HD598 Disappointment - Page 2

Burn in may help, i remember hating my akg k240s when i first got em, think of your AKGs as a sharp needle and the HD598s as... uhh... cupid's arrow. It's probably the change in sound sig getting to you.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blue Boat 

Sennheisers can sound a little dark when you compare them to AKGs... if burn-in doesn't work, try equalising the 10kHz up by 4-5dB and then scale it down a little on 9kHz, on 8kHz, until you hit 0db, which should be about 2-3kHz. 

 

Hate to revive this thread, but the equalization helped a lot for me moving to the HD 598 from the m50 (which seem to have extended highs in comparison). Thanks for the tip.

Quote:

Originally Posted by walden 

Hate to revive this thread, but the equalization helped a lot for me moving to the HD 598 from the m50 (which seem to have extended highs in comparison). Thanks for the tip.

No problemo. 

You should get the ElectriQ plugin for Foobar. Great EQ.

I returned HD598 (after a limited burn-in) and I have never looked back. Both their sound and build quality seemed lacking if compared to most of my other cans.

Later I got HD600 ... so they both are Sennheiser??? There seems to be nothing in common between HD600 and HD598 (indeed - " What's in a name?...").

@ Rudolfs

Assuming you like the HD 600 more, what do you like more about it? 

Quote:

First, the build quality is rather different. HD600 is solid, HD598 is just as dinky as HD515. Being price-wise much closer to HD600 (at the time), build quality was a disappointment. Well, it is built like CAL!, much worse than MDR V6.

Then the sound. Tried amped and unamped, and even unamped HD 600 were subjectively better. HD598 have larger soundstage, but I could not shake a feeling that they were just anemic. Indeed I cannot explain... They did go loud, but it was more like bride of Frankenstein, not Callas.Timbres were kind of correct, but they felt dead. Limited presence, limited drive, details present, but as if veiled...

HD 600 has quite some drive and presence. Timbres are just spot on. There seems to be a mid-bass hump and deeper bass fade, still they deliver adequate picture (narrow as it is). No annoying dips and spikes -- at least I could not detect any (not that I could with HD 598).

Going from HD600 to HD598, everything sounded polite, but ultimately as if the musician(s) who sang or played for you on HD 600 had left and were replaced by a nondescript impostor(s).