Which top end headphone's sound is the most realistic and closest to real life sound? - Page 5

Doug, I'll be happy to share my thoughts in due course.

Right now I'm listening to The Cars "Good Times Roll" and my favorite line, "If the illusion is real, let them give you a ride..." which is exactly what I'm doing with the Angstrom/R10.

It might be a tad bit too vibrant for 2:33am (even my fish are asleep) but hey...

it only gets better from there!
i am not so fond anymore of the stock stax amps. i hear flaws.
the best thing you can do for your omega 2 is to match him with an aftermarket amp.

I hope to have a custom balanced amp made for my R10's someday.

It looks to be pretty easy to mod the R10's cable to a balanced one.

-Ed

Erm, no.

It's not that *hate* the RS-1, it's just that they're my least favorite of the cans in that class, that's a more accurate way of putting it. I've tried the SR-80, SR125, and the RS-1 at various times in various systems, and never took to any of them. The basic Grado sound just doesn't appeal to me. This conclusion is independent of any one system.

Also, just wanted to add, that IMO, *yes* system synergy and associated equipment is certainly important. But it's easy to overstate this significance, and I think we do that a lot around here. In my experience, it's not like an HD600 on one system will sound like an R10, and pair of stock earbuds on another. Headphones have a basic sound, that is obvious the first time you hear it under whatever circumstances and that stays with it no matter what you attach to it. There is a range within which that headphone can physically perform, it can be totally maximized or totally minimized, but an HD600 is still going to sound like an HD600, just putting on its best or its worst possible face.

I'd like to suggest this performance range can be a bit narrower than *some people* might imply. (Case in pooint is when people react negatively to a Sennheiser headphone and we jump on them and insist they try this or that expensive headphone replacement cable, as if a friggin' *cable swap* is going to magically transform them into a whole new pair of headphones. When in reality, the effect is really much more limited than all that, there is only a certain range within which any cable swap is going to alter the sound for the better or the worse.) I'd also like to suggest that it's possible to dislike a pair of headphones on any given system, and if you have a sense of what this potential range of performance is for any headphone in general, it's possible to conclude that given the negativity of your reaction and the degree to which system matching can effect sound, there is no way this headphone will ever be made to sound "right" to you.

Whenever someone doesn't like our favorite phones, we tend to jump on them and say "well you obviously have a sub-optimal system", "your amp is all wrong", "well what did you expect those POS interconnects?" etc. etc. We should be willing to accept that maybe just maybe, someone actually doesn't like a certain pair of cans. There is a point at which no amp-rolling, no source rolling, and no IC rolling is going to make a certain pair of cans palatable to an given person.

In my case, I can't conceive of any amp or source that would make me like Grados.

Mark,

You have the wrong ears.



Wmcmanus,

Congatulations on you aquisition! It's a very nice system you have there. I have listened to it, you know.

I think there is a definitive answer in terms of technical capabilities of the gear involved. Taste is something else, and something that can be divorced from an assessment by experienced members.


It all depends on what you've had and what your field of reference is. If all the sum total of the high-end phones you've actually owned happens to be the RS-1 and you haven't spent quality time and effort, not to mention money in tweaking your sources then it's likely that whatever you've spent time with will be the best phones.


Meets are NOT a place for making up your mind about gear. I cannot stress that enough.

Agreed...

In terms of the other points you've raised, you're one of the lucky ones Bangraman, that can throw seemingly limitless amounts of funds into this field, and yield better and better results...

Unfortunately for me, i'm somewhat crippled in terms of funding, so I have to, as you say just pick up the best I can, and stick with it... that being said, that doesn't take away from the personal taste issue

To my ears , the phone that virtually sounds like the singer or music in real time is by far the best.
that depends on a lot of factors, listening conditions, setup, ambient temparature etc. I have actually noticed that ntes sound clearer to me on a cold night than on a warm one.
somehow i have more fun listening after i have finished work, it loosens the mind. allows me to focus on the ambience of the presentation.
to say that such'n'such phone sounds the most realisitic is entirely subjective and frankly incorrect.


cheers
kunwar

One point that was previously implied (by whom, I don't know) was that different venues have different characteristics. Indeed, different venues have their own colorations and effects on the frequency spectrum. Yes, even studios. So, if you really want to be anal about what creates the most 'real' or 'live' sounds from the recording, you would truly need to listen to that venue, live, and then see which headphone's colorations (or lack thereof) matches the venue's colorations. However, this mostly applies to live venues, not studios, since studios are not designed for live listening because none of the mixing has been done.

IMO, though, the above theory is taking it a bit far. And it has a lot of flaws, too. Obviously no one would bother to do such a thing as the above, nor is there a perfect headphone/amp combo for every venue, especially for the recording that was done in Bubba's garage. Going with the above theory, maybe a MDR-v700DJ would be suited the best for recreating the awful acoustics of such a situation.

However, if there were to be a do-all headphone that recreated the live sound (but not necessarily all of the venue's characteristics), I haven't heard it yet. Sure, the HP-2+Melos+Arcam FMJ CD33 was startlingly good, but there were instances during which certain elements were not accurately reproduced. Sometimes, the 'jive' and the emotion of the players/vocalists was not present, and sometimes it was.

I would guess that no do-all system exists. But I have no doubt that many are close.

Even real-life music doesn't really always work out the way you intend it to. I'm an ex-classical musician and I had the opportunity to study with some of the best in the field in each instrument I used to play. I have played in some of the world's premier concert halls and still do attend the occasional concert (but as wallijonn remarked I think, there's something about the stalls that makes you zzz off ), usually of a friend because I'm pretty lazy.


The only systems I've come across which can be said to reproduce anywhere near the live music experience (in the member Geek's sense) is a very high end 5.1 speaker set-up. No headphone system that I've heard comes anywhere near close.


Personally, I believe that classical lovers are most poorly served by a headphone system, and jazz lovers are among those best served. The rest? That's totally subjective.

If this is true, perhaps this is the reason I enjoy headphones more than speakers.

The really odd thing I have been to more than a few live concerts where I have said to my wife next to me "is this recorded do you think". In fact just last week I was at a Marcia Hinze concert in Sydney. It had distorted treble, way to much volume, and mid range that lacked any distinction for the voice (illdefined mid range?) and my wife and I both felt that it was inferior to a recording on our moderate quality system at home.

Perhaps one of my pet gripes is that some live concerts can have such terrible sound. Gosh, at the Sydney Entertainment Centre I once went to a concert (Tina Turner) where we had to go home and listen to her record to enjoy the sound. I wasn't even sure it was really her on the stage (we did have BAD seats). I have rarely heard bad sound quality at live jazz by the way (I could be biased).

So, when we ask what is like "live" sound... boy that's a really loaded question. Especially given Brityney uses special equipment to "correct" her voice on stage.

I think I'll stick with the question: what gives the best sound. That one is personal and likely to vary, but at least its a starting point.

Cheers,

TonyAAA

Venue acoutics probably constitutes up to 95% of a live performance's sound quality.

Kinda random

But isn't any headphone that has really any powerful bass kinda unnatural. As the instruments that are represented with a strong bass, e.g. drums, when a listener is present, doesn't the drums only reproduce the drum "sound" not the physical experience of the bass when listening to the headphones. Just my thought.

Holy crap, sorry guys
Didn't realize that this thread was started back in 2004. I just saw it at the bottom of the screen somewhere and I thought it was pretty recent

I forgive you, as this is an interesting thread.