[donunus]

Even if detail is an objective term, The Question of which is more detailed is hard to answer without any frequencies specified for example. Some headphones can have lots of High Frequency detail for example and not have any bass detail/definition at all. Some headphones have very transparent mids which can bring out the detail in timbre that is spine chillingly realistic while having no hf detail at all.

Basically it ends up where overall detail of a headphone from top to bottom becomes subjective. People focus on different parts of the music to check for detail. And then there are just some people that don't know what they are talking about too

 

[jh4db536]

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[KLS]

Quote:

Originally Posted by donunus /img/forum/go_quote.gif Even if detail is an objective term, The Question of which is more detailed is hard to answer without any frequencies specified for example. Some headphones can have lots of High Frequency detail for example and not have any bass detail/definition at all. Some headphones have very transparent mids which can bring out the detail in timbre that is spine chillingly realistic while having no hf detail at all. Basically it ends up where overall detail of a headphone from top to bottom becomes subjective. People focus on different parts of the music to check for detail. And then there are just some people that don't know what they are talking about too

I am following you

Sometimes people describe phones as 'detail', but never say 'detail' as in which part of the frequency. And in my opinion, phones with a very large soundstage sometimes place certain instrument/sound notes very far away, making the listener hard to 'pick up' the details. Though again this is related to frequency response too, as EQing does help those distant-placed detail coming upfront.

http://www.head-fi.org/forums/f4/des...ossary-220770/
Detail and resolution (or definition).
Detail - The most delicate elements of the original sound and those which are the first to disappear with lesser equipment.
Definition (or resolution) - The ability of a component to reveal the subtle information that is fundamental to high fidelity sound.

 

[donunus]

and the story goes on where that headphone with the larger apparent soundstage is more detailed to a person listening to the ambience of the room in the recording instead of that particular instrument that you say is too far away. There again, detail depends on what one is listening to.

Then the "soundstage" thing in headphones is another touchy subject too. Sometimes the soundstage you think you are hearing is just a frequency response anomaly that causes all recordings to seem like they have a certain "samey" soundstage. This is not real detail. It makes the music sound fake. The soundstage of the music you are listening to should match the sound at the perspective of where the microphones were placed during the original recording session in the case of a live recording for example. In order to really even start to measure how detailed the headphone is, one must know how it sounded where the music was recorded in the first place.

After listening to so many albums and recordings one gets the gist of it though and can tell by experience what constant anomalies one headphone has that shouldn't be consistently present in all recordings. Usually the more a headphone approaches accuracy and neutrality, detail also gets better.

If frequencies across the spectrum are equally loud meaning not one frequency is masked by another, all sounds can be clearly heard when a lot of instruments on the recording are playing at the same time for example. This usually equals MORE DETAIL. There are more factors but I believe neutrality is the biggest factor in making a speaker/headphone sound like it is more detailed.

 

[donunus]

I might be confusing detail with transparency though which I feel should be the same thing. Or are they the same? Or maybe we could say that if all parts of the spectrum are perfectly detailed then the sound is transparent

 

[oqvist]

I would say they are related... But aren´t you forgetting transient response? Speed as it´s also called

 

[donunus]

yah like I said... there are also other factors that make a sound more detailed. I just talked about one that I felt was most important because even though speed is very important for all the detail to come through, there are less headphones with severe speed limitations than there are ones that are so uneven in response.

Senns for example are always criticized to sound slow but they are not really as slow as some people think they are. One contribution to their seemingly slow sound is their frequency response tending to the smooth and dullish side compared to other cans like grados for example that seem faster due to more presence in the "presence" region or upper mids to lower highs.

This graph actually shows the senns keeping up with the transients better than the grado 225s for example

They are both far from perfect but at least the senn starts to show some semblance of a square wave

The Grados overshoot quite a bit which probably explains the extra "snap" factor in the sound making them seem faster sounding. Maybe Tyll can help me out with this.

 

[earerror]

The ultrasone pro 900's are brighter after 100 hours of burn in. Its hard to determine how good they are if you only tried them for a week.

 

[aimlink]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Edoardo /img/forum/go_quote.gif "Detail" is not a question of what sounds better on what.

Whoever said it was?? But as I said, please take a moment to think of what is being used to make that determination of detail level. Neither you, nor I, nor anyone else are equipped in exactly the same way.

 

[captian73]

I'm about to find out which is better, as soon as i get rid of a load of other headphones, including the dreadful Zino's (what a waste of space they are!).

I loved my 750's (highest of my 7 Ultrasone's so far), but until I got a half decent amp for the HD650's, i wouldn't have choosen the HD's over the 750's .... if you're with me?

The HD650's do need a good amp. I tried running them with a few CMoy's etc, but until I got my RSA hornet amp, I really didn't see the point of the HD's. I found so far that the Ultrasone's are far easier to power, but they do need some form of amping, but you don't need to go nuts.

With my RSA I have the Ultrasone's on the lowest gain setting, or medium if i'm in the mood, but the HD650 need to be on high gain all the time.

 

[Austin_J]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mulveling /img/forum/go_quote.gif I'd take the HD650 over an Edition 9. It's not slow nor thick at all, driven by a decent amp & source. Try it out of any Gilmore/Headamp, a Zana Deux, a working Singlepower Supra/SDS, maybe even a good PPA build - clean, near-reference quality sound (depending on source somewhat). Sounds very good from a Pico or Rudistor RP7.1 too. Sounds quite good from a RKV Mk II but yeah a bit thick and over-smoothed due to that amp. Sounds quite good from an sr71/HR2 but just a tad more grainy than usual. Has a much more natural tone than the Ed 9 IMO. But yeah, it's not closed.

I own both of these and couldn't agree with the quote above more. The HD 650 is all about source and amplification.... it is biased in favor of reality, which is not what some people want. I am using both with a RSA Raptor.

On the other hand, if you are driving your headphones from an iPod, etc. the Edition 9 are really nice, just not reference.

 

[rustablad]

HD650  is  a great headphone,  but  i think comparing it  to an edition 9   is close to   insane       but in the  end, with  headphones it all comes down to personal taste

 

[pcf]

Quote:

HD650  is  a great headphone,  but  i think comparing it  to an edition 9   is close to   insane       but in the  end, with  headphones it all comes down to personal taste

I had both. HD650 is long gone but Edition9 is still here.

 

 

[Minkypou]

Quote:

I'd take the HD650 over an Edition 9. It's not slow nor thick at all, driven by a decent amp & source. Try it out of any Gilmore/Headamp, a Zana Deux, a working Singlepower Supra/SDS, maybe even a good PPA build - clean, near-reference quality sound (depending on source somewhat). Sounds very good from a Pico or Rudistor RP7.1 too. Sounds quite good from a RKV Mk II but yeah a bit thick and over-smoothed due to that amp. Sounds quite good from an sr71/HR2 but just a tad more grainy than usual. Has a much more natural tone than the Ed 9 IMO. But yeah, it's not closed.

i try the hd 650 and edition on a 1800$ amp+ 2000$ dac at my local store.. seriously.. you cant love more the sennheiser,,, lol , the sound quality of the hd 650's is **** compared to the edition 9, but its your choice. Lol* i dont talk about the sound signature, only about the quality.*.

 

[vc1187]

Likely the HD650 scales better with higher end equipment.