[Lunar Eclipse]

I hope they keep the quotes and word play in the guide. The writers are definitely talented sci-fi/fantasy book, game buffs!

 

[pietcux]

I just discovered that the Sony WM1A supports LDAC. So may a lot of other Walkman devices out of today's production.

 

[MICHAELSD]

To clarify, the EL-8 are incredible headphones in the ~ $399 price range. They just don’t have the most forgiving sound signature, which makes listening to lossy music more like watching HD content on a 4K TV. I’m expecting Mobius to be even better. I really think they’ll nail the tuning. The transparency will be surprisingly fantastic for Bluetooth AAC/LDAC if the tuning is a little more fun like the Sine, mark my words.

 

[MICHAELSD]

By the way, the earcups and fit of the EL-8 is nearly perfect. I honestly thought endgame when I first heard it, and it’s definitely up there. It’s surprising how reviews are so mixed but like I said I sympathize with both the positive and negative reviews for that particular headphone. I’m extremely excited to see how Audeze tuned Mobius.

 

[evernessince]

By the way, the earcups and fit of the EL-8 is nearly perfect. I honestly thought endgame when I first heard it, and it’s definitely up there. It’s surprising how reviews are so mixed but like I said I sympathize with both the positive and negative reviews for that particular headphone. I’m extremely excited to see how Audeze tuned Mobius.

Reviews in the upper price range are always tricky. Reviewers are already taking into consideration the price and so even a 3/5 $500 headphone still means that you are getting a set of cans as good as most other $500 headphones. The headphone review scene can be highly subjective at times, it makes me wish an extremely knowledgeable expert in the field would develop a set of objective tests that could more accurately grade headphones on factors everyone agrees on. I'm not a professional in the field so I have no idea how companies like Audeze tune their headphones for best performance.

 

[VSENSES]

To clarify, the EL-8 are incredible headphones in the ~ $399 price range. They just don’t have the most forgiving sound signature, which makes listening to lossy music more like watching HD content on a 4K TV. I’m expecting Mobius to be even better. I really think they’ll nail the tuning. The transparency will be surprisingly fantastic for Bluetooth AAC/LDAC if the tuning is a little more fun like the Sine, mark my words.

I must ask, why/how do you have such high expectations? You seem to expect that the Mobius will trump both the EL8 and Sine in pure sound quality. But based on what exactly?

 

[Saljon]

I must ask, why/how do you have such high expectations? You seem to expect that the Mobius will trump both the EL8 and Sine in pure sound quality. But based on what exactly?

I don't get him on this either. Audeze actually took their sweet time to explain we shouldn't be unreasonable with our expectations after some people voiced their hopes(?) this could be like a closed back LCD-X and better than the (rather new) Sine while he seemingly read something different into that. I still don't understand where the supposed hint from Audeze Mobius being better than the El-8 and Sine resides.

In the end I just think it's excitement and hopefulness at play but again: just tuning something to sound similar to something else doesn't make it as good as the target.

Tonally tuning an instrument to sound similar to another one is very hard. Not so much for a headphone, because material reverb can be artificially created by dsps. If you have all your measurements correct you can achieve a very similar tonality to another headphone.
But that's tonal character NOT detail retrieval and the like.
Since you counteract the headphones own quirks and shortcomings via manipulating the signals the driver itself receives you will lose a ton of driver potential in the process.

I generally refer to Nubert regarding this topic. I don't know if they still sell these, but back in the day you were able to buy dsps tuned in a way so that their little Bookshelf speakers put out more bass without hurting the linearity of the box itself, creating a deeper low end, far greater than usually possible for these small sized cones and while it sounded great and flat you sure as hell noticed a slight reduction in detail in the lower mids, simply because the cone had to work more to achieve that low end while hurting smaller vibrations in the cone since the material of the driver flexed a little more.

 

[sebas388]

Audeze actually took their sweet time to explain we shouldn't be unreasonable with our expectations after some people voiced their hopes(?) this could be like a closed back LCD-X

did they? could you pass me a link to the page were they did it, please? i am a little out of the loop in this

 

[Saljon]

did they? could you pass me a link to the page were they did it, please? i am a little out of the loop in this

Will try to find it. They basically just said they would like to keep the expectations realistic (after the huge expectations were voiced here) so it was rather subliminal.

Edit: Actually couldn't find the post again. In my memory it was either from KMann or Audeze. Maybe I got the forums mixed up. I'll still try to find it. I hope I'm not going crazy here, remembering things that didn't happen... ^_^"

 

[MateuszW]

Also, there was an entry in the leaked manual that it will be tuned similar to LCD-X but the sound quality won't be as refined. "Mobius will have the sound of its own" loosely recalling.

 

[RamSpencer]

A lot of the "speculation" is based on Mad Dog Envy and Jude's initial reviews early on in this thread. Nobody was saying it was going to sound as refined as a LCD-X and they're certainly not an open back headphone.

The reference to tempering of expectations included that the built dac and amp wouldn't likely compare to expensive high end dacs and amps. Even that post stated that the Mobius has extremely low distortion and would sound like something in the catagory of a closed back LCD series.

I'm waiting to get my hands on them and don't feel like over hyping them but I think it's likely based on early reviews that they'll sound better to a lot of people than the on ear sine and the EL-8, both of which focused much more on premium designs.

The Mobius actually includes more tech than the others, like fazer technology. It's more of a mass produced headphone aimed at a different market with lower cost per unit. Only certain elements like the drivers are being manufactured in California.

The proof will be in the pudding so we will have to actually wait until we get our hands on them for personal critical examination.

 

[Lunar Eclipse]

I saved some of the google/yandex cache from the links in my browser history. I didn't want to post any of the content here after Audeze blocked access out of respect and the guide being a work in progress(possibly innacurate and dated). With that said, maybe it's no big deal and i'm just being a worry wort. I'll post this one since the same speculation gets posted over and over...
If I'm doing a big nono please let me know head-fi mods and @Audeze and I will remove. Cheers all!

Mobius is engineered to have a sound of its own and is a completely different design from anything we've made before, but we used our LCD line as a target when tuning its sound. Since it's an active headphone with DSP, we've been able to optimize the driver to the amp, the amp to the DAC, the DAC to the DSP, and so on.

Though it can't compare to the LCDs in being the ultimate in high-end sound quality, suffice to say that we're extremely happy with how Mobius sounds!

Note: While we agree with Theo. Roosevelt when he said "Comparison is the thief of joy," we understand the desire to compare headphones, and we don't blame you one bit for asking.

 

[MICHAELSD]

I must ask, why/how do you have such high expectations? You seem to expect that the Mobius will trump both the EL8 and Sine in pure sound quality. But based on what exactly?

Audeze liked a post I made on another social media platform saying that my only hope for Mobius is that it sounds as good or better than the EL-8 or Sine. That may not be indicative of anything. (I was trying to avoid posting that “hint” but since you guys pressed for it... ) I’m sure Mobius will have its own unique sound that some will prefer. It should in theory be up to par with any other closed-back Audeze headphone. Either way I’ll keep my mouth shut till I have my Mobius in my hands .

 

[Drivenby]

Lol is this 'sound hype' for the Mobius is affecting my purchasing habits.

I was just about to snatch a hd600 on sale and then I was like... But wait what if the Mobius sounds like that? I already have mid fi open backs, and I'm guessing the Mobius will be somewhere around there....

Argh ! Decisions decisions

Held off on buying that... Now I'm looking to get some IEM for a long flight coming up soon...

 

[acia]

Am tipping they're working hard, putting all their ducks in a row and working on getting their units to market.

Until the product gets to it's expected/planned release there's no reason for them to be giving any "feedback".

If "software is not 100% finished" why the hell would they (or us) want anything released?
Prior to the actual product?

Looking at the equipment in your sig - I honestly doubt the Mobius is going to scratch the itch to help you get off the "audiophile merry-go-round" if it's not the headtracking/surround you're looking for.

Don't get me wrong - would be awesome if, once you got the Mobius, you were able to sell off the HD800, Stax, amps and dacs etc and be content, but won't be holding out for it.

yep, if mobius is a one size fits all, happy to dump all the other toys. not even custom cable is needed, how nice is that!