**Hifiman HE-400 Impressions and Discussion Thread** - Page 315

Am moving this weekend ... packed up all of my headphones, but not my HE-400. Told the fiancee' that I'll be holding them in the car myself ... she rolled her eyes.

She doesn't understand! 

Quote:

Originally Posted by justin w. 

 

HE-400?

Yup!  I'm still at work and I'm busy this evening, so my first try with them will have to wait until tomorrow morning...the ultimate test of patience!  I'm still waiting for my Magni to arrive and I've got a pair of the j$ pads on the way.

The picture is of HE-500 I believe.  The other recommendation I've seen is to use the Beyerdynamic snap-on cushion commonly seen on their DTXXX-Pro models, but I've read they are a tight fit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by modulor 

Yup!  I'm still at work and I'm busy this evening, so my first try with them will have to wait until tomorrow morning...the ultimate test of patience!  I'm still waiting for my Magni to arrive and I've got a pair of the j$ pads on the way.

 

The picture is of HE-500 I believe.  The other recommendation I've seen is to use the Beyerdynamic snap-on cushion commonly seen on their DTXXX-Pro models, but I've read they are a tight fit.

They are only a tight fit IF you try to snap all the buttons. I'd recommend that you don't, and instead just clip the two end ones, like this:

It is actually better IMO because it doesn't bunch the foam in the middle up so much, so the padding ends up being softer.

This is what it looks like if you want to snap all the button.  Works good enough for me..  I snap all my buttons..

Quote:

Originally Posted by jerg 

They are only a tight fit IF you try to snap all the buttons. I'd recommend that you don't, and instead just clip the two end ones, like this:

 

It is actually better IMO because it doesn't bunch the foam in the middle up so much, so the padding ends up being softer.

This is what I thought at first too, but the material is really awesome and it's loosened up a bunch in the middle, while still keeping it tight around the top with all the buttons clipped for me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ninjames 

This is what I thought at first too, but the material is really awesome and it's loosened up a bunch in the middle, while still keeping it tight around the top with all the buttons clipped for me.

I dunno, it doesn't make sense why you guys do that. The whole point of the additional padding is to increase comfort, and headband padding needs 2 things to have good comfort: sufficient soft padding, and large area of pressure distribution. Clipping up all the buttons not only reduces the softness of the padding foam, but also reduces the area of headband coverage on your head so there is more pressure per square area. Meh.

You guys and your headbands.  The real discomfort is in the earpads!

Quote:

Originally Posted by wje 

 

I'm not sure, either.  Intimidation?  Desire of a pure, untouched sound?  If one just stays on the path to try and achieve the perfect sound without any EQ, they will be on a life-long journey.

Exactly my point. The hifiman he-400 is one of those headphones that can achieve great things. A tweak of the EQ to bring out the mids/higher mids and tone down that higher treble somewhat, and ofcourse the velour pads. With these tweaks the he-400 is not far behind the HE-500. But it's definitely much cheaper.

Have no idea what your talking about.  I don't see it.  All the padding is there, more so if you ask me..  That's why the buttons are there

Quote:

Originally Posted by TMRaven 

You guys and your headbands.  The real discomfort is in the earpads!

If you can optimize both, then there is no discomfort other than possibly the weight for some people.

Speaking of earpads, I find that the J$ earpads do inherently give more clamp because they are thicker, however the feel is nicer because they have ultrasoft foam and lambskin so it feels like two pillows rather than two rings of hard foam.