[BigMikeBass]

I recently bit the bullet on this set of headphones that I've been wanting to get to know for a long time. I found a great deal on a set missing badges... after talking to the seller, they actually had badges and sent me 2 left badges to glue on if I wanted to. A little suspect, but ok.

I plugged them in and was a little disappointed. I had heard a set recently that belonged to someone who came to get a set of K240M's from me, and the difference was astounding. I did the same comparison with mine, and meh... if anything, the DF's sounded more narrow, and little bit dull... not much of a soundstage, noticeable loss of separation compared to even my K240S... nothing like I remember the other set sounding.

I had been testing them on an old M-Audio Project I/O interface in my bedroom... today I took them downstairs to the Apollo Silverface, where I had tried the first set I heard, and found a bit more of that magic I heard the first time, then brought them over to an RME AD2 and found even more of it, leading me to believe these things are VERY source dependent. I know they are power hungry, but there's not a lot of difference in power between these headphone outputs... perhaps some are of a higher voltage, but they all fair about the same for volume. I decided to try the workhorse Oz Audio HR-4 we have in the basement... it's a powerhouse, but it just didn't sound very good, and distorted the DF when pushed... I have a set of LP Sextetts that stayed clean with it all the way up, but again, that amp is gift from God (actually my friend Dustin) for powering a band while tracking, but it doesn't do nice things for critical listening, that's for sure.

So, with all that I decided that it's not impossible I got hosed. I decided to crack em open and come to you guys for some expertise. How are these looking to you in terms of authenticity and condition? Is the lack of separation actually a part of the IRT standard? From what I read these should have a much wider soundstage than my other k240's... they don't really... and along side the sextetts? let's not even go there... they are not in the same world... I've read in more than one post that they should be... what are your thoughts?