Disclaimer: This is my first review, and I am still learning the 'ins and outs' of the terms used. I am also genuinely trying to convey what I hear personally, what with personal audio being highly subjective and all, having said that, any and all criticism is welcome.
So I had the chance to try out my cousin's sennheiser momentum, and I am now very reluctant to return them, let me explain.
The first thing that captivated me about the senn's is the sheer beauty of these things, the stainless steel headband is clad in soft lambskin leather, as is the ear-pads. The cable comes with a really substantial variable angle plug which I love, but the controls aren't android compatible, which I hate.
Another thing that struck me is how small the momentum's are, which calls into doubt their being classified as a circumaural headphone, the size, compounded by my slightly larger than usual ears, made me doubtful over wither or not they would fit me. I was partially right, the smallish ear-pads touched my ears from every corner, which gave them a rather claustrophobic feel, and the headphones don't really "disappear" like my ad900's do, they aren't especially uncomfortable( advantages of the more breathable lambskin?) , but you are very much aware that you are wearing headphones the entire time, which can get a wee bit distracting. Clamping force on the momentum's is better than I expected, but then again I would say this seeing that my current portable cans is the medieval torture apparatus known as the beyerdynamic dt1350.
Now on to the most vexing aspect of the momentum's: the sound, and what a glorious racket it is.
As has been mentioned many times on this site, the sennheiser momentum's are clearly acoustically tuned to cater to the general consumer signature, but rather than go with a strictly v shaped signature, the engineers at sennheiser seem to have gone for a shallow U shaped signature. This effectively means that you have really clean, Impactful bass, shimmering highs and a more refined mid frequency when compared to other consumer-type headphones, I find this brighter signature really agreeable, seeing that I listen to mostly house music in addition to other genre's. sound stage is a bit congested but with good spacing between instruments, but my dt1350s blow the momentum's out of the water as far as imaging and resolution go.
Now for the confusing part, the momentum's are the only headphones I have ever listened to which sound better unamped than amped, this struck me as odd, so I gave it another listen on another amp, and sure enough, the bass lost it's tight punchiness, and became rather diffuse and light, the mids took an even further seat back, and on some tracks became unbearable, and likewise the highs sounded shrill and lifeless. Now I realize that some people may disagree, and say that I have crappy gear, or crappy music, or that I don't know what I am talking about and should just go away, nevertheless to my ears the momentum's sound quality degraded in such a way that amping them really served no purpose.
amps used( Fiio e17> schiit Asgard> fiio e11> zo2, on low gain, fiio e7 desktop amp).
Summary: great looks, build, sound, portablity, and you don't even need an amp, color me curious.
So I had the chance to try out my cousin's sennheiser momentum, and I am now very reluctant to return them, let me explain.
The first thing that captivated me about the senn's is the sheer beauty of these things, the stainless steel headband is clad in soft lambskin leather, as is the ear-pads. The cable comes with a really substantial variable angle plug which I love, but the controls aren't android compatible, which I hate.
Another thing that struck me is how small the momentum's are, which calls into doubt their being classified as a circumaural headphone, the size, compounded by my slightly larger than usual ears, made me doubtful over wither or not they would fit me. I was partially right, the smallish ear-pads touched my ears from every corner, which gave them a rather claustrophobic feel, and the headphones don't really "disappear" like my ad900's do, they aren't especially uncomfortable( advantages of the more breathable lambskin?) , but you are very much aware that you are wearing headphones the entire time, which can get a wee bit distracting. Clamping force on the momentum's is better than I expected, but then again I would say this seeing that my current portable cans is the medieval torture apparatus known as the beyerdynamic dt1350.
Now on to the most vexing aspect of the momentum's: the sound, and what a glorious racket it is.
As has been mentioned many times on this site, the sennheiser momentum's are clearly acoustically tuned to cater to the general consumer signature, but rather than go with a strictly v shaped signature, the engineers at sennheiser seem to have gone for a shallow U shaped signature. This effectively means that you have really clean, Impactful bass, shimmering highs and a more refined mid frequency when compared to other consumer-type headphones, I find this brighter signature really agreeable, seeing that I listen to mostly house music in addition to other genre's. sound stage is a bit congested but with good spacing between instruments, but my dt1350s blow the momentum's out of the water as far as imaging and resolution go.
Now for the confusing part, the momentum's are the only headphones I have ever listened to which sound better unamped than amped, this struck me as odd, so I gave it another listen on another amp, and sure enough, the bass lost it's tight punchiness, and became rather diffuse and light, the mids took an even further seat back, and on some tracks became unbearable, and likewise the highs sounded shrill and lifeless. Now I realize that some people may disagree, and say that I have crappy gear, or crappy music, or that I don't know what I am talking about and should just go away, nevertheless to my ears the momentum's sound quality degraded in such a way that amping them really served no purpose.
amps used( Fiio e17> schiit Asgard> fiio e11> zo2, on low gain, fiio e7 desktop amp).
Summary: great looks, build, sound, portablity, and you don't even need an amp, color me curious.
