[fjrabon]

  My daily drivers are the HiFiMAN HE 560s. Any thoughts on if the TH-X00 ebony would be an upgrade in terms of absolute sound quality?

no, they wouldn't in terms of absolute sound quality.  HE560 win on resolution, imaging accuracy, speed and soundstage.  The THX00 has a more "fun" signature to most people, but the HE560 is a different class of technical performance.  

 

[Rockhart]

Anyone else in on this drop?

I was going to go for end game on the Atticus or Eikons, leaning more towards the Atticus' for EDM, but that's a lot of money to spend without hearing how the first batch comes out. If I have to spend a little more for not preordering, thats fine with me. Should be some people that would be willing to part with them as well.

Been doing a ton of research on some mid fi and the ebonies are getting a ton of praise. Don't care for detachable cables and these look better to me than all of that shiny on the Teaks.

If the spikes in frequency that were the achilles heel for the Walnut and Purplehearts are fixed in the Ebonies, I'm all in.

 

[fjrabon]

Anyone else in on this drop?

I was going to go for end game on the Atticus or Eikons, leaning more towards the Atticus' for EDM, but that's a lot of money to spend without hearing how the first batch comes out. If I have to spend a little more for not preordering, thats fine with me. Should be some people that would be willing to part with them as well.

Been doing a ton of research on some mid fi and the ebonies are getting a ton of praise. Don't care for detachable cables and these look better to me than all of that shiny on the Teaks.

If the spikes in frequency that were the achilles heel for the Walnut and Purplehearts are fixed in the Ebonies, I'm all in.

The fostex ebonies are much shinier than the Emu Teaks.

 

[boostergold90]

Anyone else in on this drop?

I was going to go for end game on the Atticus or Eikons, leaning more towards the Atticus' for EDM, but that's a lot of money to spend without hearing how the first batch comes out. If I have to spend a little more for not preordering, thats fine with me. Should be some people that would be willing to part with them as well.

Been doing a ton of research on some mid fi and the ebonies are getting a ton of praise. Don't care for detachable cables and these look better to me than all of that shiny on the Teaks.

If the spikes in frequency that were the achilles heel for the Walnut and Purplehearts are fixed in the Ebonies, I'm all in.

Yeah, I'm in on this one. Was waiting for the post-Christmas E-MU drop and these just happened to drop first. Looking forward to getting them in hand.

 

[Rockhart]

The fostex ebonies are much shinier than the Emu Teaks.

I'm talking about the metal casing around the cups, etc. on the Teaks.

 

[fjrabon]

I'm talking about the metal casing around the cups, etc. on the Teaks.

ah, well it's a brushed aluminum type look.  It's obviously not the same as black, but it isn't shiny.

 

[Eudis]

ah, well it's a brushed aluminum type look.  It's obviously not the same as black, but it isn't shiny.

Its closer to a satin anodized silver look but feels like smooth metal imo.

 

[Zyker]

Well, I hope you guys are happy... I backed the MassDrop.  Here's to hoping that they're a good replacement for my a900x.

 

[fjrabon]

I meant to post this the other day during the big bru-ha-ha over the color of the ebony cups.  Basically ebony varies more than just about any other tone wood in terms of coloring and grain.  With the same sourcing you get everything from: 
 

 
to 
 

 
to
 


I got to look over about 100 ebony cups Chan from EMU brought over the night before CanLanta last year and all from the same batch, there was pretty extreme variation.  Same source, same time frame, same finish.  And they all varied about as much as the above 3 cups did.  
 
If you want consistent ebony cups, coloring wise, you're simply going to be throwing away a lot of wood.  That's the only way to consistently have them be the same, just throw away (or use for something else) the roughly 80% that are different.  Simple math then tells you this increases the cost of the source wood by a factor of 5 because you have to buy 5 cups worth of wood to get 1 cup to the specs you want.  
 
I guess I was a bit wrong earlier to suggest that pure black ebony doesn't really exist anymore, it's just that it's rare to the point that you can't specifically buy it, anywhere you go to buy it, they're going to force you to buy a bunch of non-jet black in a bulk order to get it (or rather they're going to force you to buy a bulk order and it's luck of the draw as to what is in there.  What Lawton does is they buy a lot, and then after they receive their shipment, they then separate it out into different grades themselves.   Massdrop and EMU, on the other hand, it's luck of the draw as to which cups you get.  

 

[thefitz]

If you want a jet black earcup paint the ******* earcup jet black.
 
The cup is covered in finish anyway. If it was bare wood, I can understand the gripe (by maybe 2%).
 
I get you want a consistent grain from an instrument fingerboard that's bare wood. But this whole "durrr I wish this finished wood looked no different than black paint" thing is just pathetic, even for head-fi.

 

[PopZeus]

At this point, I think the backlash against color complaints is louder than the initial complaint. Although its easy to see why-- ebony is a rare tone wood whose color has no bearing on the tone, and still costs more than mahogany regardless of light the color is.

What's kinda annoying to see are people on the official Massdrop thread calling buyers of the TH-X00 EB out as suckers for paying the extra $100, as if the "cup-grade" (see what I did there?) is purely cosmetic or otherwise superficial. Considering I couldn't listen to the PH for more than a few minutes at a normal volume, I disagree with the implication.

 

[thefitz]

At this point, I think the backlash against color complaints is louder than the initial complaint. Although its easy to see why-- ebony is a rare tone wood whose color has no bearing on the tone, and still costs more than mahogany regardless of light the color is.

What's kinda annoying to see are people on the official Massdrop thread calling buyers of the TH-X00 EB out as suckers for paying the extra $100, as if the "cup-grade" (see what I did there?) is purely cosmetic or otherwise superficial. Considering I couldn't listen to the PH for more than a few minutes at a normal volume, I disagree with the implication.

I bought the EB because of the FR measurements relative to the other two. Particularly the fact that the EB stays consistent around 5kHz where the other two dip.
 
Go to the Lawton site and look at the price of cups.

 

[PopZeus]

I'm right there with ya. I LOVE this pair of headphones and since I'm not a critical listener, (I'm just looking for an extremely refined, smooth "fun" listening experience) the EBs are perfect for that. I had a pair of HE-400i and while I was impressed with the clarity and detail, I found them to be too bright and bass-thin for me to keep.

So for me, the issue is whether or not the E-MU Teak is the right baby step towards a less mid-scooped sound. Like I've said elsewhere, the only thing the EBs don't do is put vocals and guitars up front. Any more headphone pursuits would have to keep everything of what I love about the EBs while adding the only thing that's missing.

 

[zolkis]

I bought the EB because of the FR measurements relative to the other two. Particularly the fact that the EB stays consistent around 5kHz where the other two dip.

 
Exactly. I am also very interested to measure them against the TH900, and to bisect what does actually cause fixing that notch. Since the Massdrop versions seem to differ only in the wood cups, the only logical conclusion I can make at the moment it's likely indeed caused by the wood type. When I measured the TH900 drivers without the cup, they didn't have the notch, so it seems to be a cancellation effect because the cups. Let's see.

 

[thefitz]

   
Exactly. I am also very interested to measure them against the TH900, and to bisect what does actually cause fixing that notch. Since the Massdrop versions seem to differ only in the wood cups, the only logical conclusion I can make at the moment it's likely indeed caused by the wood type. When I measured the TH900 drivers without the cup, they didn't have the notch, so it seems to be a cancellation effect because the cups. Let's see.

I remember seeing a photo of the driver being shallower on the X00, but maybe it's the same driver just with a segment sunken in more.
 
I don't understand the price of the TH-900. If those damn wood cups were machine carved and painted and nothing else changed, how different would it sound, and how much would it cost?