[DoctaCosmos]

Are you going to have the inspire and k812 with you at the metro meet frank?

 

[Frank I]

I can take the k812 but the Inspire I would need Drew permission to take it since It is not my amp but  a review unit. The other thing is i will only be until about 1PM since I have to get for a concert. But I can ask tif Drew ant me to show it. I can bring it with the Hugo and k240 as a source and use the K812 for listening. I will ask

 

[DoctaCosmos]

Much thanks frank. I will be there early as I'm staying at the hotel. Anywhere nearby good for breakfast?

 

[Frank I]

Much thanks frank. I will be there early as I'm staying at the hotel. Anywhere nearby good for breakfast?

I dont know the area. Drew OK me to take the Inspire so I will bring the amp akg 812 and the Hugo and a k240 

 

[DoctaCosmos]

Nice. . I will have to listen to the ak240 to see what all the rave is about but have brushed it to the side for some time now as I'm kind of infuriated by the idea of an mp3 player with such a high cost.

 

[Beniamin]

Does anyone except me tried k812 with schiit lyr2?
Very interesting to hear some opinions

 

[pataburd]

    Patrick that Bada amp  You have a long time now. Should be sweet with the K812

The Bada, with 3x 6SN7 tubes, is a real treat with a the K812.

 

[Frank I]

  The Bada, with 3x 6SN7 tubes, is a real treat with a the K812.

The K812 loves tube amps. I really like this headphone with the amps I have on hand. Are you selling yours?I think it is a reference quality headphone and can work well in most systems if the amps and source is good. What 6sn7 are you using?  Many good choices out there . I like the sylvania chrome tops for a reasonable price. TS Black glass is out of control(expensive) but my favorite for sure.

 

[Colgin]

I finally had the opportunity to listen briefly to the AKG K812.   I own the Q701 and generally like the AKG sound so was interested to finally hear these.I work near the Harman Kardon "flagship" store in NYC. Unfortunately, this store did not have available for demo their "flagship" headphones for at least 6 weeks since I had first stopped by hoping to listen to them.  The other week they finally had them in and one of the salespeople invited me over. All I had for a source was my Iphone 5s, but at least it had my personal test tracks albeit in compressed format.  I asked if they could hook that up to an amp. The one salesperson said he could plug my Iphone into one of the H-K amps they had. He was clearly having some difficulty with this and finally another salesperson said "Oh, you can just use your phone; they will work fine." I didn't want to force the issue and was, in fact, interested in how they sounded out of a phone, but would have also like to hear them amped as well.

I generally liked what I heard on my brief listen. They did not seem particularly neutral to me, but that did not seem to necessarily be a bad thing.  They definitely had way more bass than my Q701, to the point that I think they went from an underemphasis to an overemphasis. Not that I didn't like it, but it just didn't seem neutral to me. The salesperson said they were going for more of "fun" sound with these as opposed to the "classic" K/Q7xx line.  While I don't think he really knew much of anything I did personally agree that it seemed like a more fun sound, which surprised me because I thought they were trying to go for a higher (and higher-priced) reference sound. In that respect though, I did see how maybe what they were trying to do was have a sort of HD800 sound with a little more warmth and less demands made with respect to upstream gear. I know from actual experience that the HD800 is pretty unlistenable from a smartphone. But my impression with the 812 is that while it would probably scale somewhat, I was getting a decent enough sense of what these cans were about just from my phone.

The K/Q7xx line have a wide soundstage but it pretty much goes from far left to far right. I like it, but understand that others feel this is not natural. The K812 also had a very big soundstage but was very different. The best I could come up with was it was if I was wearing a large space helmet and the sound was being piped into the helmet and the sound was kind of all around me in a sort of globe shape around my head. Certainly a different and impressive presentation. I am not sure if over time I would really dig it or just find it weird or fatiguing. But in my 20 minute or so listen I quite enjoyed the soundstage.

I did try a bunch of different tracks in different genres. I was surprised that I did not find the treble exceedingly bright even on test tracks that I find somewhat painful on my Q701.  Given what I had read I thought some tracks would be unlistenable but I did not find that to be the case. Sonny Rollins' St. Thomas, one of his great tunes, is hard to listen to on the Q701, but did not bother me on the K812. Now maybe it had to do with the weak amping of my phone. Or maybe the increased bass let me listen at a lower volume so any bright treble was less noticeable. 

Comfort for me was less good than the Q701. I really like the auto-adjust on those and they fit my head really well. The K812 seemed a little loose and unsecure even on the tightest setting, and I don't feel like I have the smallest head either. Now, I was standing in a store. Perhaps, sitting in my home this would be a non-issue.  And of course these are significantly heavier than my 701s.

Overall, I enjoyed my short listen.

 

[plakat]

@Colgin thank you for your impressions. Incidentally my first contact with the K812 was with an iPhone 5s as a source as well... while it sounded respectable I never tried that again

 

[Colgin]

  @Colgin thank you for your impressions. Incidentally my first contact with the K812 was with an iPhone 5s as a source as well... while it sounded respectable I never tried that again

It was the hand I was dealt, but less than ideal. The manager did invite me back to listen on their good gear downstairs and bring some CDs or whatever. I may take him up on it. However, I may be receiving a loaner from someone in the next several weeks in which case I can test in comfort of my home and on my own (humble) equipment.

 

[plakat]

 
It was the hand I was dealt, but less than ideal. The manager did invite me back to listen on their good gear downstairs and bring some CDs or whatever. I may take him up on it. However, I may be receiving a loaner from someone in the next several weeks in which case I can test in comfort of my home and on my own (humble) equipment.

In my case it got me interested and later on I did hear it on better equipment, deciding on the spot to get one
If you can try them at home with your own equipment do so... thats the best case (though worst for your wallet I guess). I'm still waiting for that "shiny new" to wear off a bit, though so far I'm as fascinated with them as when I got them. Promising I think. Nice to see AKG back in the game at last...

 

[DoctaCosmos]

I'm really really looking forward to doing an hd700 comparison to the k812. Both seem to be underdogs compared to their price competition it seems and both, from a consumers point, on this forum seem to get little recognition if any at all. I like to think that I'm an out of the box thinker and believe I will be able to fully respect a headphone even if it has some flaws as long as it was traded for musicality. I'm expecting the k812 to be more resolving both frequency and imaging, higher resolution. And yes I'm aware the hd700 will be a different presentation due to its FR

 

[jk47]

i got rid of my hd700's after i started using the k812.   the latter are much more open and airier in sound.  in comparison the hd700, which i had loved while i was using them, felt walled in, like i was in a small to medium sized room.  i hadn't experienced them that way until i had the k812 for comparison.  i'll be interested in hearing your take on the 2 sets.  

 

[DoctaCosmos]

I do find airy soundstage to be nice but I won't credit a headphone as being better based off of that but it definitely can make it that much better if done right. Even if a headphone has large peaks i can deal with it as long as there's enough space for the dynamics to breath and not push the peaks into my ears . So while not masking the peaks, a large soundstage can make them more tolerable to me. I don't like large dynamics that much anyways. It always makes for a better wow factor but as long as there's good separation then I find smaller dynamics with good microdynamics/details to be more musical.