On closer inspection of the 2nd pair, it has zero driver rattle/clack on both earcups, the 5% I mentioned in the above post wasn't the driver being loose at all, what it was is the piece of plastic on the outside of the left earcup, the one that says M-Audio on it and is kind of a soft-touch...

In my case, alpha pads seem to make the sub-bass more noticeable, might be because of the better sealage compared to stock pads? So if you like sub bass that could be good, but as a side effect, at least on my pair it makes female vocals sound a little more veiled? Not sure if veiled is the...

Alright, so my 2nd pair arrived, right ear-cup has no clacking at all and left ear-cup has it, but only ever so slightly, it's definitely no where near as bad as it was on the 1st pair, maybe like 5% of what the 1st pair had. So yeah, guessing it's a quality control issue from whenever they were...

Although probably not the smartest idea, I figure I'll order a 2nd pair and compare them side by side. Would be nice if the new one had zero clacking, but if the new one has the same issue I'll keep the one that has the lesser of it, and return the worse one. Then just try to find a way to...

The tickling feeling isn't so much from the bass itself, at least in this case as far as I can tell. What happen is the tickling only happens in one ear cup, the one with the overly 'loose' part that is rattling around more so than the other, which the vibration from the rattling around gets...

A rattling/clacking inside the cups.   Sound quality is fine, doesn't sound like a damaged driver. Haven't opened it so can't be sure what it is yet, but it sounds like a large component is loose, not fastened correctly inside. If I  shake my head soflty, like if I were quietly gesturing "No"...

Yeah :( if it comes to that I will, kind of hoping to avoid it though since this issue doesn't seem to be that rare with these, and if I returned it I'd either end up getting another q40 which could have the same issue, or develop it down the road. Or jump to one of the other headphones I was...

Finally got these delivered yesterday, for those of you that had the "Rattling" issue, how easy of a fix was it? Is it just tightening loose screws, or is the thing that's rattling around something that's not held by screws and needs to be glued down?  

Glad to hear that, I was very close to ordering that exact setup to be my first pair of "nice" all-around headphones, but my wallet talked me out of it since I still need to upgrade my computers GPU (still using an AMD 5870). So for the time being I settled for getting the E09k+E17, and will...

Couldn't bear to wait for news on the HDH50 any longer so just went ahead and ordered Q40/Alphapads. Hopefully I won't have the same stroke of bad luck as Hawaii did 

Anyone who has tried this mod have any experience with Q40s or CALs? If so how do they compare?

Mm yeah was considering a Rolls mixer since the Rolls mute switch I'm using is built like a tank (even if it looks like it was made in the 90's), but guess I should sink some time into googling around to see if there are any other cheap mixers that have a good rep, as far as introducing...

Mm might have to put them back into my consideration then :o Just paranoid with the sucky walls this apartment has, can hear conversations from the neighboring apartment when they speak clear as day, and they're not even speaking loudly XD

Lol yeah, if I can get a decent headphone for as cheap as $100 I'll gladly take it, saves me money that I can then put towards an amp 

Guess I'll be getting me some premium once I get off of work then