[Bigtime Audiophile]

Anyone else do a comparison between the AirPods Max and the HD6XX?

I am by no means an expert...but I daresay I am experiencing a slight bit more clarity with the AirPods Max. It's almost like there's a slight cloudy layer over everything when I switch to my HD6XX...very subtle and I don't have the audiophile vocabulary to describe it accurately. The APM just sound every so slightly more clear to me, like there's just a touch more detail. Maybe the HD6XX are a bit warmer?

I like the sound of both. I haven't done a lot of testing. I used a couple tracks from the recent Eminem Album and couple from Billie Eilish.
I'm curious to hear if anyone else is hearing the same thing as I am.

I was using Apple Music on my iPhone with the APM and Apple Music on my iMac with a small Fiio amp with the HD6XX. I listened to some with noise canceling
and some with transparency mode. I didn't turn on the EQ on in accessibility on my iPhone and EQ is flat on iTunes on my iMac.

 

[MICHAELSD]

How so? For long time you’ve been saying you were expecting the big step from Apple in audio! Well, here it is, all yours! And now you’re saying you do not want to get out of your way? I remember your stories about Apple’s opportunities to make the best and highest quality audio equipment, and here you got it! What happened to you?

All fair points, and I’m glad you asked. I’m at the point where I’m satisfied with my gear and not looking for the next major upgrade. There was a period where I was constantly in pursuit of the best audio possible when I would have been more eager to jump on these. I guess since then I’ve heard enough headphones to know what to expect. I’ve also since moved to using speakers as my primary source of audio (I value having the best sound system possible in my car, which has surprisingly become my favorite way to listen to music) and no headphone can replicate what a 12-speaker setup with separate mid-range drivers, tweeters, and woofers is capable of for overall enjoyment.

I am intrigued by AirPods Max and will probably purchase it eventually once it goes on-sale. I’m sure I would most likely love it, but I’m not sure yet that this is the revelation that I expected from Apple.

 

[MICHAELSD]

Anyone else do a comparison between the AirPods Max and the HD6XX?

I am by no means an expert...but I daresay I am experiencing a slight bit more clarity with the AirPods Max. It's almost like there's a slight cloudy layer over everything when I switch to my HD6XX...very subtle and I don't have the audiophile vocabulary to describe it accurately. The APM just sound every so slightly more clear to me, like there's just a touch more detail. Maybe the HD6XX are a bit warmer?

I like the sound of both. I haven't done a lot of testing. I used a couple tracks from the recent Eminem Album and couple from Billie Eilish.
I'm curious to hear if anyone else is hearing the same thing as I am.

I was using Apple Music on my iPhone with the APM and Apple Music on my iMac with a small Fiio amp with the HD6XX. I listened to some with noise canceling
and some with transparency mode. I didn't turn on the EQ on in accessibility on my iPhone and EQ is flat on iTunes on my iMac.

Interesting note on Apple’s computational audio: I’ve never heard Billie Eilish’s voice with as much clarity as it has on HomePod Mini. They undoubtedly tuned it using her music as one of their references.

 

[MICHAELSD]

If you haven’t seen it...

AirPod Max for Music Producers


He mainly uses the HD6xx as his reference pair for his job, and looks to compare APM to them here.

Always interesting to see perspectives from different use cases. We listen to music, this guy mixes music.

EDIT:: He isn’t doing a thorough breakdown yet In that video. He more...introduces and explains his high expectations for APM in his job. More videos to come, I think.

As a new music producer myself, I was thinking that one of the ways AirPods Max could have stood out from other ”studio” headphones would have been to integrate it into Logic with a lossless, low-latency codec.

 

[Ilomaenkimi]

Got a set to play with.

Upside.....
Connectivity, UX, control and integration with Apple ecosystem is brilliant
Downside.....
Even after a long time fiddling with settings, the sound is (at best) average. Staging is narrow, projection is short, bass is powerful but lacks detail. leading edge accuracy is poor, which dulls the impact of instruments, especially percussion. Vocals/spoken voice is pretty good, but the 'edge' at the top end can intrude a little.

Now, for all of that, it's a wireless set, so I wasn't expecting miracles. But overall (audio wise), disappointing, even compared to the airpods pro.

They're going back. Although nicer to control than my Sony's, the sound is just not there in comparison.

In someway i'm hoping that is the case when i get APM, saves my moneys.
I like APP very much, very handy to use and soundquality is pretty ok. I can enjoy music with them. And the Spatial Audio is superb with them.
It is veeery interesting to see and hear APM.

If not anything else, they creates lots of discussion...

 

[Heyyoudvd]

It’s strange how the sound quality reviews are all over the map.

Some people are saying that they sound better than the LCD-2 and 6XX, while others are saying they’re barely an improvement over the AirPods Pro and Sony XM4.

 

[ubs28]

It’s strange how the sound quality reviews are all over the map.

Some people are saying that they sound better than the LCD-2 and 6XX, while others are saying they’re barely an improvement over the AirPods Pro and Sony XM4.

Some people have even said they are better than the HD 800S and the APM is a high-end $1000+ headphone. Which is all kinds of good jokes since it doesn’t even beat my super old wireless B&W P7W on sound alone.

I‘d say just listen to the headphones yourself and form your own opinion rather than what you read in reviews. Because like you said, it is all over the place.

I also have the XM3, NC700 and QC35II and I have to agree with the others that the APM sounds alot better than those. But maybe you will hear it different.

 

[Sp12er3]

This video is a ton of fun! Very different than any other APM review. He uses the miked Sennheiser Ambeo binaurals to good effect.

This is what Jim's Review Room used to do sadly the has left YouTube.


if everyone wants to join in the fun.
LIVE tomorrow.

 

[Gweeds]

i am just expressing my opinion to bring balance to a blind Apple fanboy attitude. If you read my comments carefully you will see that I have clarified that I have certainly not heard the APM. I never said my opinion is valuable. I react to people who write here like their point of view is the only valid in audio world. And I said that according to the reviews this product’s audio quality is clearly not worth the 550 price. Are you not allowing me to do so?

nope.

According to people here who actually have them, they clearly are worth the price.

But I guess they’re just fanboys.

 

[Ilomaenkimi]

Everyone who says APM soundquality is not worth the price should remember that there is plenty passive headphones in this pricerange, are they all worth the price? Why aren't you judging them all?
Or why are you judging APM's soundquality vs price? How many of you has even heard APM?

 

[MayaTlab]

You say "but neither the impressions of someone else will anyway", in your mind this an absolute statement, but I think you are wrong to assume this, maybe for you peoples impressions mean nothing but for others they hold value and purpose, and I assume other people like myself can relate to other peoples impressions of sound and that works for us.

Perhaps have you considered that you may not have a very good ability to interrupt peoples impressions of audio and relate that to your own? Personally I would not want to just rely on my own interpretations of FR charts, I think the 'insight' and perspectives of other people is very important.

Nah it's just acoustics. As our anatomy differs we simply don't hear the same FR curve at our eardrums as others... up to a point.
When it comes to HRTF for example (ie how much your anatomy modulates the FR curve depending on a sound's location), we each have a different HRTF profile (hence why surround sound simulation is very difficult to execute).
In this study a sample of 47 people's individual HRTF profiles were measured and the variation in measured dB can exceed 20dB at some frequencies (mostly above 2000-3000hz) :

https://asa.scitation.org/doi/pdf/10.1121/2.0000562
I'd like to find something a little more specific for headphones per se but you can rest assured that over-ears do interact with your morphology as well.
The impression of someone else's might coincide to yours to some extent... but you're bound to be disappointed at some point because you don't share the exact same morphology.
This is also why measurements should be taken with a pinch of salt. But conversely that doesn't mean you can't extract information from them either and at least that information is quantified.
If a pair of headphones measures so badly that its FR curve is unlikely to corresponds to anyone's morphology or what we know of variations in individual preferences we can assert that they suck (and boy are there many HPs in that case), but when they measure reasonably well you and you only should be the judge.

 

[MayaTlab]

Transient response. Google it for more details. You can input a known waveform like a square wave and see how closely the output matches the input. The closer the output, the more accurate the driver. This is a characteristic of the driver and cannot be faked through dsp or software. So assuming crinacle measured this characteristic before making his comments, I will trust him and conclude the APM drivers are not performant enough for my preferences in this aspect. It's not the only aspect, but it's important to me.

Inner fidelity had a bunch of these measurements. Not sure where they are now. CSD waterfall plots are by far my preferred graph since they can give some insight into this characteristic as well.

An acoustics engineeer's opinion on that matter :
https://www.reddit.com/r/headphones...r?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

 

[noper]

An acoustics engineeer's opinion on that matter :
https://www.reddit.com/r/headphones...r?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3

Yes they say the SPL frequency response is a measure in the frequency domain while the impulse response is a measure in the time domain. They are two different axes. The impulse response shows you how a driver responds to an instantaneous voltage spike. Which is why I said I prefer CSD waterfall plots as they include both domains. I actually think it's easier to read a square wave plot because you know it's supposed to look like a square and you can see the effect of the input dropping low whereas an impulse response is literally feeding it an instant blip.

edit: found a good website
headphonetestlab.co.uk

 

[rael67]

can someone please test the Sound Leakage? In the German Forum some people report there would be a lot sound leakage.

 

[WilcoRoger]

My ¢2 - ANC is meant to be used in noisy environment. Once one realizes what those are, IMO most talk about SQ gets superfluous.

Let's take the Sony 1000XM2 - it has the best ANC I have tried. Do I care so much about SQ and boominess on a 12 hours intercontinental flight, between the second and third drinks? Not so much. Do I care about ANC? Yes, very much.

Let's take the B&W PX7 - it has better SQ and somewhat weaker ANC than the Sony. Does weaker ANC matter much on the commuter train or in the mall? No, it still kills all the noise and the music sounds better, so I use it in these occasions.

Let's take the ATH-msr7b - no noise cancellation, but enough isolation when other people are around. SQ better than any of the above, so I use them when I can concentrate more on the music, but still have to take the environment into account (when sound leakage would be a problem)

Finally the HD6xx - this is when I want to take time to listen to music at its best and don't have to take external factors into account (ie noise leakage in or out)

--------

Full disclosure - I use and very much enjoy both the Etymotic ER3SE and the Klipsch x12i. Both sound fantastic with unparallelled sound isolation of up to 40db (not cancellation, big difference!) and both/either fits in my pocket. But they are dangerous on the road (you are completely isolated) and are a pain when someone talks to you ("would you like another drink, sir?" )