UPDATE: Just received my
Marantz Pro MPH-2 headphones via UPS this afternoon. They look like this:
Very handsome headphones, and rather similar in design to the Yenona's, yet also different in a number of subtle/telling ways:
1 - Both headphones come in very decent boxes/packaging, but the Marantz' box is larger and slightly better designed.
2 - The Yenona's come with a garish, red colored cable that is 6.5mm on one end & 3.5mm on the other, with a partial section of coiling in the middle. I thought the cable looked like a Twizzler, too gimmicky to bother with, so I never used it. By contrast, the Marantz comes with a 3M cable that is also 6.5mm on one end & 3.5mm on the other. The 3.5mm end plugs into the bottom of the left earcup via a locking mechanism that probably means aftermarket cables are out of the question. Then again, the stock Marantz cable seems more than decent, albeit too long.
3 - The earcups of the Marantz are shallower overall than the Yenona's, with less internal volume. The earpads are also slightly shallower (1" depth/Marantz vs 1 1/8th depth/Yenona's). This may help explain the difference in soundstaging.
4 - They Yenona's are extremely comfortable, with relatively soft (but not squishy soft) earpads, very light clamping pressure, and very low weight (~250 grams). They're the kind of headphones you can easily forget you're wearing (until your ears get hot from those pleather earpads sealing to your skull--a closed headphone constant). By contrast, the Marantz are somewhat less comfortable, but still above average. They have more clamping pressure, the result of the visibly more curved radius of the headband (though I'm sure that can be bent to lessen clamping pressure). The pads are not quite as soft as the Yenona's, and the pleather is very slightly thicker/stiffer, for a slightly firmer feel against the head.
5 - The Marantz sounded terrific straight out the box--as did the Yenona's. But they're different:
Soundstage: the Yenona's have a more spacious sound and quite a bit of soundstaging for closed headphones. The sound doesn't seem "locked into" L vs R channels. The Marantz have less soundstage and less of the center image, more L vs R channel feel.
Frequency balance: the Yenona's have a lot of bass (which I like), and clearly have more mid-bass than the Marantz, which also have a lot of bass--they go low and hit hard...they may even have more sub-bass than the Yenona's (kind of early to tell on that). But the Marantz' midbass is flatter and segues into the midrange very smoothly, more so than the Yenona's. Midrange is the biggest difference between these headphones, with the Marantz having an immediately clearer/cleaner midrange. Both 'phones convey details well, but the Marantz, probably due to the greater midrange clarity, show me certain things I wasn't hearing as clearly on the Yenona's.
The seal created by these headphones is quite different. The Yenona's seal relatively well (plenty well for their abundant bass to come through), but you never get that odd "suction" feeling against the ear that 'phones with more sealing power can give. The Marantz definitely seals more, and occasionally I get that weird suction feeling.
That's it for now after 2-3 hrs preliminary listening. I'll burn in the Marantz for ~100-150 hours on a mix of music & brownian/pink noise, then see what they sound like.
PS: Can't stress how handsome these $39.99 Marantz Pro MPH-2 headphones are in person. It's unbelievable how much value is being packed into these products at such low price points.