[zambz]

   
The funny thing is, what reviews do exist are STELLAR. The worst I've seen is from like Headfonia where the guy just said "listen to the HD650 and HE400i first and see what you think." Almost everyone else said things along the lines of "one of, if not the, best headphone under $1000." I even heavily disagree with some of the claims on the more critical reviews, such as saying the HE650 is more detailed. 
 
And perhaps it's what people think of the Audeze sound, similar to the Grado sound or the Sennheiser sound. To my ears, Audeze knows how to make music sound alive and engaging more than anyone else. There's just something that happens inside these headphones that doesn't happen with other brands I've tried, though admittedly I've yet to get my hands on some of the other TOTL setups out there (MrSpeakers Ether, HiFiMan HE1000, Beyer T1, Stax). All I know is that thus far it seems like when I listen to Audeze something magical happens. 

 
Same here.  I spent heaps of time comparing the HD650 to the EL-8 open before buying too.  I'm not going to lie, the HD650 is a GREAT bang for buck quality headphone which I wouldn't hesitate to buy if my buget was more limited.  However, it is a much slower sound which is also a little bit darker and a little less neutral.  I loved them, but they just aren't quite as fast as the EL-8s and never will be (planar magnetic vs dynamic), and that's ok!  I'm also not at all a fan of the build of the HD650 which is mostly made of plastic.  But the EL-8 is the technically more capable headphone of the two without question imho.

 

[sheldaze]

  Hello everyone, i spent several hours and went through the majority of this thread, it's REALLY long and took me ages to get through!!
 
After reading the entire thread, I'd like to mention a few things, these are just my own opinion so no offence is intended:
 
Firstly, I agree 100% that the closed EL-8s are very poor performers, I would take many other closed headphones over the closed EL-8s, likely including the Oppo PM-3s, even though they too have some problems (particularly in the treble).  The PM-3s are overall better, more compact, cheaper and overall offer better sound imho.

Oppo PM-3 and NAD VISO HP50 don't fit my ears and my head, respectively. Both are excellent values, and I think I'd prefer their sound over the EL-8C.
 
I'd love the next generation, of either of those, which addressed the fit issues.
 
EDIT (after reading the other posts): HD650 and HE-400i are my favorites of my non-TOTL headphones. And that these can be had for $300 is just phenomenal.

 

[DavidA]

   
Same here.  I spent heaps of time comparing the HD650 to the EL-8 open before buying too.  I'm not going to lie, the HD650 is a GREAT bang for buck quality headphone which I wouldn't hesitate to buy if my buget was more limited.  However, it is a much slower sound which is also a little bit darker and a little less neutral.  I loved them, but they just aren't quite as fast as the EL-8s and never will be (planar magnetic vs dynamic), and that's ok!  I'm also not at all a fan of the build of the HD650 which is mostly made of plastic.  But the EL-8 is the technically more capable headphone of the two without question imho.

Having the EL8, HD-650, HE-400i, I would rank the HD-650 before the other 2, the problem with the HD-650 is its not the easiest to amp correctly while the EL8 and HE-400i are much easier.  I use a BH Crack for the HD-650, about as good as it gets for under $1000 (granted the cost of the amp plus tubes get around $700), also got to hear it driven by a EC Balancing Act + AudiGD Master 7, a step up and at a level the EL8 and HE-400i never get to from my experience so far.  I feel that the EL8 is warm/neutral (at least mine is to me), my HD-650 is just slightly brighter and the HE-400i just a tad brighter than the HD-650.  I do agree that the HD-650 is not as fast as the EL8 but all of my friends who have tried both the HD-650 and EL8 liked the HD-650 better, more musical and easier to listen to, also could have something to do with the genre of music that you listen to.
 
I think the EL8 was designed to be easy to drive correctly so they could be semi portable and marketed to the Beats & Bose masses where there is a large market share while the LCD series more for the high end audio group.  I've tried the EL8 and HE-400i on some high end equipment while visiting a friend in Japan a few months ago and they didn't scale much, if any, my Bifrost MB and Lyr2/Ember are about as good as it gets for these two.

 

[DivergeUnify]

I used SineGen and now I trust the Golden Ears test even less, because to  my ears the 6.5KHz is the same as the 8.2KHz and neither of them are catastrophic. 

believe the EL8 needs a retest. This is one graph. What made it apparent to me is there is a random 10-15db dip in the Sr009 that no one seems to have commented on.

 

[zambz]

If you do want that presence back in the upper mids / lower treble, you can indeed just dial it back in with around 3db of boost at around 7 kHz as shown below:
 

Just about every headphone out there could use some EQ, HD-800 anyone?  I'd be doing a more broad boost on the LCD-2s as well as they are a tad too laid back for me.
 
I do believe that 7kHz is a little pulled back on the EL-8, but certainly nowhere near as dramatic as what's shown in the Innerfidelity graphs.
 
I'll drop Golden Ears an email and see if the guys there will consider measuring the open backs for us.
 
Cheers
zambz

 

[zambz]

Here's the best proof I can gather right now.  I installed a HQ recording app on my HTC One M8 and positioned the mic directly on the driver and then recorded a sine wave sweep from 4 kHz to 10 kHz.
 
Here's the resulting waveform:
 

 
As you can see, it's mostly flat.  I see absolutely no dip between 6 - 7 kHz.
 
Here's the FFT for the range of the recording to show the frequency response;
 

 
Tyll's graphs show a dip of almost 30db!!! which is simply not present here.

 

[zambz]

Here's another test, this time from the right driver (normalized):
 

 
I have also emailed Golden Ears and asked them if they would please test the open EL-8s for us.  But I hope that this is already preliminary proof that Tyll's graphs in this case are potentially inaccurate.
 
Why not try the same test yourselves?  I used ocenaudio to generate the sweep and the app Hi-Q MP3 Recorded (set to record WAV instead of MP3).  You can record the sweep on multiple pairs of headphones to see the results.  I realise that the microphone on our smart phones isn't ideal or necessarily ruler flat, but a severe dip like that shown in Tyll's graphs would be revealed if it were truly there.

 

[zambz]

Now here's my full test from 1 kHz - 20 kHz and the related portion of Audeze's own measurements:
 

 
 
 

 
If anything, you may just wish to pull up 9.5 kHz a little to give some presence that is pulled back.  A little narrow boost of 3db does the trick.

 

[SomeGuyDude]

I will say there is a SMALL issue in the above: the neutrality of the microphone on the phone. I'm going to test it out using a studio mic and see what happens, will report my findings in a moment.

 

[zambz]

  I will say there is a SMALL issue in the above: the neutrality of the microphone on the phone. I'm going to test it out using a studio mic and see what happens, will report my findings in a moment.

 
Absolutely yeah, please do some measurements with your studio mic too and let us know how you go.  Though one thing is for sure, a severe dip such as that shown in Innerfidelity should show up assuming the mic itself doesn't have a severe 30db peak in that frequency range, hehe.

 

[SomeGuyDude]

Here's what I got, and I will say it was a little tricky because my microphone has a big capsule and it wouldn't fit inside the earcup, so I recorded on the outside. Take of it what you will. I know it's a little funky in the bass region and I think that's a fault of my setup, but that's not what we're interested in, right? Of course. Here we go.
 

 
Here's measured inside the cup. 
 

 
I think my measurements are a bit wonky so I'm not willing to draw any conclusions (the bass is NOT that emphasized), but I did notice that the dip exists, I measured it earlier than 6300Hz, and it's VERY narrow.
 
I wouldn't call either of my graphs "definitive", but what I noticed was that I could not reproduce the gargantuan drop Tyll got. Which could be my equipment, I dunno. 

 

[zambz]

  Here's what I got, and I will say it was a little tricky because my microphone has a big capsule and it wouldn't fit inside the earcup, so I recorded on the outside. Take of it what you will. I know it's a little funky in the bass region and I think that's a fault of my setup, but that's not what we're interested in, right? Of course. Here we go.
 

 
Here's measured inside the cup. 
 

 
I think my measurements are a bit wonky so I'm not willing to draw any conclusions (the bass is NOT that emphasized), but I did notice that the dip exists, I measured it earlier than 6300Hz, and it's VERY narrow.
 
I wouldn't call either of my graphs "definitive", but what I noticed was that I could not reproduce the gargantuan drop Tyll got. Which could be my equipment, I dunno. 

 
Awesome job!! Do you own the open or closed EL-8s?
 
Note one thing, your drop there is around 10db which is not far off the dips on the various Audeze plots (see below).  Tyll's plot had a huge wide dip of around 30db!!
 
EL-8
 

 
LCD-X
 

 

[SomeGuyDude]

Open, haha, should have clarified. The top graph is he right driver on the outside of the grill, the bottom graph is the right driver on the inside against the pad. 
 
And yeah, that's the thing. The dip is REALLY narrow. Like it drops for a second and comes back, I think that's why it's nearly unnoticeable during music, it would require an instrument exist very specifically in that realm for an extended period of time, which just won't happen. . But the fact is we're gonna need more testing. I'd love to put together a better rig. 

 

[zambz]

Yeah, I think the ideal testing gear costs a lotta money.
 
I just did another test with my phone.  Of course, please do take into account that the mic will have its own frequency response, so this time I measured my ADAM A7 monitors (I have the high shelf filter turned down to lower the brightness by a few db), these are very neutral monitors.  These can serve as a reference for neutral sound.
 
ADAM A7
 

 
Note that this was recorded about 10 cm away from the speakers so there will be some randomness going on due to the room which is not treated.
 
And now the EL-8s:
 

 
As you can see, they are similar except for a few things:
 
* Bass won't measure accurately on the EL-8 as I couldn't produce a proper seal with the mic
* Similar to the official Audeze graphs, the EL-8s are pulled back a bit between around 4 kHz - 10 kHz
 
But there are no huge dips to be seen here at all.  My Bang & Olufsen H6 has definitely got a few dips, I'll measure that now to demonstrate that my measurement system is somewhat accurate enough to discern such a problem.

 

[SomeGuyDude]

Yeah, I definitely want to see some pro tests done because all I know is something is seriously suspect with that gigantic canyon Tyll was showing.