[Dadracer]

As it happens I don't think the HD600 frequency response is better and I still prefer the HD800. Virtually all headphones are a compromise so adding EQ is a waste of time and effort that could be usefully employed listening to music. I prefer to choose headphones like any other piece of kit. Is it better than the alternatives I can afford? No need to worry about imaginary peaks and troughs on a graph.

 

[greggf]

I gotta agree with dadracer.
 
Back when my inlaws had a summer cottage, they had a ritual of having evening campfires.  My mother-in-law could never just sit back and enjoy the damned fire.  She was constantly adding wood or brush, poking the fire, foraging for more wood.  She couldn't just have a beer and sit and watch the fire and the sunsets.
 
EQing strikes me the same way.  There are people who like the campfire and then there are people who like OCD fiddling.  You can't do both.  Either you're a "relaxer" or a fiddler.  Either you like the HD800, or else . . . move along, take up knitting or something where fiddling is the entire point of the endeavor.

 

[JamieMcC]

 
Only £100 more than the HD800? Not bad I guess. I expected a much higher price.

The HD800 can easily be found new online for under £700 in Europe, I purchased mine from AVClass in the Netherlands they arrived in 2 or 3 days to the UK and I experienced no problems registering them with Sennheiser for the full warranty and received a frequency response chart a couple of  days later.  15-20 minutes checking online can save a lot of cash compared to paying the rrp on the high street.

 

[robm321]

  I gotta agree with dadracer.
 
Back when my inlaws had a summer cottage, they had a ritual of having evening campfires.  My mother-in-law could never just sit back and enjoy the damned fire.  She was constantly adding wood or brush, poking the fire, foraging for more wood.  She couldn't just have a beer and sit and watch the fire and the sunsets.
 
EQing strikes me the same way.  There are people who like the campfire and then there are people who like OCD fiddling.  You can't do both.  Either you're a "relaxer" or a fiddler.  Either you like the HD800, or else . . . move along, take up knitting or something where fiddling is the entire point of the endeavor.

I agreed too.

 

[edwardsean]

   I'd be certainly concerned if they messed with the soundstage. IMO the soundstage sounds borderline "too big" compared to the actual recorded source. 

Could you explain this? I've heard comments like this about certain headphones for a long time, especially about the HD800. But, I can never understand this. The HD800s soundstage is huge comparative to other headphones, but ridiculously tiny "compared to the actual recorded source." If you were there at the session, the singer is not singing a millimeter away from your nose and the high hat is not riding a few inches from your ear and the bass is not thumping in your throat. The scale is vastly larger in every dimension. I'm always trying to get soundstage bigger even with the HD800s, which is why I've appreciated the advances in DSP. 
 
I don't mean to disparage your opinion because I know the perspective is shared by probably more people than those who share mine. I think I kinda understand when I compare coherency to other phones, but when I think of live music I can never wrap my head around a headphone having an artificially inflated image. By the physics of a speaker abutting your ear, it's already artificially too small. 

 

[ubs28]

 
Could you explain this? I've heard comments like this about certain headphones for a long time, especially about the HD800. But, I can never understand this. The HD800s soundstage is huge comparative to other headphones, but ridiculously tiny "compared to the actual recorded source." If you were there at the session, the singer is not singing a millimeter away from your nose and the high hat is not riding a few inches from your ear and the bass is not thumping in your throat. The scale is vastly larger in every dimension. I'm always trying to get soundstage bigger even with the HD800s, which is why I've appreciated the advances in DSP. 
 
I don't mean to disparage your opinion because I know the perspective is shared by probably more people than those who share mine. I think I kinda understand when I compare coherency to other phones, but when I think of live music I can never wrap my head around a headphone having an artificially inflated image. By the physics of a speaker abutting your ear, it's already artificially too small. 

For that type of soundstage you need speakers. If you like bass, speakers are also awesome for this.
 
But I'm always suprised when speaker setups costing more than $100000 can't compete with a very cheap HD800 in terms of details that you can hear.

 

[potkettleblack]

I gotta agree with dadracer.

Back when my inlaws had a summer cottage, they had a ritual of having evening campfires.  My mother-in-law could never just sit back and enjoy the damned fire.  She was constantly adding wood or brush, poking the fire, foraging for more wood.  She couldn't just have a beer and sit and watch the fire and the sunsets.

EQing strikes me the same way.  There are people who like the campfire and then there are people who like OCD fiddling.  You can't do both.  Either you're a "relaxer" or a fiddler.  Either you like the HD800, or else . . . move along, take up knitting or something where fiddling is the entire point of the endeavor.

 

[Dadracer]

But even stereo through speakers is an artificially produced sound recreation. Unless its a live recording then its is surely down to how the music has been recorded and mixed. Even in a live recording you would need some kind of surround system (more artifice) to recreate the real sound stage. I am not sure that you can directly compare headphone sound and speaker sound as they are both artificial and both compromises..........even if they are good ones.

 

[cddc]

Not sure whether the paint issue is addressed on HD800S?

 

[edwardsean]

  But even stereo through speakers is an artificially produced sound recreation. Unless its a live recording then its is surely down to how the music has been recorded and mixed. Even in a live recording you would need some kind of surround system (more artifice) to recreate the real sound stage. I am not sure that you can directly compare headphone sound and speaker sound as they are both artificial and both compromises..........even if they are good ones.

I think that's right, but speakers do reproduce the scale of live sound far better than headphones. At the same time, to ubs28's point, headphones like the HD800 generally resolve better than a lot of speakers. So for me a kind of happy convergence has been a top-flight headphone system with DSP used to simulate the scale of a speaker soundstage. in this regard I am truly grateful for the advances in processing that have brought us technologies like those used by Smyth and OOYH.
 
DSP is also why I'm ambivalent about the HD800S. The old thinking was that for sound to be natural you had to engineer it at the physical level of the drivers, amp topology, conducting materials, etc. Until we can beam sound directly into our brains, that will never change. However, DSP was also rubbish back then and unless you had e.g., a $4000 Pultec you couldn't just fix a spectral design flaw with EQ--not in an organic way. Today, you have a raft of amazing soft EQs and so I'm still not sure the material tweaks that were made to the HD800 design could not be rendered digitally. I guess we'll all see soon enough. 

 

[Robert777]

  The HD800 can easily be found new online for under £700 in Europe, I purchased mine from AVClass in the Netherlands they arrived in 2 or 3 days to the UK and I experienced no problems registering them with Sennheiser for the full warranty and received a frequency response chart a couple of  days later.  15-20 minutes checking online can save a lot of cash compared to paying the rrp on the high street.

And I got mine from a seller in France shipped to the UK for under £600. It came with a 2 year warranty, not the 10 year Club Orpheus one, and I obtained the frequency response from Sennheiser. These deals do come up and can more often than not be trusted. Time will tell if I regret not paying full retail for the 10 year warranty.

 

[Dadracer]

What is the paint issue on the HD800S?

 

[shabta]

  What is the paint issue on the HD800S?

He means: "is the issue on the HD800 of the paint chipping off addressed with the new paint job of the HD800S?" Time will tell...

 

[Nicklikesmusic]

 
For that type of soundstage you need speakers. If you like bass, speakers are also awesome for this.
 
But I'm always suprised when speaker setups costing more than $100000 can't compete with a very cheap HD800 in terms of details that you can hear.

Have to comment on the above about the HD800 competing yet alone beating $100000 speaker systems in terms of recreating small details.
 
 
My iPod with $10 earbuds lets me hear details too that I can't hear on speakers. There are details on speakers that you can't hear on headphones. The left and right channels are mixed in our heads when using headphones. The channels physically interfere with each other in the air before reaching our ears using speakers. Just like two physical ocean interfering can create a crest or a dip when meeting so can the sound waves from two speakers. I have noticed new tones using speakers that my HD800 just don't create. Some people will call this coloration from the cabinet  but not all of it is. 
Why I like the Concept 20's is that they have very low coloration. If you like the HD800 for it's imaging (Im an image whore) you will love the Concept 20. Until recently I didn't think any speaker could be as precise as the HD800 in terms of it's ability to pinpoint sources in it's soundstage... I also used my Schiit Valhalla 2 as a preamp for my speaker setup and although it makes the music more euphonic and enjoyable to my wife- it does destroy the absolutely precise imaging but on the positive it gives the system a turntable sound, i.e. a depth of sound which must have gone back 15 feet into the wall with my eyes closed... wow
With my HD800 though the Valhalla 2 sounds sublime. Possibly the low channel separation of this amp gives a wider stereo effect (a small bit  what actually happens with speakers )
Sorry...off topic!

 

[Dadracer]

If imaging and neutrality is high on your list for speakers may I suggest the LS3/5a which will fit on your Concept stands and produce the most realistic vocal sounds you will have experienced and holographic stereo.