AudioQuest Carbon Nighthawks.
What Best describes their sound :
Like holding satin sheets against your body.
As if headphone sound could be rich dark chocolate but better..
Have you ever felt a cool relaxing breeze on a mild Spring afternoon ?
The wind, the air, the breeze, as you feel it float past you and wrap around you and meld into you, its an ahhhhhhhhh.....
Well, that is how the Nighthawk's sound.
Its what they deliver.
Its what they are designed to do.
They are designed to rescue your ears from faux treble response, and wrap them instead in golden honey-sound.
This specific sound is the sweetness of sound that discerning ears love regarding "earlier" Audeze gear, while presented in a spectacular highest of tech set of "carbon" headphones.
When i first saw them, i fell in love with the fact that they look in person like a gleaming midnight black Porsche 911 Turbo.
Simplistic aesthetic design, yet the sculpted futuristic lines of the headphone's design are elegant and refined.
Interestingly, the HE1000 & Ananda (and similar) copied the same shape, yet, all of these are much much larger.
These are pretty headphones, and their comfort as provided by their fit, is to make $3000 USD headphones, envious.
Ok, all gushing aside, let me respond to what you are curious about, if you are thinking about a purchase.
It seems that all reviews, nearly all that you will discover, refer to their treble response as being soft, recessed, rolled off, lacking.
And the other reviews say their bass is just not balanced, it could be, too much.
Ok, well, here is the reality........we live surrounded by a hifi world of headphones which are created by, driven by, and immersed within this unfortunate idea that treble is the main reason for headphone sound.
"""i dont care about how good they sound, just tell me about the TREBLE !! """"""
Many are affected with this obsession, regarding how they assess the quality of a headphone's sound.
And we as long term tone-addicts - headphone-users have become use to this, ourselves... and have adjusted our listening criteria-preference to relate to this concept.
These headphones deny all that.
They rebuke it.
They are the polar opposite of that agenda, criteria, as their reason to exist.
They create a velvety sound, smooth, rich, tonally quite accurate, but they do not qualify as a "modern" sounding headphone.
"Modern" is : too much high end, too much separation of instruments, too much over-focus on resolution, and not enough focus on overall beauty.
The AudioQuest NightHawks are, according to MY ears... entirely created to push back against dry, bright, sterile, cold, $3000 USD headphone "analysis sound".
They gloriously succeed by offering all the sound and not of the shrill.
Soundstage is wide, mids are plentiful, treble is accurate but not sharp-edged, and the bass is in full bloom.
What do they sound like?
They sound, (first impression).... a bit like.... > early Audeze sweet deep tone married to the Aeon C, is what came to my mind upon first encounter within their sound.
Treble addicts, will not love these.
Bass addicts, wil not love these.
Beautiful sound addicts, .... = give them a try.
There is one more thing i can tell you, if you have found this review and own these or are thinking about a purchase.
There is a simple 10 second mod you can do to these headphones that will change their dynamic presentation substantially, and basically recreate their sound as "modern", including increasing their resolution and treble response.
When i tried this, i realized that these good headphones, would have been great if they had been simply designed exactly as they are, but closed.
Here is the MOD. Get 2 pieces of wide clear plastic tape that you would use for shipping, and put them over the open part of the headphones.... right over the grills, and you'll have all the treble you want and a tighter and actually better sound.
One thing tho......because you are now compressing the sound and sound pressure inside the headphone, you have to adjust your volume LOWER, or things will get weird inside the headphones.......
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What Best describes their sound :
Like holding satin sheets against your body.
As if headphone sound could be rich dark chocolate but better..
Have you ever felt a cool relaxing breeze on a mild Spring afternoon ?
The wind, the air, the breeze, as you feel it float past you and wrap around you and meld into you, its an ahhhhhhhhh.....
Well, that is how the Nighthawk's sound.
Its what they deliver.
Its what they are designed to do.
They are designed to rescue your ears from faux treble response, and wrap them instead in golden honey-sound.
This specific sound is the sweetness of sound that discerning ears love regarding "earlier" Audeze gear, while presented in a spectacular highest of tech set of "carbon" headphones.
When i first saw them, i fell in love with the fact that they look in person like a gleaming midnight black Porsche 911 Turbo.
Simplistic aesthetic design, yet the sculpted futuristic lines of the headphone's design are elegant and refined.
Interestingly, the HE1000 & Ananda (and similar) copied the same shape, yet, all of these are much much larger.
These are pretty headphones, and their comfort as provided by their fit, is to make $3000 USD headphones, envious.
Ok, all gushing aside, let me respond to what you are curious about, if you are thinking about a purchase.
It seems that all reviews, nearly all that you will discover, refer to their treble response as being soft, recessed, rolled off, lacking.
And the other reviews say their bass is just not balanced, it could be, too much.
Ok, well, here is the reality........we live surrounded by a hifi world of headphones which are created by, driven by, and immersed within this unfortunate idea that treble is the main reason for headphone sound.
"""i dont care about how good they sound, just tell me about the TREBLE !! """"""
Many are affected with this obsession, regarding how they assess the quality of a headphone's sound.
And we as long term tone-addicts - headphone-users have become use to this, ourselves... and have adjusted our listening criteria-preference to relate to this concept.
These headphones deny all that.
They rebuke it.
They are the polar opposite of that agenda, criteria, as their reason to exist.
They create a velvety sound, smooth, rich, tonally quite accurate, but they do not qualify as a "modern" sounding headphone.
"Modern" is : too much high end, too much separation of instruments, too much over-focus on resolution, and not enough focus on overall beauty.
The AudioQuest NightHawks are, according to MY ears... entirely created to push back against dry, bright, sterile, cold, $3000 USD headphone "analysis sound".
They gloriously succeed by offering all the sound and not of the shrill.
Soundstage is wide, mids are plentiful, treble is accurate but not sharp-edged, and the bass is in full bloom.
What do they sound like?
They sound, (first impression).... a bit like.... > early Audeze sweet deep tone married to the Aeon C, is what came to my mind upon first encounter within their sound.
Treble addicts, will not love these.
Bass addicts, wil not love these.
Beautiful sound addicts, .... = give them a try.
There is one more thing i can tell you, if you have found this review and own these or are thinking about a purchase.
There is a simple 10 second mod you can do to these headphones that will change their dynamic presentation substantially, and basically recreate their sound as "modern", including increasing their resolution and treble response.
When i tried this, i realized that these good headphones, would have been great if they had been simply designed exactly as they are, but closed.
Here is the MOD. Get 2 pieces of wide clear plastic tape that you would use for shipping, and put them over the open part of the headphones.... right over the grills, and you'll have all the treble you want and a tighter and actually better sound.
One thing tho......because you are now compressing the sound and sound pressure inside the headphone, you have to adjust your volume LOWER, or things will get weird inside the headphones.......
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-
-
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