[rovopio]

  k551 is the same as the k550 in size, it just has an inline remote and mic. If you have a small head look at another headphone. If you wear glasses and have a small head deffo not a recommended purchase. A decent seal is required to get any kind of bass.

 
im looking for a thin detailed analytical headphone. my 940 broke. i dont think i'd want t70p for pricing reasons. so... my choice goes to k550. they dont sell it where im at, they only have k551.
 
i read 1 or 2 reviews abt k551 saying that it has diff. sound than k550 particularly on the mids... i also read someplace else that k551 is basically (replacing?) k550, or an update k550...
 
so um.... is there anybody here who've owned both? is it more similar (or the exact same), or is it night and day differences?
 
googling doesn't yield a very good result in terms of comparison....
 
btw thanks for replying... ps: i dont really care abt bass. i like thin sound just fine...

 

[TheGiantHogweed]

From what I know, the K550s and K551s sound about the same.
I found the cable on my K550 too long for portable use so I ended up braiding it and it is now just over 1m instead of 3m. I didn't want any extra volume control so that is why I didn't go for the K551s.

 

[porschephille]

I just saw k550 on the tv show White Collar. One of the actors was listening in from a mobile surveillance van...using our favourite accurate closed cans! Season 6-Episode 1-Actor Sharif Atkins.

 

[Dozbik]

Hi! 
 
I have the chance to buy a pair of these headphones for approximately $122,5 after conversion. They are used, but in fine condition, there are no aesthetic defects on them and they are perfectly functional (owner claims he's had it for a year and only used it once or twice a week, but only to listen to a few songs on each occasion). My question is if you would recommend me this can for this price, which I believe is quite a bargain (well, at least where I live it still costs $220 in a retailer) or are there now cans that are better in this price category? I don't really want to spend considerably more, but if there's any reasonable upgrade for a slight rise in price up to around $150-$170, then I'm fine with that. 
I predominantly listen to progressive rock, progressive metal, classical music, rock 'n' roll and instrumental stuff, like Steven Wilson, Porcupine Tree, Transatlantic, Anathema, Neal Morse, Dream Theater, Rush, Haken etc. etc., just to name a few artists. Not into electronic music or rap etc. From what I managed to gather from the reviews is that this pair excels at managing clear, acoustic instruments, drums, vocals with having a slightly withdrawn bass. These are all excellent for my taste, they pretty much represent what I'm looking for, but I'd also like to know how they fare when, say, a progressive metal song turns into heavy, distorted, gloomy and so on or they turn on lots of effects on the guitar, the synthesizers, a lot of background effects etc. I'd love to hear some of your views in connection with that. Does this pair manage to retain its excellent sound quality even when it comes to music that uses lots of effects, distortion, relay and all the fun stuff you can imagine with modern music technology?
Oh, and one more thing: do you recommend any external amplification to this? I mainly plan to listen to it from my PC to which I have an Asus Xonar DG sound card. What do you think, will that suffice or do I need extra amplification to get out the most of this little baby?  
Okay, one last thing (really, this time!). Is it a bit pointless to buy closed headphones for home listening? I mean, I might take these on the road sometimes, but not too often I believe. So if I want to listen to music in my room, would it make more sense to approach open headphones? Yet, from what I've read from the reviews, this can has also excellent soundstage, so is there really any point in forcing the issue?
I will listen to these at the weekend, but I'm trying to get as much feedback beforehand to refresh my knowledge.
 
Thanks a lot in advance! 

 

[misobol]

Hi All,
This is my first post on this forum, so please gentle with me
A little background on me. I'm your average music lover with taste for wide variates on genre. I also passionately play FPS games(BF4 this days).
 
So I've got myself present AKG K550 and Beyerdynamic DT990 250 Pro ohm to choose from.
I've got both shipped and used on Asus Xonar DX and Asus Xonar Phoebus ( this one has amplification ).
 
For first two days I only had AKG K550 and I thought it was great sounding compared to my old Samson's SR850.
Bass was very far reaching and sound is crisp and I can distinguish sounds that I didn't hear before, this is very fun.
My only grief with them is very strong clamp, I'm currently stretching them on foot ball.
 
Today DT990's came, I was thinking I'm going to love them due to those having more bass ( I always thought I liked a lot of bass) and them being more comfy. 
I've got them hooked up and I couldn't believe how crowded they sound, the base is almost bloated, I can't distinguish sounds, everything has this warm like signature, and is slightly muffled.
 
Are my impressions of DT990s compard to K550 are roughly correct or I've got broken set?

 

[GirgleMirt]

Correct.  The worse with the 990s are the voices, on some recordings, they can sound horrible.  Well that and they can sound harsh/bright...  It's a very colored headphone.  Other than that, the detail is pretty good. I'm not sure what 'crowded' means in terms of sound.  But yeah, their recessed mids and boosted highs and lows...  They can sound great on some recordings, quite bad on others.  In my experience, the 990s do quite decently with orchestral stuff, and as I said, not phenomenal with voices.  Well voices can be hit and miss, it can sound ok, or it can sound quite off, I guess it all depends on the voice itself.  But yeah, the 550s have the 'AKG' sound, which is pretty neutral, and that works well basically with anything.  The 990s are not neutral in any way...  And that hurts it more often than it helps them IMHO.
 
Oh, about the 990 bass, I wouldn't call them bloated though.  I have the 600 ohms, with Magni amp, the bass quality is actually very good.  Are you amping them with anything?  That might have quite a bit to do with the bass response and quality you're getting, maybe burn in too.
 
A few examples of where the 990 can shine:
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Outlands/4x9rBK?src=5
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Unmei+No+Yoru+UNLIMITED+BLADE+WORKS/3TIBOq?src=5
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Recognizer/4ud3oK?src=5
http://youtu.be/z64HCi2rQkE?t=8m33s
 
And an example of where they fall flat on their face:
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/One+Slip/6TQQ5I?src=5

 

[TheGiantHogweed]

  My only grief with them is very strong clamp, I'm currently stretching them on foot ball.
 

The one issue that doing this can cause is that you can loose some impact of the bass. It is very noticeable that if I press hard on mine when i am wearing them, the bass becomes much more noticeable. If I pull them away from my ears slightly, the bass really does become light weight.

 

[misobol]

  The one issue that doing this can cause is that you can loose some impact of the bass. It is very noticeable that if I press hard on mine when i am wearing them, the bass becomes much more noticeable. If I pull them away from my ears slightly, the bass really does become light weight.

 
I see, I think I might done wrong thing. I've mistaken strong clamp with pressure from head band.
I've stopped stretching them now, it was short enough not to do anything as the seal is still good.
But I'm unsure what to do stop that headband "drilling" into my head
 
Or is there another set that can do K550 sound magic in that price range with greater comfort?

  Correct.  The worse with the 990s are the voices, on some recordings, they can sound horrible.  Well that and they can sound harsh/bright...  It's a very colored headphone.  Other than that, the detail is pretty good. I'm not sure what 'crowded' means in terms of sound.  But yeah, their recessed mids and boosted highs and lows...  They can sound great on some recordings, quite bad on others.  In my experience, the 990s do quite decently with orchestral stuff, and as I said, not phenomenal with voices.  Well voices can be hit and miss, it can sound ok, or it can sound quite off, I guess it all depends on the voice itself.  But yeah, the 550s have the 'AKG' sound, which is pretty neutral, and that works well basically with anything.  The 990s are not neutral in any way...  And that hurts it more often than it helps them IMHO.
 
Oh, about the 990 bass, I wouldn't call them bloated though.  I have the 600 ohms, with Magni amp, the bass quality is actually very good.  Are you amping them with anything?  That might have quite a bit to do with the bass response and quality you're getting, maybe burn in too.
 
A few examples of where the 990 can shine:
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Outlands/4x9rBK?src=5
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Unmei+No+Yoru+UNLIMITED+BLADE+WORKS/3TIBOq?src=5
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/Recognizer/4ud3oK?src=5
http://youtu.be/z64HCi2rQkE?t=8m33s
 
And an example of where they fall flat on their face:
http://grooveshark.com/#!/s/One+Slip/6TQQ5I?src=5

 
Thanks for those examples, I'll listen to them on both headphones Today.
 
I'm amping with sound card itself, it's has thee gain settings and is able to drive headphones up to 600ohm (I'm using 12db setting with DTs).
By crowded I meant that there's impression of one kind of sound killing another kind of sound, not letting me appreciate details.

 

[TheGiantHogweed]

I see, I think I might done wrong thing. I've mistaken strong clamp with pressure from head band.
I've stopped stretching them now, it was short enough not to do anything as the seal is still good.
But I'm unsure what to do stop that headband "drilling" into my head

Or is there another set that can do K550 sound magic in that price range with greater comfort?

Thanks for those examples, I'll listen to them on both headphones Today.

I'm amping with sound card itself, it's has thee gain settings and is able to drive headphones up to 600ohm (I'm using 12db setting with DTs).
By crowded I meant that there's impression of one kind of sound killing another kind of sound, not letting me appreciate details.

If you look through some of the older pictures in this thread, you may see that some people have put extra padding on the headband. I think that the padding there is quite thin considering that the headphones themselves are rather heavy. The padding is much thicker on the ear pads. If you used some extra padding there and have them at a bigger size, they might not put on quite as much pressure.

 

[Dobrescu George]

you are hearing right.akg k550 just has a lot more soundstage, and the entire sound is better.. and you asked this on k550 thread, where most people love k550... ask the same question in beyer thread, and you might get a better answer, i think...
for me, k550 was the only headphone that i would ever buy under hd800 and ultrasone dj series...
 
about the clamping force, it seems to go away with time, i mean, as i tried the demo unit, the clamping force was weak...

 

[misobol]

If you look through some of the older pictures in this thread, you may see that some people have put extra padding on the headband. I think that the padding there is quite thin considering that the headphones themselves are rather heavy. The padding is much thicker on the ear pads. If you used some extra padding there and have them at a bigger size, they might not put on quite as much pressure.

 
I'm trying extra padding on sides of headband made of kitchen sponge, will see how that goes.
 
I'm wondering whether sound on PHILIPS Fidelio X1 would be more similar to AKG or to Beyerdynamic, they seems to be
praised for comfort and are reported really good with positional sound in games and in my price range.

 

[TheGiantHogweed]

I'm trying extra padding on sides of headband made of kitchen sponge, will see how that goes.

I'm wondering whether sound on PHILIPS Fidelio X1 would be more similar to AKG or to Beyerdynamic, they seems to be
praised for comfort and are reported really good with positional sound in games and in my price range.

If you don't mind headphones being open back and leaking sound, you may as well go for them. You can get better sounding headphones for less money than the K550s if they are open-back. The Fidelio X1s are open back. My Audio technica ATH-AD700s sound much better than my K550s even though they were over £40 less. They are no good if you dont't want to disturb people around you though. In that way, the K550s are much better.

 

[rwpritchett]

FWIW, I have both K550 and the Fidelio X1. They are very different headphones so it's difficult to say one is better than the other without some frame of reference. For comfort, the X1 wins. It's like a Teddy Bear gently hugging your head.

Also, I bent my K550 headband slightly to improve fit and comfort. What I did was actually the opposite of what you described. Instead of bending the cups outward to lessen the clamp force, I placed the headband over one of my arms and gently squeezed inward on the cups. This created a more arched shape and the entire headband now rests evenly across my head. Before, the headband seemed to be too straight on the apex which put the majority of the headphone weight resting at a single point on top of my head.

 

[misobol]

FWIW, I have both K550 and the Fidelio X1. They are very different headphones so it's difficult to say one is better than the other without some frame of reference. For comfort, the X1 wins. It's like a Teddy Bear gently hugging your head.

Also, I bent my K550 headband slightly to improve fit and comfort. What I did was actually the opposite of what you described. Instead of bending the cups outward to lessen the clamp force, I placed the headband over one of my arms and gently squeezed inward on the cups. This created a more arched shape and the entire headband now rests evenly across my head. Before, the headband seemed to be too straight on the apex which put the majority of the headphone weight resting at a single point on top of my head.

 
Thank you for the reply. I figured that I won't know if I like unless I try it, so I've pulled trigger on Fidelio X1 and AKG K702.
 
Everyone, thanks again for all your help.

 

[Hacienda]

  I'm currently stretching them on foot ball.
 

Freels?