As I await my LCD-4, anyone compared it to the 2016 LCD-3? The 2016 LCD-3 is quite a bit better than the previous one, so I'd be curious to hear some opinions. How much better do you feel the LCD-4 is compared to the LCD-3?
Do Audeze burn the LCD-4 in before dispatching them or no?
I had a oct version 2015 of the LCD3. That means just before Audeze changed voicing to the 2016 for both LCD3 and 4.
One of the sensitive areas were definetely high female vocals with LCD3. I believe that is right in the frequency range of 10-13 khz where tryll from innerfidelity reported a frequency drop on LCD4. Im sure Audeze did this to ensure that the uncomfortable tones in that sensitive area doesnt sound too strong. As a result with the LCD4, high female vocals are not uncomfortable to listen to even playing loud. Ive heard HD800S too and that is more screaming in that frequency area, and I believe thats one of the reasons why they are favoured with eg. violin music as violins use the upper frequency areas more than mid-range. With LCD3 when I listened to singers like Aurora and Foxy I had to turn down the volume alot to even listen to their songs, and I did not quiet enjoy rest of the music in their songs as their vocals were so strong compared to all the other instruments. Also with the song "The Four Seasons" composed by Vivaldi and played by Max Richter, the violins were uncomfortable at the end of the song as they became too strong with LCD3.
With LCD4 I can turn up the volume on both Aurora and Foxy, and play the Four Seasons by Vivaldi at the same volume level as all other songs, which is fantastic. That tells me LCD4 is in control of the reproduction in all aspects of the frequency range we can hear as humans. I can even turn volume up more than the normal listening level on those songs if Im in a good mood!!
The LCD4 have damn more resolution and accuracy than LCD3. The bass control, OMG.. never heard anything like this on open headphones and the bass goes really deep and I mean really deep. The Old Love song with Eric Clapton Unplugged album, there is a low bass rythm, and that you can hear like a good old thump and your head vibrates which is really cool to get that kind of bass response from headphones. I could still hear the bass thump on LCD3 but not as deep, and definetely not vibrating my head too. This brings me back to that I can feel the music more with LCD4, as instruments have more hit to them, more engaging than what I heard before.
Complex songs. Im talking a ****load of instruments. These songs I have in my review collection and I bring them up every time I listen to a new system to see how engaging the system is and if the system is missing anything. These songs are not easy for a system to reproduce as they were recorded due to the complexity of the song and that they explode in the middle. To be engaging to us as listeners the equipment have to be tuned to deal with the songs.
The first song is He's a Pirate by Klaus Badelt. When I revieved Pioneer SE-Master1 and HD800S only HD800S could reproduce this song at an engaging level, but I felt I missed some lower notes and bass punch (Which Master1 did have when I reviewed). Once I got the LCD3 half a year back I immediately felt they had good control of the song and good bass response too. But I never reviewed LCD3 up against HD800S on the same system. But, once I got LCD4 on my system, I could clearly hear a hughe difference in separation between instruments throughout this song. Job well done for LCD4. Now I can really enjoy this movie song, event hough I personally dont like it very much. But its soo cool to know that I have a headphone that reproduces one of the more complex songs to reproduce at an engaging and interesting level.
Next song is Master of Shadows on the album Invincible. I believe this is also a movie album. With lots of drums, horns rythm violins that goes up and down constantly throughout the song and then the explosion of all instruments and choir in the middle of the song. My LCD3 started cheating once the choir starts to scream, meaning the rythm violin drowns in the choir probably due to the same frequency area of the choir and rythm violins. With LCD4 eveyr single instrument group is audible even when the choir explodes in the song.
Next song is Strength of a Thousand Men on the album Archangel. Also here we have alot of instruments, good bass punch and epic female and man choir. This song also explodes quicly with all instruments playing with several groups of drums and low and high horns. Right after the female choir there is a very engaging full pump on all instruments, and on LCD4 I can hear every single instrument group clearly.
Also this weekend Ive been reviewing one of the best resolution high-end DACs thats available in the market Hegel HD30, and it suits the LCD4 very well. Ive questioned myself if it became too high resolution with this DAC. So I will look and review high end pre-amps with adjustment functions to mabye take off the top and sharpness just a bit.
With that said, when you get to the level of so much sharpness, quick response and good thump throughout the whole soundrange and you start looking for methods of reducing the crisp a bit, your system is definetely good enough and LCD4 is part of that system.
