... got my Nighthawks today and compared them to my Owls. It's quite hard to decide which one is "better" - because both of them are great
Out of the box - without EQing - i like the owls a bit better - they have a "refreshed" feeling compared to the hawks. Everything is a bit more crisp, accurate, balanced, on point - but WITHOUT losing the overall laid back audioquest signature, which is great!
The mids on the hakws are a bit more recessed while the owls are just perfect here (for my taste). Voices are so great on the owls - which doesn't mean that the hawks doin a bad job here. I simply like a bit "forward" character in the voices.
Bass is a bit more on the hawks (speaking of quanitity) - but not that precise as on the owls. It seems like on the one hand the bass has more power on the hawks - but it bleeds a bit more into the mids. The overall feeling on the hawk's upper bass is a bit more "soft and boomy" - dont get me wrong, it's still very good. But the owls seem to be much more... "mature" in this point. There are many songs where i find the 125-250hz range to be too present - by EQing it a bit down, you can remove this kind of "boomy veil" touching the lower mids, which makes the hawks a bit more clean sounding.. just like the owls.
The soundstage on the hawks is a bit wider due to the open design (not that much!) - but imaging / separation is better on the owls. To be honest, it's incredible how big AND precise the stage of the closed owls actually is Size isn't everything
If i could only keep one of these cans, i would go for the owls as they are the better allrounder out of the box. But with some EQing i also like the overall feeling of the hawks softer signature. I'm looking forward to spent lots of hours with these two boys in the next days
Out of the box - without EQing - i like the owls a bit better - they have a "refreshed" feeling compared to the hawks. Everything is a bit more crisp, accurate, balanced, on point - but WITHOUT losing the overall laid back audioquest signature, which is great!
The mids on the hakws are a bit more recessed while the owls are just perfect here (for my taste). Voices are so great on the owls - which doesn't mean that the hawks doin a bad job here. I simply like a bit "forward" character in the voices.
Bass is a bit more on the hawks (speaking of quanitity) - but not that precise as on the owls. It seems like on the one hand the bass has more power on the hawks - but it bleeds a bit more into the mids. The overall feeling on the hawk's upper bass is a bit more "soft and boomy" - dont get me wrong, it's still very good. But the owls seem to be much more... "mature" in this point. There are many songs where i find the 125-250hz range to be too present - by EQing it a bit down, you can remove this kind of "boomy veil" touching the lower mids, which makes the hawks a bit more clean sounding.. just like the owls.
The soundstage on the hawks is a bit wider due to the open design (not that much!) - but imaging / separation is better on the owls. To be honest, it's incredible how big AND precise the stage of the closed owls actually is Size isn't everything
If i could only keep one of these cans, i would go for the owls as they are the better allrounder out of the box. But with some EQing i also like the overall feeling of the hawks softer signature. I'm looking forward to spent lots of hours with these two boys in the next days
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