[OneEyedHito]

FWIW I have heard most of the TOTL Headphones in my own home on either my own equipment or loaned gear and the Susvara is still the best bar none. Others get close or offer a different flavor of sound that is great at first but eventually the Susvara are always the main draw. Like a first true love if you have had that experience.

 

[Spawn300Z]

FWIW I have heard most of the TOTL Headphones in my own home on either my own equipment or loaned gear and the Susvara is still the best bar none. Others get close or offer a different flavor of sound that is great at first but eventually the Susvara are always the main draw. Like a first true love if you have had that experience.

I would have to agree. But can’t take them on trips with me. So I’m able to use the Expanse/Stealth to fill that duty.

 

[alxw0w]

As far as whats "correct/natural", unless you get the person who mastered something to hear it off a bunch of gear and tell you which setup sounds like how he/she wanted

Yes and no.

Try Hifiman Arya and listen to vocals.
And tell me that it sound natural to you, that every sound engineer mastered it's music so all female vocals sound like they are singing in a church and females are angels....

While you cannot fully hear what mastering engineer heard you can fully tell which headphone has skewed tonality.

People should really pay more attention to scientific part of our hobby (or rather why we hear what we har). Try harman app 'how to listen' with some time you will find it pretty easy to hear and name flaws in headphones tonality.

 

[number1sixerfan]

What I said is not about Susvara, it is the general attitude of audiophiles to assign close to absolute adjectives to subjective opinions, and I don't quite understand the relation of that particular tuning with those set adjectives, like the one that you last used, "expressive". How can something that conveys a well balanced information from lows to highs be less expressive than something that favors a particular piece of information (like bass or treble) over the others? Can be preferred, but calling musical or expressive just doesn't work for me.

You're providing a perfect example of the subjectivity of this hobby. He described the vocals of Susvara as emotion inducing (of which I agree with) from his perspective and you don't agree based on your perspective and what you hear. There's more absoluteness in this post than in the original lol (in the refuting of the adjectives he's actually using (someone calling it musical when in fact that just doesn't work for you). For the life of me I just can't understand why we can't accept that people hear differently and will have different perspectives on gear lol.

Anyways, almost none of the newer headphones do vocals/tonality, and in particularly as it relates to the midrange, as naturally as the OG vintage cans (R10, HE90, L3000--imo based on having them on hand for reference), but of the newer TOTLs the Susvara is definitely up there in terms of getting decently close (emotionally inducing vocals and prominent/forward, and sightly lush mids for me). So hearing someone say its vocals are off, sounds off to me--but that's just how this hobby goes, we hear differently and that's ok lol

 

[Hifivoice]

Yes and no.

Try Hifiman Arya and listen to vocals.
And tell me that it sound natural to you, that every sound engineer mastered it's music so all female vocals sound like they are singing in a church and females are angels....

While you cannot fully hear what mastering engineer heard you can fully tell which headphone has skewed tonality.

People should really pay more attention to scientific part of our hobby (or rather why we hear what we har). Try harman app 'how to listen' with some time you will find it pretty easy to hear and name flaws in headphones tonality.

There was a time in the 90s+, where music from Yello was finally mixed on walkmans, because their target audience was using that equipment most. The result is not necessarily accurate, and it probably sounds better with flawed equipment than with good equipment.

That doesn't mean I advocate that approach, but it means that "sounding natural" is not what every sound engineer is doing. I also prefer the scientific approach, but it doesn't work always the best for a full and wide music collection. E.g., Ella Fitzgerald CDs sound marvellous on old tube radios, which are far from accurate, but in my opinion give a better idea about the atmosphere than transparent equipment that reveals the edgy distortion that is present in those recordings. I wouldn't want to listen to a recent recording of a Mahler symphony on such a chain though...

So, how would you define correct or natural? Without putting a scope, it is hard to make a crisp statement about it.

 

[DarginMahkum]

For the life of me I just can't understand why we can't accept that people hear differently and will have different perspectives on gear lol.

What a copy-paste response, that keeps being repeated over and over again here. Before jumping on the template conclusions, if you would read what I have written instead of just reacting, you would understand that it is not about what one hears subjectively, but that I cannot make a relation between a vague term like "expressive" and south of neutral mids that lacks some information compared to a neutral tuning. Can you? If you can, the stage is yours.

 

[alxw0w]

There was a time in the 90s+, where music from Yello was finally mixed on walkmans, because their target audience was using that equipment most. The result is not necessarily accurate, and it probably sounds better with flawed equipment than with good equipment.

That doesn't mean I advocate that approach, but it means that "sounding natural" is not what every sound engineer is doing. I also prefer the scientific approach, but it doesn't work always the best for a full and wide music collection. E.g., Ella Fitzgerald CDs sound marvellous on old tube radios, which are far from accurate, but in my opinion give a better idea about the atmosphere than transparent equipment that reveals the edgy distortion that is present in those recordings. I wouldn't want to listen to a recent recording of a Mahler symphony on such a chain though...

So, how would you define correct or natural? Without putting a scope, it is hard to make a crisp statement about it.

Natural is transparent or in another words music sounds closest to what was produced in the first place.

Get a bright headphones and listen them. Everything is bright, with dark mastered music it's probably ok as it counter balance it's darkness, also most of the times audiophiles say that they hear more details etc... Which is only about high frequencies being emphasized. But then listen bright music with bright headphones... You ears are going to bleed.
Same goes to dark headphones it can fix bright sounding music.

Once you train yourself to hear what emphasis on certain frequencies do to our music you can most likely say what is natural or closer to natural sound. It's nothing magical.

 

[number1sixerfan]

What a copy-paste response, that keeps being repeated over and over again here. Before jumping on the template conclusions, if you would read what I have written instead of just reacting, you would understand that it is not about what one hears subjectively, but that I cannot make a relation between a vague term like "expressive" and south of neutral mids that lacks some information compared to a neutral tuning. Can you? If you can, the stage is yours.

I read your posts in full. But no, I don't care to derail this thread, and also I've already offered my perspective on the Sus mids/vocals just right now, as did the OP. Nobody owes you a detailed, scientific researched based explanation as to why they feel a piece of gear can be described differently than what you believe. This just further proves my entire point just now.

 

[alxw0w]

ps. also when we talk about natural/neutral sound we should rather talk about it as a spectrum rather than exact point/value.

For example susvara can be fully called natural sounding headphone. But for example to me (but thats just my subjective opinion which is valid to me) expanse is more natural/neutral sounding in vocals.
But there are certain headphones that you can fully say are not in that spectrum

 

[Hifivoice]

Natural is transparent or in another words music sounds closest to what was produced in the first place.

Get a bright headphones and listen them. Everything is bright, with dark mastered music it's probably ok as it counter balance it's darkness, also most of the times audiophiles say that they hear more details etc... Which is only about high frequencies being emphasized. But then listen bright music with bright headphones... You ears are going to bleed.
Same goes to dark headphones it can fix bright sounding music.

Once you train yourself to hear what emphasis on certain frequencies do to our music you can most likely say what is natural or closer to natural sound. It's nothing magical.

Natural or closer to natural w.r.t. frequency response is a measurable entity. You can make flat measuring speakers, and in an anechoic room you can hear how those sound. When you put such speakers in a room, you hear the power response, a combi of the direct sound and reflections. The response is not flat. Floyd Toole writes about an overall preferred curve that is considered to be "overall satisfying", with a bump in bass, and going down like 2dB from 200Hz onwards.

Free field, diffuse field, and all sort of variants of Harman curves are an attempt to come to a "power response" definition of a "natural" headphone response, heavily relying on personal properties like ear canals, ears, head shape and shoulders resulting in tens of dBs of difference in a frequency range.

I develop loudspeaker for decades, with a flat on-axis response (anechoic room measured) and a balanced power response. Difference of 0,5dB in treble are super obvious, and with some recordings you tend to go up in treble, with others down to get to something I experience as natural (tweeter curves start dancing up and down from 3kHz, so what is the proper average sound pressure to claim it is "flat"?).

I go to classical concerts at least once per month, realising that every voice, cello, violin or full orchestra etc. sounds very different. Even the way a pianist plays the same Steinway piano in that concert hall (Uchida, Pires, Solokov, Yuja Wang, Giltburg, etc. etc.) makes the piano sound super different (intonation, force in the lower registers, use of the pedals). Sitting at another place in the hall as well. So, tell me, how should a piano sound like, if you were not at the specific place at the recording, and understand the microphone placement and mastering choices?

It is not so black and white. Large variations and distortions are definitely easy to recognise, as they put an explicit signature everywhere. But subtle tonal variances, that may make-or-break the subtleties of a musical performance, will largely differ per instance.

Now on top, there are many other thing than frequency response; e.g. impulse and/or phase response, resonances, noise floor, linearity over volume/frequency, intermodulation, driver breakups, left-right coherence, spaciousness, etc. etc. that add to the concept of naturalness. Which effect is more dominant, and is this true for all sorts of musical performances?

 

[DarginMahkum]

Natural or closer to natural w.r.t. frequency response is a measurable entity. You can make flat measuring speakers, and in an anechoic room you can hear how those sound. When you put such speakers in a room, you hear the power response, a combi of the direct sound and reflections. The response is not flat. Floyd Toole writes about an overall preferred curve that is considered to be "overall satisfying", with a bump in bass, and going down like 2dB from 200Hz onwards.

Free field, diffuse field, and all sort of variants of Harman curves are an attempt to come to a "power response" definition of a "natural" headphone response, heavily relying on personal properties like ear canals, ears, head shape and shoulders resulting in tens of dBs of difference in a frequency range.

I develop loudspeaker for decades, with a flat on-axis response (anechoic room measured) and a balanced power response. Difference of 0,5dB in treble are super obvious, and with some recordings you tend to go up in treble, with others down to get to something I experience as natural (tweeter curves start dancing up and down from 3kHz, so what is the proper average sound pressure to claim it is "flat"?).

I go to classical concerts at least once per month, realising that every voice, cello, violin or full orchestra etc. sounds very different. Even the way a pianist plays the same Steinway piano in that concert hall (Uchida, Pires, Solokov, Yuja Wang, Giltburg, etc. etc.) makes the piano sound super different (intonation, force in the lower registers, use of the pedals). Sitting at another place in the hall as well. So, tell me, how should a piano sound like, if you were not at the specific place at the recording, and understand the microphone placement and mastering choices?

It is not so black and white. Large variations and distortions are definitely easy to recognise, as they put an explicit signature everywhere. But subtle tonal variances, that may make-or-break the subtleties of a musical performance, will largely differ per instance.

Now on top, there are many other thing than frequency response; e.g. impulse and/or phase response, resonances, noise floor, linearity over volume/frequency, intermodulation, driver breakups, left-right coherence, spaciousness, etc. etc. that add to the concept of naturalness. Which effect is more dominant, and is this true for all sorts of musical performances?

Things are relative and the hearing is very adaptive. As long as something is not below or above some threshold, ears can adopt and it becomes the new neutral after maybe 10 seconds, so that makes neutrality a region rather than an exact point. That still does not change chnge the fact that, if you listen to transducer A and you are percieving enough information for the timbre, frequency, location etc., and then listen to B (let's say swithing instantly) and hear more information for the same sound without any inconvenience added anywhere else (like bass, treble), then B is more neutral for that person (assuming the sound covers the full frequency spectrum). Two examples are Susvara for 'A' and Stealth / Expanse for 'B'. Referring to your first sentence, it is a measurable entity and why it should not be disregarded. On the other hand, there is was Solitaire P. I sometimes found the mids tuning OK (just enough) for the same music and sometimes not, dependent on how tired my ears are.

That brings me to my main point: I have a feeling that some audiophiles often do HP shopping as a therapy, invented these "positive" adjectives for the relative and "subjective" imperfections of their expensive buys, also to keep them buying more. It is often not very welcome to talk about these, especially if it is about something like Susvara or TC, that are regarded as holy pieces.

 

[alxw0w]

Natural or closer to natural w.r.t. frequency response is a measurable entity. You can make flat measuring speakers, and in an anechoic room you can hear how those sound. When you put such speakers in a room, you hear the power response, a combi of the direct sound and reflections. The response is not flat. Floyd Toole writes about an overall preferred curve that is considered to be "overall satisfying", with a bump in bass, and going down like 2dB from 200Hz onwards.

Free field, diffuse field, and all sort of variants of Harman curves are an attempt to come to a "power response" definition of a "natural" headphone response, heavily relying on personal properties like ear canals, ears, head shape and shoulders resulting in tens of dBs of difference in a frequency range.

I develop loudspeaker for decades, with a flat on-axis response (anechoic room measured) and a balanced power response. Difference of 0,5dB in treble are super obvious, and with some recordings you tend to go up in treble, with others down to get to something I experience as natural (tweeter curves start dancing up and down from 3kHz, so what is the proper average sound pressure to claim it is "flat"?).

I go to classical concerts at least once per month, realising that every voice, cello, violin or full orchestra etc. sounds very different. Even the way a pianist plays the same Steinway piano in that concert hall (Uchida, Pires, Solokov, Yuja Wang, Giltburg, etc. etc.) makes the piano sound super different (intonation, force in the lower registers, use of the pedals). Sitting at another place in the hall as well. So, tell me, how should a piano sound like, if you were not at the specific place at the recording, and understand the microphone placement and mastering choices?

It is not so black and white. Large variations and distortions are definitely easy to recognise, as they put an explicit signature everywhere. But subtle tonal variances, that may make-or-break the subtleties of a musical performance, will largely differ per instance.

Now on top, there are many other thing than frequency response; e.g. impulse and/or phase response, resonances, noise floor, linearity over volume/frequency, intermodulation, driver breakups, left-right coherence, spaciousness, etc. etc. that add to the concept of naturalness. Which effect is more dominant, and is this true for all sorts of musical performances?

That's why I talked about spectrum rather than one value one approach.
Different pianos sound different that's for sure.
But don't tell me that piano that is not in tune can be called normal/natural.

And that what is happening when you don't pay minimum attention to fr and try to stay in that natural spectrum.

 

[ericx85]

Yes and no.

Try Hifiman Arya and listen to vocals.
And tell me that it sound natural to you, that every sound engineer mastered it's music so all female vocals sound like they are singing in a church and females are angels....

While you cannot fully hear what mastering engineer heard you can fully tell which headphone has skewed tonality.

People should really pay more attention to scientific part of our hobby (or rather why we hear what we har). Try harman app 'how to listen' with some time you will find it pretty easy to hear and name flaws in headphones tonality.

If the chance comes around to hear the Arya I'll give it a listen to see if I can hear what you describe, and I'll definitely check out the app. Would love to gain some more perspective on this stuff. As heated as some of these discussions get for some reason, there's always some good info to come from them people shouldn't shy away from taking into consideration. Appreciate the info on the app.

 

[alxw0w]

If the chance comes around to hear the Arya I'll give it a listen to see if I can hear what you describe, and I'll definitely check out the app. Would love to gain some more perspective on this stuff. As heated as some of these discussions get for some reason, there's always some good info to come from them people shouldn't shy away from taking into consideration. Appreciate the info on the app.

It's always about seeing different perspective, in a long run everybody will benefit from it.

It's a forum we should exchange our thoughts even if we don't agree.
Also we should keep in mind that speaking through the innternet could be challenging because you don't really see and feel intention of other man talking, which sometimes you can feel being attacked when in fact there is nothing that happening.

 

[Hifivoice]

That's why I talked about spectrum rather than one value one approach.
Different pianos sound different that's for sure.
But don't tell me that piano that is not in tune can be called normal/natural.

And that what is happening when you don't pay minimum attention to fr and try to stay in that natural spectrum.

I have never heard a headphone that makes a piano go out of tune, so that's not what is happening.