Setup 1: Win7 PC -> USB -> Modi -> PYST -> Magni
Setup 2: Win7 PC -> USB -> E10k
Summary
Disclaimer: this is my first review on Head-Fi and I fully declare that I know (nearly) nothing. Please be kind.
Based on the reviews I read here and elsewhere, I chose to go with the HE400's for my quiet, at-home setup. My primary listening material is electronic house, jazz, and swing, so I figured I'd go with a headphone that everyone described as "fun" and "interesting". But as soon as I plugged them in I knew something was wrong. The detail was phenomenal, the bass lovely and linear (and gets notably better with burn-in), and treble surprisingly clear. But most men's voices, the low notes in women's voices, some cymbals, violas, and french horns all sounded like they were behind a velvet curtain. On some recordings these headphones are truly spectacular, but almost half the time I found myself recoiling at the bizarre frequency response hole with which I was presented. After some 20 hours of testing and listening I have decided that $300 headphones shouldn't make me go "ew", and have decided to return them and try some much-flatter HD-600's instead.
Physical Attributes
The packaging is simple but effective and got the 'phones to me without any kind of damage.
Instead of a rigid carrying case, like what I got with my Senny HD 380 Pro's, HiFiMan provides a simple velvet bag. While this might be good for some gentle kinds of transport, there's no way I'd put these in my backpack or anything.
Although bright blue in some photos, in real-life mine had a nice, dark blue colour. The cans themselves look quite nice, but the headband and its attachments are bargain-basement.
Comfort
Out of the box the HE400’s definitely have death grip. Fortunately, the headband is somewhat bendable, so it’s quite easy to reshape it to lower clamp force. For that matter, if you had some kind of head deformity you could probably bend it to work around that, too!
The ear cups are nice and deep and didn’t touch my sticky-outy ears at all. My HE400’s came with both the pleather and velour pads, and I found that the velours were about 7mm thicker than the pleathers. The cups themselves are very large. While this might be good for some people, they were so big on my face that they touched my jawbone and forced my mouth open slightly! When I think of listening fatigue I don’t often think of a sore jaw, but there you go.
While I didn’t find the cable to be hard to manage, one strange consequence of its rigidity was that it pulled my head down. I found that the cable had such a hard time bending around things (like the arm of my listening chair) that it would pull my head towards where the cable was coiled, on the floor in my case.
Despite my whinging, the comfort isn’t that bad, say 7/10, but they’re not a forge-that-you-even-have-them-on headphone like my HD 380’s.
Amplification
While it could be that there ‘phones weren’t burned in at all, I did find that my E10k DAC/Amp didn’t bring out the bass in the HE400. Once I got them home and plugged them in to my Magni I noticed that bass had much more presence, without ever being boomy or overpowering. Bass is noticeably absent without amplification, though, so don’t listen to the marketing and think that you’ll be fine driving these with an iPod.
Sound
The HE400’s do most things very well. I put on Sting’s The Last Ship and couldn’t believe how good it sounded. Sting sounded perfectly positioned in the sound stage, and the acoustical accompaniments were clear and detailed. I sat there and listened to the whole album and thought I had found acoustic bliss. Despite what most say, I found that a lot of classical music, especially Vivaldi, sounded great on these headphones, too.
But when I put on nearly anything else I thought of velvet, and too much of it. The female vocalist from The Moleskins, for example, sounded like she was singing from 5 metres behind her band. A viola, cello, or french horn soloist sound like they’re playing in a velvet-lined box, and some cymbals sound as though they’re not even on the same sound stage!
So what is causing this? The 2,000 to 6,000 Hz frequency response hole. If you bring up the FR for the HE400 on HeadRoom you’ll see it quite clearly. In retrospect I should have known better, but I was expecting it to manifest differently. Material that is recorded flat presents the hole quite clearly. It’s only material that is recorded with those frequencies over-amped that sounds truly great to me on these headphones. And that’s what was going on with the Sting and Vivaldi recordings that I liked. On my Shure E2 IEMs (my favourite reference monitors to date) Sting sounds way too forward and Vivaldi harsh. The FR hole in the HE400’s was simply flattening those out for me. Unfortunately for the HE400’s, most recordings are between flat and laid-back, and the more laid-back the worse the recording sounds on them.
Conclusion
The HE400’s are great headphones for some recordings. They have a velvety-smooth signature, great detail, and amazing channel separation. But when I add up the frequency response hole and the comfort issues I experienced I have decided to return these headphones and try something else.
Would I buy these again? Probably not. If I were to go for some more orthodynamics I’d go with something with flatter tuning. Still, this was a fun experiment and I get to exercise Amazon’s return policy, something I don’t do often.
Arriving next week: Sennheiser HD600’s. At least on a graph, they seem much more attuned to my tastes.
Setup 2: Win7 PC -> USB -> E10k
Summary
Disclaimer: this is my first review on Head-Fi and I fully declare that I know (nearly) nothing. Please be kind.
Based on the reviews I read here and elsewhere, I chose to go with the HE400's for my quiet, at-home setup. My primary listening material is electronic house, jazz, and swing, so I figured I'd go with a headphone that everyone described as "fun" and "interesting". But as soon as I plugged them in I knew something was wrong. The detail was phenomenal, the bass lovely and linear (and gets notably better with burn-in), and treble surprisingly clear. But most men's voices, the low notes in women's voices, some cymbals, violas, and french horns all sounded like they were behind a velvet curtain. On some recordings these headphones are truly spectacular, but almost half the time I found myself recoiling at the bizarre frequency response hole with which I was presented. After some 20 hours of testing and listening I have decided that $300 headphones shouldn't make me go "ew", and have decided to return them and try some much-flatter HD-600's instead.
Physical Attributes
The packaging is simple but effective and got the 'phones to me without any kind of damage.
Instead of a rigid carrying case, like what I got with my Senny HD 380 Pro's, HiFiMan provides a simple velvet bag. While this might be good for some gentle kinds of transport, there's no way I'd put these in my backpack or anything.
Although bright blue in some photos, in real-life mine had a nice, dark blue colour. The cans themselves look quite nice, but the headband and its attachments are bargain-basement.
Comfort
Out of the box the HE400’s definitely have death grip. Fortunately, the headband is somewhat bendable, so it’s quite easy to reshape it to lower clamp force. For that matter, if you had some kind of head deformity you could probably bend it to work around that, too!
The ear cups are nice and deep and didn’t touch my sticky-outy ears at all. My HE400’s came with both the pleather and velour pads, and I found that the velours were about 7mm thicker than the pleathers. The cups themselves are very large. While this might be good for some people, they were so big on my face that they touched my jawbone and forced my mouth open slightly! When I think of listening fatigue I don’t often think of a sore jaw, but there you go.
While I didn’t find the cable to be hard to manage, one strange consequence of its rigidity was that it pulled my head down. I found that the cable had such a hard time bending around things (like the arm of my listening chair) that it would pull my head towards where the cable was coiled, on the floor in my case.
Despite my whinging, the comfort isn’t that bad, say 7/10, but they’re not a forge-that-you-even-have-them-on headphone like my HD 380’s.
Amplification
While it could be that there ‘phones weren’t burned in at all, I did find that my E10k DAC/Amp didn’t bring out the bass in the HE400. Once I got them home and plugged them in to my Magni I noticed that bass had much more presence, without ever being boomy or overpowering. Bass is noticeably absent without amplification, though, so don’t listen to the marketing and think that you’ll be fine driving these with an iPod.
Sound
The HE400’s do most things very well. I put on Sting’s The Last Ship and couldn’t believe how good it sounded. Sting sounded perfectly positioned in the sound stage, and the acoustical accompaniments were clear and detailed. I sat there and listened to the whole album and thought I had found acoustic bliss. Despite what most say, I found that a lot of classical music, especially Vivaldi, sounded great on these headphones, too.
But when I put on nearly anything else I thought of velvet, and too much of it. The female vocalist from The Moleskins, for example, sounded like she was singing from 5 metres behind her band. A viola, cello, or french horn soloist sound like they’re playing in a velvet-lined box, and some cymbals sound as though they’re not even on the same sound stage!
So what is causing this? The 2,000 to 6,000 Hz frequency response hole. If you bring up the FR for the HE400 on HeadRoom you’ll see it quite clearly. In retrospect I should have known better, but I was expecting it to manifest differently. Material that is recorded flat presents the hole quite clearly. It’s only material that is recorded with those frequencies over-amped that sounds truly great to me on these headphones. And that’s what was going on with the Sting and Vivaldi recordings that I liked. On my Shure E2 IEMs (my favourite reference monitors to date) Sting sounds way too forward and Vivaldi harsh. The FR hole in the HE400’s was simply flattening those out for me. Unfortunately for the HE400’s, most recordings are between flat and laid-back, and the more laid-back the worse the recording sounds on them.
Conclusion
The HE400’s are great headphones for some recordings. They have a velvety-smooth signature, great detail, and amazing channel separation. But when I add up the frequency response hole and the comfort issues I experienced I have decided to return these headphones and try something else.
Would I buy these again? Probably not. If I were to go for some more orthodynamics I’d go with something with flatter tuning. Still, this was a fun experiment and I get to exercise Amazon’s return policy, something I don’t do often.
Arriving next week: Sennheiser HD600’s. At least on a graph, they seem much more attuned to my tastes.
Anyway great review