[tisb0b]

No, I was honestly just curious how he intends to position the HE-6 in the face of stiff competition. I stated what I believed to be the flaws, if he only intends on aiming it towards the people that already have the funds and the means to power the headphones and effectively giving the finger to all others that is honestly fine by me as I'm obviously not within his target market.  
 
Quote:

Just because you already own something doesn't mean the HE-6 isn't a good deal with an inexpensive speaker amp. It might be not as good of a deal for you, but you state it like Nankai is personally out to get you because you already own a nice headphone amplifier. Think bigger than yourself, please.
 
How do YOU know if the HE-6 isn't worth the premium to YOU? And for the record it isn't a premium at all. LCD-2 ~$1000, Concerto ~$700 = $1700 USD. HE-6 $1200-1600, good quality used vintage receiver $100 (or use the one in your home theater (free) = $1200-1700.

 

[Maxvla]

I'm still not understanding what you mean with regard to price and how he's shafting everyone.
 
If anything he's doing people a favor by transitioning to cheaper speaker amps instead of requiring a Zana Duex or RSA B52 for instance. In addition, he's making it so that your nice big home theater amp can pull double duty and cost you nothing extra to run some nice headphones. If you had a nice home theater and wanted to use LCD2 you'd have to buy a separate headphone amplifier to do them justice. This is more expensive!
 
I really have to ask, though.. do you not have a speaker amp of any kind? Pretty rare these days. If you do, you'd simply buy the HE-6, plug them into your speaker amp, and be done! No extra headphone amplifier needed.
 
If it works out that I prefer the HE-6 with my speaker amp to my HD600 balanced setup I could sell my HD600 setup and end up paying only a few hundred for the HE-6 all said and done.

 

[tisb0b]

You've misunderstood the intent behind my post, he's not shafting anyone and no-one requires a Zana Deux or RSA B52 to power a pair of headphones. I'm sure as hell that I'm not the only one with the concerns stated in my original post. I've only been in this hobby for about a year and my parents weren't exactly into audio so it is natural that I don't have a speaker amp considering I don't require one for my little audioengine A2 + S8 sub setup. 
Quote:

I'm still not understanding what you mean with regard to price and how he's shafting everyone.
 
If anything he's doing people a favor by transitioning to cheaper speaker amps instead of requiring a Zana Duex or RSA B52 for instance. In addition, he's making it so that your nice big home theater amp can pull double duty and cost you nothing extra to run some nice headphones. If you had a nice home theater and wanted to use LCD2 you'd have to buy a separate headphone amplifier to do them justice. This is more expensive!
 
I really have to ask, though.. do you not have a speaker amp of any kind? Pretty rare these days. If you do, you'd simply buy the HE-6, plug them into your speaker amp, and be done! No extra headphone amplifier needed.
 
If it works out that I prefer the HE-6 with my speaker amp to my HD600 balanced setup I could sell my HD600 setup and end up paying only a few hundred for the HE-6 all said and done.

 

[Maxvla]

I still don't understand your point, but lets let it drop and be one of those mysteries of life.
 
I do need to apologize though. I tend to get into this mindset that everyone on this forum is an adult on their own or married. I forget about younger people (I'm 28) that are still at home and might not have all the 'normal' things such as a home theater in this case.

 

[tisb0b]

I'm only 20 if that helps put things into perspective =), I'm fascinated by how businesses work and I was mainly curious that despite the faults I've listed how Nankai intends on overcoming them in order for the HE-6 to be successful so he can get a good ROI. Granted I know there are no absolutes but I'm more concerned with the approach he intends to take. 
 
Quote:

I still don't understand your point, but lets let it drop and be one of those mysteries of life.
 
I do need to apologize though. I tend to get into this mindset that everyone on this forum is an adult on their own or married. I forget about younger people (I'm 28) that are still at home and might not have all the 'normal' things such as a home theater in this case.

 

[Maxvla]

Quote:

I'm only 20 if that helps put things into perspective =), I'm fascinated by how businesses work and I was mainly curious that despite the faults I've listed how Nankai intends on overcoming them in order for the HE-6 to be successful so he can get a good ROI. Granted I know there are no absolutes but I'm more concerned with the approach he intends to take. 
 

 

I would imagine he would hope to follow the AKG K1000 model. People like them well enough to devote special gear to making them sound their best, whether that's a high end headphone amplifier (mostly for the raw power needed) or a speaker amp of any grade. I've seen K1000 on both headphone and speaker amps, some of those capable of both.
 
I honestly don't see any obstacles in the way. It's merely a different path. People buy and sell gear all the time regardless of it being all dynamic or not. Switching a buy/sell of a dynamic headphone amp to a speaker amp doesn't make any difference. Stax and other stats survive in their own way, K1000 fans in their way, HE-6 fans would merely join the group.
 
The irony of this discussion is not lost on me, however. Someone with a perfect setup for K1000 would be an EXCELLENT candidate to simply drop in a pair of HE-6. And with K1000's going for well over $1000 now there's a good chance there would be no financial loss at all if they chose the HE-6 to keep.
 
One other interesting facet to this discussion is that if you were to go the speaker amp route, you could easily pick up a Woo WEE energizer and have a electrostatic rig ready to go. You couldn't do that with most headphone amps.

 

[tisb0b]

I see, thanks for the insight =)
 
Quote:

I would imagine he would hope to follow the AKG K1000 model. People like them well enough to devote special gear to making them sound their best, whether that's a high end headphone amplifier (mostly for the raw power needed) or a speaker amp of any grade. I've seen K1000 on both headphone and speaker amps, some of those capable of both.

 

[monsieurguzel]

Unfortunately my amp was pretty much designed for the K1000 and powers them beautifully, yet somehow I felt that there was a little something missing from the sound of the HE-6.  Maybe it was underpowered at 10wpc, but maybe the sound signature just doesn't suit me as well as the LCD-2.
 
Also I have a problem with everybody saying to get a cheap speaker amp as a substitute to drive the HE-6.  In this hobby we strive to get good quality setups and amplification.  Many really cheap headphone amps can output just as much current as multi thousand dollar headphone amps and yet it doesn't mean they are anywhere as good.  The same mentality needs to be applied to speaker amps, where there are a million things more important than just the power output.

 
Quote:

I would imagine he would hope to follow the AKG K1000 model. People like them well enough to devote special gear to making them sound their best, whether that's a high end headphone amplifier (mostly for the raw power needed) or a speaker amp of any grade. I've seen K1000 on both headphone and speaker amps, some of those capable of both.
 
I honestly don't see any obstacles in the way. It's merely a different path. People buy and sell gear all the time regardless of it being all dynamic or not. Switching a buy/sell of a dynamic headphone amp to a speaker amp doesn't make any difference. Stax and other stats survive in their own way, K1000 fans in their way, HE-6 fans would merely join the group.
 
The irony of this discussion is not lost on me, however. Someone with a perfect setup for K1000 would be an EXCELLENT candidate to simply drop in a pair of HE-6. And with K1000's going for well over $1000 now there's a good chance there would be no financial loss at all if they chose the HE-6 to keep.
 
One other interesting facet to this discussion is that if you were to go the speaker amp route, you could easily pick up a Woo WEE energizer and have a electrostatic rig ready to go. You couldn't do that with most headphone amps.

 

[Frank I]

Bottom line you did not care for them and that is ok. I thought you were honest in your evaluation and I believe you need to have thr right synergy, I get mine in 2 weeks and frankly I heard them on a NAD 31BEE and thought they sounded good but I did not have them for a week with my system and we will see if I get the same impression.

 

[moodyrn]

There isn't a headphone in existence that everybody is going to love. That's what make this hobby unique. I remember reading where someone preferred a pair of sr60s to a pair of hd800s. And someone preferring a pair of k701s to a pair of T1s. Sound is sooo subjective. I think the most intriguing thing about this hobby is the number of hit and misses. I lot of people base a purchase on impressions and reviews because it's impossible to walk in a store to audition most of this gear. I have had some really good hits and some very bad misses in my time here.

 

[Frank I]

Great post. I agree. You need to post impressions and then I I always have done I read reviews and do some research and then if they are what I think I try them. Nobody can like every headphone amp or speakers systems. Not everyone will like the cans. I started with the 701 and then started buying like crazy. At some point we need to stop and just listen to the music. Any your right some will be hits and some will be misses.

 

[monsieurguzel]

Good points everyone.  And I personally hate how every new flagship headphone automatically becomes the latest, greatest thing for a few months on head-fi.  I don't buy that kind of stuff.
 
Truth be told, I also went through a 1 year phase of buying like crazy just about everything I could get my hands on...and have finally settled with a system that I'm super happy with and finally get to enjoy music instead of thinking about trying to get better sound out of my setup.  So maybe if I were in the mood to purchase new headphones I might have given the HE-6 more of a chance

 

[Skylab]

There is definitely a really annoying tendency on head-fi that seems very pervasive that when someone doesn't like a headphone that others do like, that the others immediately will assert that it is the doubter's amp, or source, or cables, or whatever, that is the cause of the dissension, rather than the headphones themselves.

While I liked them more than you did, Monsieur, I basically agreed with much of your assessment of their sound. It's not for you - that's completely cool. If I had to choose between just the HE-6 and the LCD-2, it would be the LCD-2 for me as well. Others have felt the inverse. That's also cool. It's important to get lots of viewpoints.

 

[monsieurguzel]

Exactly!  If the LCD-2 didn't exist, I probably would have prefered them over the HD800 which I used to love, meaning that the HE-6 is really that good.  But as many have mentioned, these are all top end headphones and I'm not in the game for owning a lot of different flavors anymore.  So when it comes to choosing between the LCD-2 and HE-6, I choose the LCD-2 but I could see people going the other way if that is the sound signature they prefer.
 
And yes, blaming lack of synergy and amplification on my system which easily costs over 10 Grand is a little ridiculous.
 
Quote:

There is definitely a really annoying tendency on head-fi that seems very pervasive that when someone doesn't like a headphone that others do like, that the others immediately will assert that it is the doubter's amp, or source, or cables, or whatever, that is the cause of the dissension, rather than the headphones themselves.

While I liked them more than you did, Monsieur, I basically agreed with much of your assessment of their sound. It's not for you - that's completely cool. If I had to choose between just the HE-6 and the LCD-2, it would be the LCD-2 for me as well. Others have felt the inverse. That's also cool. It's important to get lots of viewpoints.

 

[moodyrn]

Quote:

There is definitely a really annoying tendency on head-fi that seems very pervasive that when someone doesn't like a headphone that others do like, that the others immediately will assert that it is the doubter's amp, or source, or cables, or whatever, that is the cause of the dissension, rather than the headphones themselves.
 

I'm with you there. It is very annoying. I pointed this out on another forum. I remember on one forum I pointed something I didn't like about the hd800s and someone went as far to stated that there was a problem with the music I listened to without even knowing what type of music I listen to. I will never understand why some people get offended when someone don't like a particular can that someone else may love. The only thing that "should" matter is if you like them. I could care less about someone absolutely hating that very few cans I currently own.