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Skullcandy Mix Master Mike versus Audeze LCD-3 - Page 9

post #121 of 143
7/1/12 at 4:25pm
Thread Starter 
Originally Posted by Joe Bloggs View Post

 

Okay.  I've posted a guide to equalizing headphones to match an ideal loudspeaker response.

http://www.head-fi.org/t/615417/how-to-equalize-your-headphones-advanced-tutorial-in-progress#post_8491380

 

If you have an "ideal" IEM, you can pretty much follow this guide, except using your reference IEM as your reference speakers.

 

If you can, follow the steps in that post up to step 9 and post a screenshot of the equalizer settings you've arrived at so far, then I can talk you through the rest of the process. (of transforming another pair of phones to sound 99% like the JH11 or *gasp* make another pair of phones or the JH11 themselves sound better than the JH11)

 

The remark about room nodes in step 9 doesn't apply to headphones, of course.  OTOH, if you find sharp peaks and dips above 2kHz (probably much higher than 2kHz though, for in-ear customs), those may be ear canal resonances.

 

Well I don't actually own the JH11 or UM Miracle I can only demo them, but you're convinced I can change a basic IEM into 99% of their sound, is that correct?

 

I will have a look at your guide, and dedicate some time to see what you're getting at.

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post #122 of 143
7/5/12 at 1:20pm
Thread Starter 

I've had 10 page long PM's with Joe Bloggs so that is sortof wrapped up.

 

 

As for me loving colour in headphones and trying to justify, cherry pick, or twist something, I just saw this article now that the Beyerdynamic Tesla T5p is the 5th flattest headphone ever measured (at the most complete and extensive headphone / earphone measurement database there is).

 

So that was all nonsense too.

 

 

If you want to look at CSD, this is one of my favorite IEM's which I recommend a lot.

 

UE700 (Click to show)

04.CSD_Ultimate_Ears_UE700.png

 

 

I'm not saying this is an ideal looking response, or that I even have any idea what that sounds like, this is just a response to those theories.

 

 

Kiteki

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post #123 of 143
7/5/12 at 1:30pm
Thread Starter 

Also I find this CSD interesting, I think I'll have to buy this one to see how it sounds now - http://en.goldenears.net/6472

 

 

Anyway, goldenears.net, despite all their equipment and knowledge, don't seem to think they can account for all sound in the graphs alone.

 

So... I that will suffice to answer my questions on the Skullcandy and LCD-3 for now.


Edited by kiteki - 7/5/12 at 1:32pm
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post #124 of 143
7/5/12 at 7:09pm
Thread Starter 

Looking at the UE700 some more, it scores well in their flatness index too (3.15).

 

I can't see anything indicating the UE18Pro sounds superior.

 

UE700 - http://en.goldenears.net/2072

 

UE18Pro - http://en.goldenears.net/12590

 

 

This is evidence of a lack of evidence -to me-, especially since GE adds the subejctive listening section "transparency / dynamics / high-rez".

 

Yup, I have answered my questions, and hopefully clarified the issue a little.

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post #125 of 143
7/5/12 at 7:41pm

ok - if you're happy. 

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post #126 of 143
7/6/12 at 5:19am
Thread Starter 

Via pure luck, in a shopping mall I never visit, I had the chance to demo the Skullcandy Mix Master Mike tonight, along with several other headphones I've been curious about.

 

The sound quality really is very good, it's easily better than the Aviator, and I think above the Sennheiser HD 25 II and Audio Technica AD700 which I quickly demoed there as well.

 

I also listened to one of the tracks I have with no info above 11kHz, some youtube to mp3 converter made it like that, it sounded excellent either way.

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post #127 of 143
7/16/12 at 2:33pm

Selling overpriced hokum is a tradition in HiFi.

 

Although, I'd love to see CSDs of both.

 

UE700 looks like a great material for equalization and custom mold. UE18Pro, much less.

Funny thing is that UE still keeps that horrible large driver bulge and short nozzle...

 

About equalization - time invariant methods cannot correct for enclosure or driver resonances, so the "perfect" headphone would have as little resonance as possible and as wide bandwidth as possible.

Here's where I had failures both with equalizing GR07 (6k resonance, sibilant sounding) and RE272 (4k resonance, bell-sounding).

On the other hand, balanced armatures I had/have (Sleek's SA6, UE 4vi) tended to have many small resonances, sounding preferable to a larger one, but tended to "crash" in the lowest end when equalized. Effect sounded similar to a soft limiter.

 

Also funny thing that's counterintuitive to some is that properly equalized IEMs actually make it harder to notice differences in lossy encodings, I suppose due to matching the psychoacoustic model more closely. Major boosts in 3-4kHz range seem to be most responsible.

 

Even the high end SE-5 Reference is improved noticeably by equalization... At least it doesn't have any major resonances or bandwidth issues I could hear and the difference from flat is within 6 dB (and symmetric by area) making them very nice and balanced sounding without it.

 

I'd weigh the issues in terms of audibility and annoyance like this:

- major frequency response boosts/nulls (> 6 dB) - if there are more close, then extra audible due to comb filtering-like effect

 - in terms of placement: ~6k > ~2k > ~3k > ~4k > 200 > rest (GERI is not close enough to my own weighting)

- major resonances (regardless of FR) - visible on CSD, includes "loose" bass

- clipping

- major lowpass

- noise

- compression

- intermodulation distorion

- harmonic distortion (odd and higher order more audible)

- jitter

 

Oh, and soundstaging issues are directly related to crossfeed, then frequency response and finally (minor) reverb.


Edited by AstralStorm - 7/16/12 at 3:33pm
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post #128 of 143
7/17/12 at 2:54am

Going right back to the original question - "can I easily 'golden FR' the Skullcandy into a $2000 headphone". Am I missing something or would +10dB at 10Hz be impossible for the Skullcandy to produce without distortion?

 

The MMM matches the HD650 fairly well in FR (actually the 650 apparently has a touch more low bass) but I just tried with mine adding +10dB to <20Hz in foobar and it makes little difference to the sound. The bass rolls off because it can't replicate those frequecies. 10dB is ten times the power - seems a bit unrealistic to expect to achieve that from an equaliser.

 

graphCompare.php?graphType=0&graphID[]=853&graphID[]=3401


Edited by joeyjojo - 7/17/12 at 3:02am
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post #129 of 143
7/21/12 at 10:07pm

CSDs and ringing are another part of it. It's possible that the MMM are actually well behaved. I have not heard it. As someone mentioned above, distortion is also another factor. Frequency response could be similar in the bass, but quality of the bass could be very different. Distortion does go some way in describing the bass quality. Here is a little discussion on bass distortion between the TH900 and HP1000 which I think is relevant to this thread: http://www.head-fi.org/t/595683/fostex-th900-impressions-discussion-thread/1350#post_8550368

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post #130 of 143
7/30/12 at 10:07pm
Thread Starter 
Originally Posted by joeyjojo View Post

Going right back to the original question - "can I easily 'golden FR' the Skullcandy into a $2000 headphone". Am I missing something or would +10dB at 10Hz be impossible for the Skullcandy to produce without distortion?

 

I considered the 10Hz area forgivable since you can't hear it, sub-bass will only become audible around 17Hz and even then doesn't impart very much into the total sound until around 40Hz.

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post #131 of 143
8/2/12 at 6:32am
Quote:
Originally Posted by kiteki View Post

 

I considered the 10Hz area forgivable since you can't hear it, sub-bass will only become audible around 17Hz and even then doesn't impart very much into the total sound until around 40Hz.

 

Oh then you havn't been listening to the right headphones then.  biggrin.gif

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post #132 of 143
8/5/12 at 1:44am
Quote:
Originally Posted by TMRaven View Post

 

Oh then you havn't been listening to the right headphones then.  biggrin.gif

 

Well I don't know about you but my hearing only allows down to 17Hz or so, well was it 16 or 17Hz don't remember. You may hear extra distortion or something that isn't a clean signal but I doubt 90%+ of people hear 15Hz and below.


Edited by RPGWiZaRD - 8/5/12 at 1:46am
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post #133 of 143
8/5/12 at 2:42am
Thread Starter 

I can hear down to 17Hz as well with a simple test, discounting 'feeling' lower Hz with your skin or eyes etc. which I haven't tried.

 

I've seen goldenears.net call 100Hz-10kHz "the safe zone", as in lower and higher than that isn't very reliable, they pick up varying results / resonance there and then average it afaik.

 

So I'm assuming what's missing there is a special microphone for LF, and a special microphone for HF, there may lie some answers in high-end sub-woofer or tweeter development.

 

 

Anyway if you measured two instruments, like two flutes of different material, with tests like these, I bet they would also look very very similiar on paper.

 

If you can't tell a cheap flute from an expensive one with microphones, hardware, and software, it makes sense you can't with audio playback either, unless you are only interested in the total transparency in the playback of both flutes.

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post #134 of 143
8/5/12 at 7:02am
Quote:
Originally Posted by RPGWiZaRD View Post

 

Well I don't know about you but my hearing only allows down to 17Hz or so, well was it 16 or 17Hz don't remember. You may hear extra distortion or something that isn't a clean signal but I doubt 90%+ of people hear 15Hz and below.

 

 

My line wasn't about hearing below 15hz, it was about a headphone not providing enough sub-bass to impact the total sound until above 40hz.

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post #135 of 143
8/20/12 at 10:33am

MMM's won't match HD650 in highs. Not ever. The > 20 dB difference in highest end (beyond 14 kHz) is huge and impossible to correct without introducing major distortion.

 

It also seems that they have more resonance by looking at the step responses. And these do provide plenty subbass, but in both cases the decay is subpar. So you end up with "headphone" bass.

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