[ADUHF]

I agree 100% with you all! Audiophile grade headphones should always be able to produce sub-bass. But I guess the typical consensus, is that open backed headphones are uncapable, but I think thats crap. They might not be able to hit sub-bass as hard as closed back, but if they are finely tuned, they should produce.

Maybe with the planars. With dynamic drivers I still have my doubts.

That's not true.
Look at planars in that regard.
Many of them are capable to produce sub bass down to 20Hz without getting rolled off.
But to reach these lows they need a lot of power.

There are several Audeze and HiFiMan planar magnetics on the graph tool that I posted above, if you want to check out their frequency response...

https://crinacle.com/graphs/headphones/graphtool/

The open-back planars are well-extended in the bass. But most have little or no elevation to speak of in that range. They are either flat in the bass and midrange (HiFiMan). Or have a slight downward slope toward the bass (Audeze), rather than a rise. That seems to be fairly typical for open-back planars. The Closed Audeze LCD-2C has a slight shelf in the bass.

Since these already have some bass in the lower frequency range, it might be possible to adjust the frequency response with an EQ, or with the tone controls on a receiver, or mixer, or using a dedicated tone-controlled, like the Schiit Loki (if you have no EQ features on your amp or computer) to improve their bass response a little, as bagwell359 suggested above. It's something I've never tried though. And I have not had great luck with it on dynamic open-back headphones.

Other than closing the headphones up, there might be one other potential way of adding some bass and sub-bass to an open-back headphone which does not currently have much low-frequency response. If you have an amp with preouts on it, you could try connecting those to a sub-woofer under your desk or next to your chair, or wherever you usually listen to your headphones.

I have not tried this either, so not entirely sure it'd work. You might, for example, need a pretty fast sub-woofer, because there could be a slight delay between the sound in your headphone, and the bass. Some experimentation would probably also be necessary to figure out the right volume and frequency range for the sub-woofer, to match the response of your headphones, and acheive the best cross-over between the two transducers.

This would obviously not work as well for portable applications.

 

[Whazzzup]

The only thing that matters is are you financially committed to be an audiophile. This precipice of which is met at ten fold budget increase that’s met with no guilt whatsoever

 

[ADUHF]

What about the Sennheiser HD559, 569 and 599? I'd like to get one of them and which has heavy bass while all the detail are not hidden?

Haven't seen any reliable raw FR graphs for the HD 559 yet. The 599 and closed-back 569 both have a little bass though...

HD 599
https://www.rtings.com/headphones/1-4/graph#408/4011
https://www.rtings.com/headphones/1-4/graph#408/4012
Rtings Review: https://www.rtings.com/headphones/reviews/sennheiser/hd-599
Oratory1990 Graph: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cwkkn7mjqxh29ra/Sennheiser HD599 (preliminary).pdf?dl=0

I should probably add this^ one to my list of bassier open-backs in the most over-rated brands topic.

HD 569
Inner Fidelity Graphs: https://www.innerfidelity.com/images/SennheiserHD569.pdf
Inner Fidelity Review: https://www.innerfidelity.com/content/sennheiser-hd569-around-ear-sealed-headphones
Oratory1990 Graph: https://www.dropbox.com/s/63epzmjbuhm4tcm/Sennheiser HD569.pdf?dl=0

The Senn HD 58x Jubilee is also fairly well extended in the bass. Though probably not as bassy as the two above headphones.

HD 58X
https://www.rtings.com/headphones/1-4/graph#891/4011
https://www.rtings.com/headphones/1-4/graph#891/4012

 

[Chris Kaoss]

Maybe with the planars. With dynamic drivers I still have my doubts.



There are several Audeze and HiFiMan planar magnetics on the graph tool that I posted above, if you want to check out their frequency response...

https://crinacle.com/graphs/headphones/graphtool/

The open-back planars are well-extended in the bass. But most have little or no elevation to speak of in that range. They are either flat in the bass and midrange (HiFiMan). Or have a slight downward slope toward the bass (Audeze), rather than a rise. That seems to be fairly typical for open-back planars. The Closed Audeze LCD-2C has a slight shelf in the bass.

Since these already have some bass in the lower frequency range, it might be possible to adjust the frequency response with an EQ, or with the tone controls on a receiver, or mixer, or using a dedicated tone-controlled, like the Schiit Loki (if you have no EQ features on your amp or computer) to improve their bass response a little, as bagwell359 suggested above. It's something I've never tried though. And I have not had great luck with it on dynamic open-back headphones.

Other than closing the headphones up, there might be one other potential way of adding some bass and sub-bass to an open-back headphone which does not currently have much low-frequency response. If you have an amp with preouts on it, you could try connecting those to a sub-woofer under your desk or next to your chair, or wherever you usually listen to your headphones.

I have not tried this either, but it should work. You may want a pretty fast one though, because there could be a slight delay between the sound in your headphone, and the bass. Some experimentation would probably also be necessary to figure out the right volume and frequency range for the sub-woofer, to match the response of your headphones, and acheive the best cross-over between the two transducers.

This would obviously not work as well though for portable applications.

You're absolutely right when looking on graphs.
It might be one piece of the whole thing, but can't show the different perception of the waves hitting your/my/his/her eardrums generated by the different driver design.
I for me, tend to like the bass out of a planar more then from a dynamic, although there're a lot dynamics with a hugh driver space out there which sounds very well in bass reproduction.

 

[ADUHF]

Other than closing the headphones up, there might be one other potential way of adding some bass and sub-bass to an open-back headphone which does not currently have much low-frequency response. If you have an amp with preouts on it, you could try connecting those to a sub-woofer under your desk or next to your chair, or wherever you usually listen to your headphones.

I have not tried this either, so not entirely sure it'd work. You might, for example, need a pretty fast sub-woofer, because there could be a slight delay between the sound in your headphone, and the bass. Some experimentation would probably also be necessary to figure out the right volume and frequency range for the sub-woofer, to match the response of your headphones, and acheive the best cross-over between the two transducers.

So I ran this idea by a couple folks at B&H and GC, and they seemed a little skeptical about whether it would work.

It sounds like it would require an active sub-woofer, with it's own built-in amp and (importantly) cross-over function as opposed to one without. Otherwise you'd have to get a separate cross-over controller to tell the speaker which frequencies to use, which would run into more bucks.

If there's no volume control on the amp for the preouts, then it might also be somewhat difficult to easily control the volume on the sub, without some type of inline volume controller. Maybe something like a Passive Big Knob could be used for that, if you don't want to have to reach down and adjust the volume on the sub-woofer itself.

 

[340519]

Maybe you're an audiophile who likes bass?

It could happen.

I'm an audiophile who definitely likes bass.

 

[CTR640]

I'm an audiophile who definitely likes bass.

Whoever doesn't like bass, can better hang out with screeching crows

 

[340519]

Yeah I just bought the audeze lcd 4 because it has killer bass.

 

[CTR640]

Yeah I just bought the audeze lcd 4 because it has killer bass.

And a killer wallet haha. but screw it, as long as it sounds damn good, why not. I was interested in the Abyss 1266 because others has said it's like a speakers on your head or subwoofer? But their sensitivy of 88 seem to be harder to drive. Rest assured, the headband looks like a retard.

 

[340519]

And a killer wallet haha. but screw it, as long as it sounds damn good, why not. I was interested in the Abyss 1266 because others has said it's like a speakers on your head or subwoofer? But their sensitivy of 88 seem to be harder to drive. Rest assured, the headband looks like a retard.

Lol that was funny. I have a bryston bha1 driving the 4s so there is stupid power.

 

[IEMusic]

I define low bass as 20Hz-40Hz (41.5 E-string on bass, 32 lowest Organ).

under 20 Hz is sub-bass. People can barely hear that, they can feel it. 12 Hz is the lowest humans can hear at all, and that only under specific circumstances.

I think most people tend to define sub bass as anything below around 60-80Hz, with mid bass being around 80-200Hz. Of course we could all have different definition.

Less than 20Hz would be considered sub-sonic, and not really discussed much outside of home theater.

 

[IEMusic]

So I ran this idea by a couple folks at B&H and GC, and they seemed a little skeptical about whether it would work.

I highly doubt that you could get it to sound decent with such a setup, though you would get a tactile response. If you turned it up, it would disturb those around you, if that’s a consideration.

You would need a headphone amp with preamp outputs to connect a powered sub to. Assuming you sit close to the sub, the time delay shouldn’t be significant, but it would be something you can’t fix without DSP. A phase dial wouldn’t be adequate. Figuring out the crossover point and other factors would make this a real pain to implement. If you happen to have the equipment around, you could always try it. Also, if you really want much freq response below 30-40Hz, you would probably need at least a good 12” sub. Then come room interactions........whew, the list goes on and on.

 

[Whazzzup]

Th900 or even better la900 does satisfy the bass

 

[ADUHF]

I highly doubt that you could get it to sound decent with such a setup, though you would get a tactile response. If you turned it up, it would disturb those around you, if that’s a consideration.

You would need a headphone amp with preamp outputs to connect a powered sub to. Assuming you sit close to the sub, the time delay shouldn’t be significant, but it would be something you can’t fix without DSP. A phase dial wouldn’t be adequate. Figuring out the crossover point and other factors would make this a real pain to implement. If you happen to have the equipment around, you could always try it. Also, if you really want much freq response below 30-40Hz, you would probably need at least a good 12” sub. Then come room interactions........whew, the list goes on and on.

Would it shatter the tubes on a tube amp? I wonder.

 

[IEMusic]

Would it shatter the tubes on a tube amp? I wonder.

I’m not sure I understand the question, but I wouldn’t think so. People use tube amps for main speakers, along with powered subs frequently