[mushjoon]

Hi, everyone it's my first time writing on this forum.

I'm a beginner who's trying to learn mixing/mastering by myself but the current headphone that I use doesn't give me a good picture of how my music actually sounds like.

I'm looking for the most neutral sounding headphones that wouldn't add too much coloration to what my music actually sounds like, so I can catch what I did wrong and fix it.

I don't care if the headphones are too "dry", "analytical", "cold," or whatever. I'm not trying to buy something that I can enjoy my music with. I need a tool that can show me what kinds of mistakes I've been making.

Here's the list of what I'm using currently:
PC's Soundcard: Realtek ALS S1200A
Audio Interface: Behringer UMC404HD
Headphone: Audio-Technica ATH-M40X
Budget: About $200
I went to a hi-fi shop the other day and had a chance to listen to Sennheiser HD 600, Beyer DT880 and AKG K702, all driven with a Sony PHA-3 headphone amp.

The most pleasant sounding cans were HD 600, but it's a bit beyond my budget right now.

I know that monitoring with speakers in a properly treated room is the best but I can't afford neither of them.

K702 sounded a bit piercing with lots of sibilance, but the highs were very detail. DT800 were pretty meh but if that's how "neutral" headphones are supposed to sound like, then I'll take it.

I also saw HD 599 on sale and its frequency response seems a bit similar to that of HD 600. Is it a good candidate for mixing process?

If you have any other recommendation, I would highly appreciate them.

Thank you in advance!

 

[silent-circuit]

Don't generally recommend open-backs for mixing unless you have really low ambient noise wherever you're using them. Also kind of surprised you're not getting good results with the M40X, a lot of pros actually use them. If you're in an environment where you /can/ go with an open back the other one I'd strongly recommend looking in to is the ATH-R70X. I've heard the HD600 and HD6XX many times, and at least to my ears the R70X is more resolving and 'true neutral' than either. It's a 400+ ohm headphone, though, so not the easiest to drive. Should be in budget (or slightly above) used. New, look at the Senn HD 560S, supposed to be very neutral, but also open back.

Senn HD280 Pro for ~$100 may also be an option. Very popular for monitoring.

 

[PurpleAngel]

Takstar HF 580 planar headphones, with Sendyaudio AVIA ear pads.

 

[ADUHF]

Are you using any kind of correction software with your setup, mushjoon? If not, that might be the place to start.

This is a graph I made not too long ago showing the difference between the AT M40x, and the average of 19 other neutral-ish headphones, based on frequency response data from the headphone review website, Rtings. A straight horizontal line would indicate an exact match between the two.



Same kind of thing for the Senn HD 280 Pro mentioned above...



Both of these headphones deviate from a neutral response in spots. And the more neutral a headphone is to begin with, usually the better it will be for the kind of thing you're tryin to do.

Both headphones could also potentially be corrected to have a more tonally "flat" and accurate response though with some equalization software. You can probably learn more about that kind of thing from websites dedicated specifically toward music production. Gearslutz is one of the more popular ones that I know of for pro audio music production and related gear, software and other tools. But there are probably some other good ones as well. And maybe some are geared more towards the type of independent home audio production that you're doing.

 

[ADUHF]

Here are a few other popular HPs in a similar price range...



Pretty much every headphone will deviate to some extent from a neutral response. So it's all a question of degree.

The definition of a "neutral response" is also not something which has really been settled. So each software manufacturer may have a slightly different approach to achieving it. And some may be more accurate than others.

You can also try to perform the corrections yourself though with your own equalization software. Since I mostly use headphones for listening to music videos on YouTube, I just use an EQ extension in my browser to accomplish this, to tweak the sound on my Beyer DT-770 and/or AudioTechnica M50x more to my liking.

Generally speaking, you want your headphones to approximate the sound of a good (anechoically flat) pair of speakers in a typical listening space... whatever that is.

Open headphones are a little harder to correct than closed headphone btw, especially in the sub-bass where open headphones tend to have more falloff than closed.

 

[mushjoon]

Takstar HF 580 planar headphones, with Sendyaudio AVIA ear pads.

How is it compared to HIFIMAN HE400i headphones?

 

[PurpleAngel]

How is it compared to HIFIMAN HE400i headphones?

I would assume they are very close in sound, but have never listened to the HE400I.

 

[ADUHF]

Any more progress on coming to a decision yet, mushjoon?

I just posted some fairly detailed tips on EQ-ing the 250 Ohm Beyerdynamic DT-770 here btw. And could do something comparable for your AT M40x as well, as a temporary stop-gap until you figure out what else to get. If you're interested. I don't currently have a pair of the M40x. But have listened to them in the past. And there are also decent graphs available for that headphone, which I could use for a reference.

I only know how to do the graphic EQs though at this point though, as opposed to parametric EQs. Based on the plots, the M40x would not be very difficult to EQ to a somewhat more neutral and accurate sound for the type of thing you're doing.