Hi everybody, new to the forum. I was interested some new headphones, specifically the SRH1840, so I stumbled across this thread and despite clearly better uses of my time I read every page. I'm new to this type of community as the last headphones I bought were before the age of the internet, but wow, how things have changed.
It seems there are an incredibly large number of people who are ready to dismiss this headphone based simply on a few graphical plots of information. These people seem to be so biased against the headphone that they refuse to have anything to do with it and automatically put it into a category not worth their time and have an ability to write it off before even listening to it. At the same time, many who have actually listened to them love them. Also interesting to note how the HIFIMAN HE-500, a headphone with "audiophile approved graphs" has the exact same review score as the SRH1840 on Amazon (4.8).
Even Purrin, probably the most outspoken SRH1840 hater who spoke at length on the crappiness of the headphone based on the shockingly bad graphs, couldn't muster up much if any criticism, finally admitting that they produced "OK" sound, and didn't have the "treble boasting" as much as the graph would indicate, but of course these are still "lowfi" headphones, as is obviously and painfully indicated by the graphs.
I wasn't sure what to think. After looking at frequency response graphs, distortion graphs, sine wave plots, THD 3-d plots (oooo pretty pictures) and a whole lot of other mumbo jumbo I've come to the conclusion that I've wasted just about enough of my life on it then I have patience for. It seems that while many "audiophile" approved headphones share very very similar frequency response graphs, and maybe don't show as much distortion in the distortion graphs, it seems there is "more then one way to skin a cat" as the saying goes, and that things which should be "obvious failures" in this headphone, such as a "boasted treble", are audibly absent from "professional" reviews.
It seems to me if every headphone shared the same frequency response graph I suspect every headphone would sound almost the same, maybe that is an "audiophile approved" vision of the future but personally I've always been of the opinion that choice is good.
So I've decided to go ahead and order a pair. They can be had for $400 these days, a relative steal considering people were incredibly satisfied with them at $700. If you all don't hear from my again it is because I am thoroughly enjoying the music with a part of me wondering what "audiophiles" will be discussing and debating in the next 10 years.