AlanU
500+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- Apr 20, 2015
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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.
If you've ever listened to an old school AVR they use to have settings like Hall, coliseum, etc etc.
I do find the HD800 to have an artificial spacious sound. If you listen to Eva Cassidy "Live at Blues Alley" the HD800 sounds like the music is played in "Coliseum". Listening to the same song in professionally designed sound rooms with 2 channel speakers $$$ the music presentation does not sound like the HD800. Same song "Fields of Gold" in other sound rooms with different speakers still do not have the vast exaggerated sound stage of the HD800.
If you use a Concero HD DAC you'll also get an additional massive soundstage that is definitely not true to source.
Regardless of how good our Headphones get they will never get the musical emotional engagement of two disappearing 2 channel speakers. The resolution of headphones is incredible but even at live performances you cannot easily get the micro detail of tapping feet or fingers sliding on the strings etc. Music reproduction is "artificial" I've yet to hear headphones that even remotely comes close to the musical engagement I get with a 2 channel. Even my Totem Forests disappeared and created intimate musical bliss. I'll listen to a 2 channel 90%++ of the time. As you move up the chain in 2 channel speakers the dispersion of sound gets better and better.
I don't know of any other headphones that have similar soundstage of the HD800. The music reproduction of the HD800 is without a doubt unique. The Senn HD800 probably has one of the most biggest "soundstages" in the headphone world. I use my personal 2 channel and professional sound rooms as a bench mark in how "artificial music reproduction" should sound like.
Since there's no factors of room acoustics in the headphone world the HD800 or any flashship headphone will never have room ambiance. The characteristic of the HD800 is not natural like how planars reproduce vocals.
I understand your point about "soundstage" is small in headphones compared to the real world. Headphones will never sound as good as a 2 channel. Even many of my friends that are not involved in the headphone world finds the HD800 to have a large spacious sound. When I mention "coliseum" in a joking manner they saw a relationship with that word with what they hear in the HD800. When they immediately throw on my HD650 they think that's a "normal" presentation of music.
Imaging can be subjective in the 2 channel world. Some may find micro hyper detail to be a perfect representation of laser cut defined sounds locating instruments and vocals (position on stage). Some may find tubes to provide holographic musical bliss that blends the vocals and instruments together but less defined. However in both cases the speakers must disappear so you have no idea what location they are positioned in the room.
Headphone wise the speaker is directly in front of your ears. You can try to "see" where the singer resides in the music ...call it forward or 2,3 rows back. You can hear fine details by far better than any consumer grade home speakers. Some how the HD800 makes things sound like your in a huge room and has a less intimate soundstage. Due to the nature of the dynamic drivers you need to have a very organic sounding source (or coloured, pleasantly distorted tube amp) to produce musical emotional realism to the HD800.
If the HD800S gets a bigger soundstage than the mark1 I'd find this to be a bad "upgrade".
I do like my HD800 HP's. I select my HP with the type of mood I'm in. HD800 is simply different....nothing wrong with that.