I have an LCD 3 and am curious about an upgrade path. I was eyeing the LCD4 and would love to hear your thoughts on how they differ, as you could ABX them.
My acquisition path was, LCD3 pre favor -> LCDX -> LCD3 fazor (at this point I decided to sell LCDX) -> LCDi4 (at this point I decided to sell LCD3) -> LCD4 (I decided to keep LCDi4)
Starting with
sound stage, LCDX sounds more formal, structured to me like this
LCDX: LEFT [ | | | | | | | ] RIGHT
But LCD3 feels more like this with a bigger focus at the center point of the sound stage. It provides a perception that LCD3 gives more sound, especially the mid range in terms of texture/layer/details, and due to the centered sounding, it also gives you an illusion of slightly less contrast and dynamic than the LCDX but to me the detail retrieval / high / lows are fairly equal.
LCD3: LEFT [ | | |||| | | |] RIGHT
LCD4 feels more like this, sound is everywhere. I don't find LCD4 to have larger sound stage, it's just sound is filled in all spaces but with very large image body, so the contrast is as good as LCDX but the overall dynamic and weight of each note is a lot stronger (reminds me of Focal Stellia) than LCD3 and LCDX.
LCD4: LEFT [|||||||||||||||] RIGHT
In terms of
neutrality, LCDX > LCD3 ~= LCD4, I feel LCD4 and 3 are both tuned to please your ears for enjoyment on the mid timbre and bass response, and they're not very accurate as LCDX, but very pleased to listen to. Female vocals on LCD4 has the most sweetened/ saturated sound that makes singer almost feel younger.
In terms of
details, LCD4 > LCD3 ~= LCDX, the extra details usually come from a sense of what I call "realistic grain" or "realistic sparkles". All three headphones do not have piercing treble or boomy bass, but LCD4 adds a lot of sparkle and grain to the experience, making you feel the music is more sophisticated than what it's truly there, but in a highly convincing and clean way. That's why sometimes people prefer LCD3 because LCD4 tried really hard to prove it to you that it can shout at you for all the details. I don't find it distracting though, still very much pleasing.
In terms of
speed of decay, LCD4 >> LCDX > LCD3. Perception wise, LCD3 has a slight echo chamber sound you will feel the sound will bounce around a little bit before/after the note and it's very warm, musical, comforting, LCD4 has very fast decay in bass and treble, it's like you see a F1 car coming at you and the next moment it's gone. What it does to bass is you will perceive much deeper initial kick and punch, follow by silence. I personally prefer this as it makes complex music sound more structured, and add contrast and dynamic to the music.
In terms of
musicality, LCD3 > LCD4 > LCDX. LCD3's sound makes you focus on one primary subject at a time, your brain can easily find that attaching point and if you're not paying attention and working, the music blends in the background as a nice cushion. LCD4 really tries to impress you and as said above, not the most neutral and trying to add more excitement and element to the sound, I'd consider it a bit intense and you feel sucked into the music. I actually don't find LCDX to have great musicality for most of the music I listen to (vocal, jazz, alt rock), the structures of the sound is just too scatted but I can see it works really well for EDM and classical music.
In terms of
euphoric sound, LCD4 >> LCD3 > LCDX, this is an alternative way to look at musicality. Because LCD4 is intense, it provides you a temporary suspense of euphoric feeling to a piece of intense music (like sound tracks in Interstella) you just don't experience in other LCDs. It's a combination of speed, detail, and sound stage.
My recommendation is, if you're happy with LCD3 or LCDX, don't upgrade nor ever listen to / touch / try LCD4. But if you have at least one more back up headphone (let's say you have HD650 and LCD3) and you have a lot of cash to spend in the hobby, sell your LCD3 and buy a LCD4.
Oh, lastly, probably an unpopular opinion, but if you haven't bought LCDX/LCD3 and considering buying, and you have an iPhone, then I wouldn't bother with LCDx/LCD3, and buy a LCDi4 +
Lighting Cypher cable instead, most everything said about them is true : ).
If you're unhappy about LCDX, you might be happier with LCD3, but the other way around is much less likely to happen.
