eulenfalter
New Head-Fier
(using only a MacBook Air M1)
NOT a blind experiment (YET -> will try later)
Hello,
my HPH-200s arrived today, and I'm sharing my first impressions. I have never done a direct comparison of headphones. What I noticed is that there is a risk of confirmation bias and placebo/nocebo effect. You will find and hear what you're expecting, and you might also tend to go down a certain path once you "cast" one headphone as having certain characteristics. I can only say, I would have to take measures to do a true blind test. I'm very confident I certainly will be able to tell the two headphones apart, but I would not be surprised if it would take me more than 30 seconds of listening to some tracks to be able to tell with 100% certainty.
The build quality of both headphones is good. The Sennheisers have slightly nicer matte plastic quality, but the Yamahas are absolutely fine too. The Senns have worse swivel joints (make noises, feel cheaper. The yamahas have nice feeling soft resistance). The head padding of the Senns is softer than the Yamahas' and therefore better. The cable of the Yamahas is stiffer (not as nice to the touch, and will retain unattractive and very annoying bends, huge problem), but much more sturdy, and has an L-plug instead of a massive straight plug (which the Senns have, and that seems like the cable might break there if not taken care of) which is much better. The Senns have a one-sided cable which has its ups, and its downs depending on situation. There is air space between your ear and the loudspeaker area on the Yamahas which gives it a very light feeling, as in less heat and moisture build-up. They don't feel heavy at all even though they are a good deal heavier, but still very light compared to other headphones. I'm impressed with how light and airy they feel. They are equivlanet to the Senns in that regard. The ear cushioning of the Yamahas is stiffer than that of the Senns, but it's a large area so pressure is distributed. The Senns have a faux leather coating that peels off after a short amount of use. The material beneath is acceptable but it then looks worn and needs to be taken care of very much. All in all I like both headphones design-wise very much, a mix of both would be perfect (all the upsides, that is haha).
Sound: This is going to be very subjective and the very first amateurish impressions of a beginner, and I might add more impressions as time goes by. Also see the caveat at the beginning of this post. I have not been "spoilt" by reading too many headphone reviews, so some descriptions I made up myself, and other descriptions may not reflect the same thing that they refer to in the headphones community. So here's my notes (mixing pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral descriptions).
Yamaha HPH-200 <-> Sennheiser HD239
colder <-> warmer
harder <-> softer
brighter <-> more cozy
wider <-> more narrow, limited
more clear <-> also clear, but softer
sharper <-> softer
too sharp <-> just right
mercilessly exposing S-sounds/consonants (sibilance) and other similar sounds in music that then almost hurt my ears like artefacts <-> Senns do not do that
they sound more like real loudspeakers <-> sound more like small speakers, feel limited
you hear a lot of things (i.e. almost more than you want to) <-> certain things "drown" / are so silent you're then not sure if it's the Senns of the Yamahas that give those things the right amount of exposure. Sometimes I prefer the Senns, sometimes the Yamahas depending on track, in that regard
less intimate, more analytical <-> more intimate, more relaxing
unforgiving to mistakes of the musician when recording/creating <-> works with everything
I get the feeling I need to turn up the volume for them to shine/ in order to be able to rate and evaluate my music <-> work at very low volume (I did take into account that they have different impedance ratings)
CAVEAT: A LOT OF THIS WAS NOT DONE BY BLIND LISTENING. I WILL WRITE MORE LATER. I'm just curious if there is anything to these first impressions that could indeed be true, or if I'm completely making stuff up
I was trying to swap the phones as fast as I could and relistened to the same passages.
Update: The more I listen, the more I notice that the Sennheisers put like a "velvet soft veil" around the music without compromising the quality too much (still sounds very clear, though some aspects might go unnoticed), making almost every track sound easy/relaxing to the ears. The Yamaha seems to be superior for some tracks, and the Senns for others, so now I feel like I need to swap headphones all the time :/ Also, in terms of comfort I much prefer the Yamaha because of the air pocket as opposed to the direct contact of the Senns, and regarding the cable, the Yamahas are really getting annoying.
this is an example where the Senns will simply smoothen and round off all the sharp edges, making it relaxing to listen to, whilst the Yamahas will be like little knives torturing your ears, like clipping. I guess my next quest is now to look for (open) headphones that will be more similar to the HD239, but higher quality / wider / fuller sound, and accepting a weight up to around 250-300g.
Edit: I read up on sibilance (which is a term that only refers to the human voice it seems), and it seems that people notice this for example when moving to higher quality phones like the HD600. So this may not be an inherent downside of the Yamahas, I'm not sure, it might even point to their quality. Also people here say it's (also) a recording problem. Nonetheless I'm wondering if there is reason to believe that the HD650s have less of this than the HD600s, as I'm looking to get either.
NOT a blind experiment (YET -> will try later)
Hello,
my HPH-200s arrived today, and I'm sharing my first impressions. I have never done a direct comparison of headphones. What I noticed is that there is a risk of confirmation bias and placebo/nocebo effect. You will find and hear what you're expecting, and you might also tend to go down a certain path once you "cast" one headphone as having certain characteristics. I can only say, I would have to take measures to do a true blind test. I'm very confident I certainly will be able to tell the two headphones apart, but I would not be surprised if it would take me more than 30 seconds of listening to some tracks to be able to tell with 100% certainty.
The build quality of both headphones is good. The Sennheisers have slightly nicer matte plastic quality, but the Yamahas are absolutely fine too. The Senns have worse swivel joints (make noises, feel cheaper. The yamahas have nice feeling soft resistance). The head padding of the Senns is softer than the Yamahas' and therefore better. The cable of the Yamahas is stiffer (not as nice to the touch, and will retain unattractive and very annoying bends, huge problem), but much more sturdy, and has an L-plug instead of a massive straight plug (which the Senns have, and that seems like the cable might break there if not taken care of) which is much better. The Senns have a one-sided cable which has its ups, and its downs depending on situation. There is air space between your ear and the loudspeaker area on the Yamahas which gives it a very light feeling, as in less heat and moisture build-up. They don't feel heavy at all even though they are a good deal heavier, but still very light compared to other headphones. I'm impressed with how light and airy they feel. They are equivlanet to the Senns in that regard. The ear cushioning of the Yamahas is stiffer than that of the Senns, but it's a large area so pressure is distributed. The Senns have a faux leather coating that peels off after a short amount of use. The material beneath is acceptable but it then looks worn and needs to be taken care of very much. All in all I like both headphones design-wise very much, a mix of both would be perfect (all the upsides, that is haha).
Sound: This is going to be very subjective and the very first amateurish impressions of a beginner, and I might add more impressions as time goes by. Also see the caveat at the beginning of this post. I have not been "spoilt" by reading too many headphone reviews, so some descriptions I made up myself, and other descriptions may not reflect the same thing that they refer to in the headphones community. So here's my notes (mixing pleasant, unpleasant, and neutral descriptions).
Yamaha HPH-200 <-> Sennheiser HD239
colder <-> warmer
harder <-> softer
brighter <-> more cozy
wider <-> more narrow, limited
more clear <-> also clear, but softer
sharper <-> softer
too sharp <-> just right
mercilessly exposing S-sounds/consonants (sibilance) and other similar sounds in music that then almost hurt my ears like artefacts <-> Senns do not do that
they sound more like real loudspeakers <-> sound more like small speakers, feel limited
you hear a lot of things (i.e. almost more than you want to) <-> certain things "drown" / are so silent you're then not sure if it's the Senns of the Yamahas that give those things the right amount of exposure. Sometimes I prefer the Senns, sometimes the Yamahas depending on track, in that regard
less intimate, more analytical <-> more intimate, more relaxing
unforgiving to mistakes of the musician when recording/creating <-> works with everything
I get the feeling I need to turn up the volume for them to shine/ in order to be able to rate and evaluate my music <-> work at very low volume (I did take into account that they have different impedance ratings)
CAVEAT: A LOT OF THIS WAS NOT DONE BY BLIND LISTENING. I WILL WRITE MORE LATER. I'm just curious if there is anything to these first impressions that could indeed be true, or if I'm completely making stuff up
I was trying to swap the phones as fast as I could and relistened to the same passages.
Update: The more I listen, the more I notice that the Sennheisers put like a "velvet soft veil" around the music without compromising the quality too much (still sounds very clear, though some aspects might go unnoticed), making almost every track sound easy/relaxing to the ears. The Yamaha seems to be superior for some tracks, and the Senns for others, so now I feel like I need to swap headphones all the time :/ Also, in terms of comfort I much prefer the Yamaha because of the air pocket as opposed to the direct contact of the Senns, and regarding the cable, the Yamahas are really getting annoying.
this is an example where the Senns will simply smoothen and round off all the sharp edges, making it relaxing to listen to, whilst the Yamahas will be like little knives torturing your ears, like clipping. I guess my next quest is now to look for (open) headphones that will be more similar to the HD239, but higher quality / wider / fuller sound, and accepting a weight up to around 250-300g.
Edit: I read up on sibilance (which is a term that only refers to the human voice it seems), and it seems that people notice this for example when moving to higher quality phones like the HD600. So this may not be an inherent downside of the Yamahas, I'm not sure, it might even point to their quality. Also people here say it's (also) a recording problem. Nonetheless I'm wondering if there is reason to believe that the HD650s have less of this than the HD600s, as I'm looking to get either.
Last edited:
....