[Vic]

I own both the W5000 and the SA5000 and agree with a lot of thing said above by other post, apart from the soundstage: IMO the W5000 has an excellent soundstage, quite wide, but especially very tridimensional, with the best imagin I have heard in any can south of $1000. One of the biggest problems with the SA 5000 is actually the very narrow soundstage (to me it develops more vertically than horizontally) with really artificial imaging.

The W5000 are by far my favourite HP, but I am keeping the SA5000 as I consider them "special cans" that give a unique presentation to certain kinds of music, although I would never live with them as my only HP.
Another major difference is that instrument sound very natural with the W5000 (again much more than any other <$1000 HP), while with the SA5000 everything is very artificial and often I cannot tell a flute from an electric guitar, although generally they sound very pleasing.
As said above, the W5000 is really amp independent as long as it is fed by a decent source. I never managed to get the best out of the SA5000; I am waiting for delivery of a Supra XLR and believe that with the right tubes I can get a lot more out of them.
Also I have the feeling that they can improve a lot with recabling and probably I will try to balance them with a warmer cable that could tame the tendency to excessive brightness

 

[ken36]

I just sold my SA5000s a couple of weeks ago, only because I no longer have a decent Dynamic amp. I've replaced them with a Stax SR-404 which is also a very detailed headphone, but without the Sony brightness.

 

[Alex M]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Svperstar Thanks for the lengthy reply. I would like to try the W5000s but I don't know if it is $900 better than the SA5000

I think that W5000 provides a smoother sound, but I also find $900 to be a bit high.

 

[Iron_Dreamer]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alex M I think that W5000 provides a smoother sound, but I also find $900 to be a bit high.

Well, a more reasonable price is $800, and they can be had for less than that if you hunt and peck (which makes the question whether they're $550 better than the SA5K)

 

[fureshi]

i traded my sa5k a while ago for senn hd650. while i loved the sa5k, i also have the qualia010, which i find to be similar to the sa5k presentation but on a higher level. it didn't make sense for me to keep the sa5k around and besides, i'd been wanting to try the hd650 for quite a while.

the hd650 have since become my office cans while the sa5k was never brought into the office. it didn't help that the sa5k headband mesh gave me crazy headphone hair. yes, i'm vain.