First of all, I've owned *2* pairs of these beauties. In fact, I still do. I've once lost an ear-pad (don't even ask how..), I've ordered a replacement pair of the ear-pads and haven't listened to my Momentum's in over 4 months since then, it was the worst time of my life!!! (you can easily find my forum posts on this). Turns out, I've specified the wrong delivery address to custom-cable. Damn!!
I've also owned: K-701s (AKG is great but it's a shame, real shame, that they can't be driven by smartphones..), IE-8i (IE-80 by Sennheiser), various other inner-ear's.. etc..
But get this:
- Paycheck arrives. I have two choices: Wait 1 day (only 24 hours!) for Amazon delivery of these pairs and a price of 245 EUR, *or* visit a local store and pay up 320 EUR and get them immediately.
Any "sane" person will tell you, just wait 24 hours and save money! But I just couldn't. And I have zero regrets.
It's as if someone asked you: "Do you want to get back to your first love in life, and experience ultimate bliss?". Uhm, yes..?!
Damn it.
I really don't want to advertize for a company. But music moves me so much.. And Sennheiser has nailed it.
These things hypnotize you and make you love music in a way you've never experienced music before. On the very first day you may doubt them a little bit, maybe even a lot!! (warmup time is not a conspiracy, it's a real thing! Naysayers beware. I've hated them the first few days..). But as days go by these things just get better and better.. Damn. I think it's really the 4th day of relatively consistent music listening that you're going to realize the unreal energy these 'phones have.
A few things to note:
- You can crank them up to 9/10 volume on your smartphone and nobody outside will hear a thing or complain at all! Seriously. While listening to them I kept thinking "Damn, I'm probably disturbing people on the subway..". Nope! An easy test is to just cover both ear-pads with your hands and observe how much leakage they have. It's almost non-existent! I've always felt shy about listening to music at high-volume, but I can crank these things up to almost the highest volume and nobody gives me any bad looks.
- The top (the headband) is something you will never, ever, feel! This is something Sennheiser has truly mastered. It's super light-weight, it looks like it has no foam (and it doesn't have any!), and you wouldn't be wrong to attempt to assume that there's something missing at first. But in reality, you can't really feel the headband. It's just "not there". This is *miles* away from rival companies like AKG, which have attempted to provide something comfortable but ultimately failed. I'm looking at you AKG K-701. (Google for "I've knifed my K-701s. OP is not the only to have done this.. sadly.. :/).
So yeah, the headband is seriously the last thing you have to look at. Btw, I shave to about 1.5 CM and I still can't feel the headband. So take this into consideration. Comfort is a huge thing and you should really care about this (e.g. the IE-8 / IE-80 is quite big for an in-ear, and is sadly nowhere near the comfort levels of the Momentum 2.0, even though its sound quality is insane!).
- Protip: When you attach your cable, don't turn it all the way to the right (full-lock). It has nothing to do with sound-quality. It has to do with every-day activities. I've managed to break my cable because I was dancing with my headphones on. if I had them turned all the way counter-clockwise the detachable cable would have just fallen out. Instead it ripped. Sad, but it happens! Yeah, I shouldn't dance with my headphones, go figure!
- The Android volume controls just don't work for some smartphones. This is a known problem. Essentially, instead of increasing/decreasing the volume, the volume controls are replaced with next-track and previous-track commands. *Perhaps* this works properly on a Samsung, but it definitely doesn't work on an HTC. Honestly though it's no big deal, my phone has volume buttons anyway.
- When I say "it has great highs" - I'm not kidding. I listen to a lot of music with insane highs. Goa Trance? Thrash Metal? Yeah, you're covered. Trust me.
Downsides:
- I would almost say "it's the price". But really, when you consider the next highest thing offered from Sennheiser is the $1.5K HD800 then you really have nothing to complain about here. This is the mountain top of music fidelity you're going to get at this price. And quite honestly it's worth much more! So much more. I can't believe this fidelity exists at $<300. I've never tried the HD800's, but I have a feeling they're either over-priced or they're something out of this world, because there's just no way they're worth 5 times the much as the Momentum 2.0s and being able to deliver 5x the fidelity. No way.
Ultimately if you're a really conscious buyer you should try to give these a try-out. Perhaps a live listen in some pro audio shop. But your really can't go wrong with buying these. You *will not regret* buying these. Guaranteed.
I've also owned: K-701s (AKG is great but it's a shame, real shame, that they can't be driven by smartphones..), IE-8i (IE-80 by Sennheiser), various other inner-ear's.. etc..
But get this:
- Paycheck arrives. I have two choices: Wait 1 day (only 24 hours!) for Amazon delivery of these pairs and a price of 245 EUR, *or* visit a local store and pay up 320 EUR and get them immediately.
Any "sane" person will tell you, just wait 24 hours and save money! But I just couldn't. And I have zero regrets.
It's as if someone asked you: "Do you want to get back to your first love in life, and experience ultimate bliss?". Uhm, yes..?!
Damn it.
I really don't want to advertize for a company. But music moves me so much.. And Sennheiser has nailed it.
These things hypnotize you and make you love music in a way you've never experienced music before. On the very first day you may doubt them a little bit, maybe even a lot!! (warmup time is not a conspiracy, it's a real thing! Naysayers beware. I've hated them the first few days..). But as days go by these things just get better and better.. Damn. I think it's really the 4th day of relatively consistent music listening that you're going to realize the unreal energy these 'phones have.
A few things to note:
- You can crank them up to 9/10 volume on your smartphone and nobody outside will hear a thing or complain at all! Seriously. While listening to them I kept thinking "Damn, I'm probably disturbing people on the subway..". Nope! An easy test is to just cover both ear-pads with your hands and observe how much leakage they have. It's almost non-existent! I've always felt shy about listening to music at high-volume, but I can crank these things up to almost the highest volume and nobody gives me any bad looks.
- The top (the headband) is something you will never, ever, feel! This is something Sennheiser has truly mastered. It's super light-weight, it looks like it has no foam (and it doesn't have any!), and you wouldn't be wrong to attempt to assume that there's something missing at first. But in reality, you can't really feel the headband. It's just "not there". This is *miles* away from rival companies like AKG, which have attempted to provide something comfortable but ultimately failed. I'm looking at you AKG K-701. (Google for "I've knifed my K-701s. OP is not the only to have done this.. sadly.. :/).
So yeah, the headband is seriously the last thing you have to look at. Btw, I shave to about 1.5 CM and I still can't feel the headband. So take this into consideration. Comfort is a huge thing and you should really care about this (e.g. the IE-8 / IE-80 is quite big for an in-ear, and is sadly nowhere near the comfort levels of the Momentum 2.0, even though its sound quality is insane!).
- Protip: When you attach your cable, don't turn it all the way to the right (full-lock). It has nothing to do with sound-quality. It has to do with every-day activities. I've managed to break my cable because I was dancing with my headphones on. if I had them turned all the way counter-clockwise the detachable cable would have just fallen out. Instead it ripped. Sad, but it happens! Yeah, I shouldn't dance with my headphones, go figure!
- The Android volume controls just don't work for some smartphones. This is a known problem. Essentially, instead of increasing/decreasing the volume, the volume controls are replaced with next-track and previous-track commands. *Perhaps* this works properly on a Samsung, but it definitely doesn't work on an HTC. Honestly though it's no big deal, my phone has volume buttons anyway.
- When I say "it has great highs" - I'm not kidding. I listen to a lot of music with insane highs. Goa Trance? Thrash Metal? Yeah, you're covered. Trust me.
Downsides:
- I would almost say "it's the price". But really, when you consider the next highest thing offered from Sennheiser is the $1.5K HD800 then you really have nothing to complain about here. This is the mountain top of music fidelity you're going to get at this price. And quite honestly it's worth much more! So much more. I can't believe this fidelity exists at $<300. I've never tried the HD800's, but I have a feeling they're either over-priced or they're something out of this world, because there's just no way they're worth 5 times the much as the Momentum 2.0s and being able to deliver 5x the fidelity. No way.
Ultimately if you're a really conscious buyer you should try to give these a try-out. Perhaps a live listen in some pro audio shop. But your really can't go wrong with buying these. You *will not regret* buying these. Guaranteed.
