It also seemed to have very good dynamics. The highs were extended without being irritating and it was able to deliver a lot of detail while still remaining smooth.

K1000 -  This was the first time I have had the opportunity to try these. They were connected to a real to real rig. They didnt fail to impress. I was expecting a thin sound being spaced of my ears and hotter highs. I found that they have great tone and texture with all the notes portraying great body in there respected place. The mids and highs were balanced and delivered the music with a natural and musical tone. I thought the bass was fine. I didnt even care about the bass because the rest of the presentation totally overcame any of the flaws the bass had. Very impressed by these.

Luxman P1u -  I had some time to be able to do some comparisons with my rig since they were close together.This amp seem to have plenty of power to drive any can. I used the T1 while a/b and found that the volume only had to be turned up to 12 oclock to be able to get a nice load volume. It has great detail and good dynamic. The high I found were well extended and almost on the verge of being tip up too much The bass was a little thinner than my rig I found. I could see this amp matching good with darker can and would be careful of cans that can have sibilance issues.

HE 5le -  Still dont like this can. The mids can be harsh it seems at times and I have now upgraded them to being only bass shy rather than having no bass at all. I figured out that when they are on the stacker they seem to have very little bass. Would get a liitle bass from them when I moved to other rigs. That brings up the stacker.

Stacker amp -  A very nice powerful amp capable of running any cans easily. I did find that the bass was recessed on it compared to other amps and there was a little background hiss. Both of these problems might be attributed to the tubes in it probably. Possibly rolling different tubes would solve one or both of the small issues. Great mid range and treble. I can see why it would make a great ortho amp because its strengths of great mids and mild bass matches the typical sound signature of orthos.

T1 -  Still not overly impressed by this can. While it doesnt do anything wrong to say, it doesnt set itself apart by doing anything great. It has a nice balanced signature, but for $1300, I feel it is overpriced considering the audeze lcd-2 can be had for $900 and have a more even presentation while retrieving more detail and appearing to be more dynamic. I would only put them a step above the stock d7000.

Random thoughts-  Joe from Kosmic was a great guy to talk to offering lots of tips and was quick to try to answer any questions. He had a lot of great gear. The dbel amps were very nice eye candy but never had the chance to listen to the headphone amp, but did hear the speaker amps that the k1000 was connected to. If the headphone amp sounds as good as the speaker ones then i will be sad that I never had the opportunity to take a listen. The real to real sounded awesome and I now understand why my uncle always used one when I was growing up. Nice room and a good turn out. I hope somebody post pictures with the names of the people in them because I met and talked too a lot of people that I didnt know there names. Thanks for organizing the meet Big Poppa and  to the people who brought snaks. I look forward to the next one.

You should know, you went there before and after the meet.

Little thought on cyber 20. It is a very small amp, but pack a lot of power. Consider its price, it produce very beautiful tone, even has better TONE than P-1u with T1 especially, it did everything very well. Only issue was the noise floor was not as quite as I would like, remember it was under meet condition. I don't know if it was caused by tubes.

I am not very impressed as Kingstyle about K1000. I think owning HD800 is more piratical for similar application. K1000 doesn't do wrong for what they are good for, just not enough to steal my heart. Some people claim K1000 do bass, well, to me it is like vibration from the headphone hit your temple where the pad sits to create the bass sensation.

I mostly agree with the King about LCD-2. Vocal presentation did not bother me at all. HF extension is not up to HD800 level, but it was considered balanced to my taste. They are totally heavy, and fit ok, not great on my Asian pumpkin head. The ear pads gets hot too quickly, I was told they don't do adjustment well. Bass was great! Give you the head thump when the music calls for. There is very little muddiness with the presentation as whole, I don't know why? Maybe the warmness, or the body that make me feel that. It remind me a trace (just a little) of HD650

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A few pics:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/27177305@N08/sets/72157624526245348/

Thanks Gil for a great meet and thanks to everyone who bought drinks and food at the aftermeet.

As always, I had no plan or goals at this meet.  I'm always curious to find something I like as much as my own setup and Kingstyles' setup always pleases.  The other standout for me was the K-1000s.  I've heard them a few times before and I always liked them.  The soundstage is the best I've heard and it's just so different from any other headphone.  I haven't had much time to really analyze their sound but I've always enjoyed it and haven't heard anything that sounds off with them.  Even the bass sounds good to me but I'd need to test with more music to really get a better idea.

I listened to the T1 on a few setups and liked them but they were too clean for me.  I guess they're a very neutral headphone, so maybe paired with a nice tube amp, they'd sound great.  I even enjoyed the recabled HD-800's a little bit more after going back and forth a few times.  But even that headphone is too clean for me.

I got to compare the T1 and LCD-2 on Seamaster's system and felt the LCD-2 was more musical and had more body.  I don't think the volume was matched, so that could have influenced my decision.  I also quickly went through about 8 headphones using Kingstyles' system and liked the D7000 the best.  Didn't even know it was the same model as Kingstyles' own headphones, since the wood was a different shade.  I didn't compare the 2 against each other.  Also tried my L3000 on his system and may have liked it best, but I'm biased.  

Hi, newbie here.  Was nice meeting all of you and testing a bunch of stuff out.  Glad I got to test the T50p against ESW10s (for what I use 'em for the T50p seems better, hard to say if I got some time w/ both).  It was the first time I tested some of the higher-end Grados, reaffirmed that I am not a Grado person.  Liked listening to the LCDs, though I really didnt put in enough time w/ them to really A/B them with my existing equipment.  They were surprisingly comfy despite their weight, though that could certainly change w/ longer use.  Since I'm already committed to some decent equipment, if I decide to get these it might be when the LCD-3, LCD-4 or whatever down the road comes out.

I was most impressed on first listen by the Electrostat headphones.  Certainly wasn't the best for everything, but I've never been that wowed by Alice in Chains before.

And oh yeah, got the WA6 hooked up now and so far it's running great.  Thanks a lot, Poetik!