huy_ha
100+ Head-Fier
- Joined
- Jul 26, 2001
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I bought Sennheiser MX-500 to save my Grado SR-125 from the various forms of environmental detritus in New York City. Some days, however, you need to rock out and the Senns don’t cut it, so I picked up a used pair of Sony MDR-7506.
My initial impressions were favorable, but when putting them head to head with the SR125 through a Creek OBH-11, I noticed a compressed feel about them. Perhaps I’m attuned to open air headphones. This was most apparent on drums, cymbals, and female vocals (esp. those with reverb added in the recording) like “Frozen Charlotte” by Natalie Merchant (w/ the singer from Innocence Mission?) or “I Love You” by Sarah McLachlan. Recordings that already sounded a bit compressed, like Sunny Day Real Estate’s Diary, also suffered from this effect. So I searched the forums for V6/7506 mods and decided to fiddle with the earpads.
Velour pads would have defeated my purpose of having cans I didn’t have to worry about in inclement weather and polluted atmospheres, so I decided to see if my replacement pads for my Beyer Dynamic DT-48 would work on the 7506. What started as a half-ass mod turned out to my liking. The DT- 48 has a cardboard-like oval platform which sticks to the driver housing, around the circular plastic grille that covers the driver. The outer cushy ear pad, however, is attached to the platform by a ring much like the 7506's earpad. So I slipped both sets of earpads off and placed the DT-48 earpads on the 7506. Voila! Almost.
The DT-48 pads are just a tad larger than the housing of the 7506. They are close enough in size to stay on without worry, but their bigger size means you can swivel the earpads about thirty degrees in either direction. This adds up to being able to keep the headband wherever is most comfortable on the top of your noggin and adjusting the earpads, instead, to an angle that suits your ears. The DT-48 pads are also circumaural on my ears. The internal distances of the earpad are roughly 2 inches across and 2.5 inches the other way. It’s made of pleather, which is getting softer, but will still leave your ears hot. They are almost twice as thick as the 7506 pads (caveat: my 7506 pads were worn down from heavy use).
In the end - and I don’t know if it’s due to the circumaural aspect, the increased distance of the driver from my ear, or the adjustable angle of the pads - that compressed quality is just about gone and recordings seem to have opened up (vocals more natural, cymbals and snare less processed sounding). Oh, and I kept the foam driver covering on to tame the highs a bit. There is some loss of bass with this mod, but there seemed to be plenty to go around to begin with. I’m sure this pleather will be annoying in the summer, but for now it works quite well. And just in case anyone thinks I’m defecting (or defective), I still go to my Grado’s when at home and on favorite recordings, especially for vinyl. Their combination of forward and open sound still knocks me out.
Equipment used: Denon DCM-360, Creek OBH-11 through Pioneer VSX-D608, Radio Shack Gold Series 6' extension, Grado 1/4" to 1/8" adapter, Grado SR-125, Technics TT with Grado Green.
Recordings used: Natalie Merchant - Ophelia, Motherland; S. McLachlan - Sufacing; Sunny Day Real Estate - Diary; Quicksand - Slip, Manic Compression; Pretenders - Singles (LP), Mellencamp -Scarecrow (LP)
[can you tell I just started reading Stereophile reviews this year?]
My initial impressions were favorable, but when putting them head to head with the SR125 through a Creek OBH-11, I noticed a compressed feel about them. Perhaps I’m attuned to open air headphones. This was most apparent on drums, cymbals, and female vocals (esp. those with reverb added in the recording) like “Frozen Charlotte” by Natalie Merchant (w/ the singer from Innocence Mission?) or “I Love You” by Sarah McLachlan. Recordings that already sounded a bit compressed, like Sunny Day Real Estate’s Diary, also suffered from this effect. So I searched the forums for V6/7506 mods and decided to fiddle with the earpads.
Velour pads would have defeated my purpose of having cans I didn’t have to worry about in inclement weather and polluted atmospheres, so I decided to see if my replacement pads for my Beyer Dynamic DT-48 would work on the 7506. What started as a half-ass mod turned out to my liking. The DT- 48 has a cardboard-like oval platform which sticks to the driver housing, around the circular plastic grille that covers the driver. The outer cushy ear pad, however, is attached to the platform by a ring much like the 7506's earpad. So I slipped both sets of earpads off and placed the DT-48 earpads on the 7506. Voila! Almost.
The DT-48 pads are just a tad larger than the housing of the 7506. They are close enough in size to stay on without worry, but their bigger size means you can swivel the earpads about thirty degrees in either direction. This adds up to being able to keep the headband wherever is most comfortable on the top of your noggin and adjusting the earpads, instead, to an angle that suits your ears. The DT-48 pads are also circumaural on my ears. The internal distances of the earpad are roughly 2 inches across and 2.5 inches the other way. It’s made of pleather, which is getting softer, but will still leave your ears hot. They are almost twice as thick as the 7506 pads (caveat: my 7506 pads were worn down from heavy use).
In the end - and I don’t know if it’s due to the circumaural aspect, the increased distance of the driver from my ear, or the adjustable angle of the pads - that compressed quality is just about gone and recordings seem to have opened up (vocals more natural, cymbals and snare less processed sounding). Oh, and I kept the foam driver covering on to tame the highs a bit. There is some loss of bass with this mod, but there seemed to be plenty to go around to begin with. I’m sure this pleather will be annoying in the summer, but for now it works quite well. And just in case anyone thinks I’m defecting (or defective), I still go to my Grado’s when at home and on favorite recordings, especially for vinyl. Their combination of forward and open sound still knocks me out.
Equipment used: Denon DCM-360, Creek OBH-11 through Pioneer VSX-D608, Radio Shack Gold Series 6' extension, Grado 1/4" to 1/8" adapter, Grado SR-125, Technics TT with Grado Green.
Recordings used: Natalie Merchant - Ophelia, Motherland; S. McLachlan - Sufacing; Sunny Day Real Estate - Diary; Quicksand - Slip, Manic Compression; Pretenders - Singles (LP), Mellencamp -Scarecrow (LP)
[can you tell I just started reading Stereophile reviews this year?]
