[MalinYamato]

I received today another D7200 as my good old one I bought shortly after its release has been worn out after years of intensive use on the go. What surprised me immediately was that the new one is a little bit louder at the same volume. Another difference is somewhat loose bass without texture bleeding into mids and giving impression of veil. I suppose Denon haven't changed specifications but it sounds like a different headphone, maybe like D5200 could sound (never heard it). A bad batch? Has someone the same experience?

I am confused, are you implying that D5200 sounds better than your previous D7200?

 

[Klonatans]

I am confused, are you implying that D5200 sounds better than your previous D7200?

No, I meant that the D7200 from 2020 sounds different and inferior to the D7200 from 2017, so I made a hypothetical comparison with the D5200 as a lower end model.

 

[reiserFS]

Love my D7200s. Has anyone compared them in SE vs Balanced? Any noticeable improvements? Do they scale well with better equipment?

 

[Maxx134]

No, I meant that the D7200 from 2020 sounds different and inferior to the D7200 from 2017, so I made a hypothetical comparison with the D5200 as a lower end model.

Where did you get them?
Open pads and check drivers.

 

[Klonatans]

Where did you get them?
Open pads and check drivers.

Amazon Germany, brand new. I don't want to bother with defective headphones, I'll send them back instead as there is a return window.

 

[RoyGB]

How is the vocal performance of the 7200. I have been in the market for an upgrade for my 650's and a compliment to my 9200's. I was thinking either these or the Elex. If anyone has both a direct comparison that would be awesome. If not general impressions would be great. As far as I can tell nobody has talked about vocal performance explicitly in this thread.

 

[zolkis]

How is the vocal performance of the 7200. I have been in the market for an upgrade for my 650's and a compliment to my 9200's. I was thinking either these or the Elex.

The Elex FR looks good, better than all of the headphones mentioned above, of which I own all, except the Elex.
But I compared these to the Utopia, Elear and Clear and personally I prefer the Denons, since I hear a hard signature - not metallic harshness, but a kind of hardness perhaps still related to self-damping properties of the membranes? If you are not bothered by such, the Elex is probably a good choice.

Then, when you have the D9200, I could hardly justify getting a D7200. If you really want another headphone, especially for vocal performance, I'd go with e-stats: IMHO no dynamic can improve on the Denons ATM.

I have the D7200 since I got it before the D9200 and I managed to improve it to my liking (as described in this thread) to get close to the original D9200 (even better in some respects), yet still I thought what if I could also improve a D9200... and so it happened .

 

[MalinYamato]

How is the vocal performance of the 7200. I have been in the market for an upgrade for my 650's and a compliment to my 9200's. I was thinking either these or the Elex. If anyone has both a direct comparison that would be awesome. If not general impressions would be great. As far as I can tell nobody has talked about vocal performance explicitly in this thread.

you have a 9200, you mean you have a Denon AH-D9200 and are not satisfied with its vocal performance? Sennis like 600 and 650 as I heard are regarded as the king of vocals and you may be spoiled by those with regards to that. I have a D7200 and I like it a lot, but 9200 is supposed to be much better. Not? Anyway, I am sort of in the same situation as yours, perhaps unlike you have no budget for Focals, playing with the idea to get something that performs better with vocals, jazz and classics. Open planars?! I got planars such as Sundaras, Those sound a bit better with vocals, cymbals and strings, but perform poorly with mid and lower bass. I am still looking for something better and have heard good things about Hifiman Deva wrt vocals and mid-range.

 

[RoyGB]

Thanks for the replies. For me the thing is the 9200's, although fantastic in just about every regard including vocal clarity, presentation, and resolution, have recessed vocals comparative to the rest of the music. The 650's are an absolute treat for vocals, the warm relaxed nature and upfront vocalists are wonderful to listen to but they are just to veiled and lacking extension for my liking. From what I can tell, the only headphones that can really fill the 650 void in terms of sound signiture is some of the ZMF stuff from what I have read, but those are about double my budget at the moment. Elex are currently $600 (with a bit of a wait) and I have the ability to get a pair of 7200's for about the same price.

Plus, this would mean I could use the 9200 cable with the 7200 and vice versa. This would be great since my tube amp is only single ended and I only have an aftermarket balanced cable and the short one that came with it. Some people over on the 9200 thread stated that the 7200 cable is much better than the 9200 cable on the 9200's. My personal experience agrees that the 9200 benefits more from a copper cable. The silver one is just too bright for my liking. It kills some of the bass and makes it feel like there is more brightness to the treble. This was my way of attempting to kill 2 birds with one stone rather than going cable/adapter shopping.

I might be willing to trade my 9200 silver cable for the 7200 copper cable if anyone is interested. Probably not for a couple of weeks though if I do decide to trade.

Figured it was worth a shot to ask and see if I could gather some opinions on vocal performance of the 7200

 

[MalinYamato]

Thanks for the replies. For me the thing is the 9200's, although fantastic in just about every regard including vocal clarity, presentation, and resolution, have recessed vocals comparative to the rest of the music. The 650's are an absolute treat for vocals, the warm relaxed nature and upfront vocalists are wonderful to listen to but they are just to veiled and lacking extension for my liking. From what I can tell, the only headphones that can really fill the 650 void in terms of sound signiture is some of the ZMF stuff from what I have read, but those are about double my budget at the moment. Elex are currently $600 (with a bit of a wait) and I have the ability to get a pair of 7200's for about the same price.

Plus, this would mean I could use the 9200 cable with the 7200 and vice versa. This would be great since my tube amp is only single ended and I only have an aftermarket balanced cable and the short one that came with it. Some people over on the 9200 thread stated that the 7200 cable is much better than the 9200 cable on the 9200's. My personal experience agrees that the 9200 benefits more from a copper cable. The silver one is just too bright for my liking. It kills some of the bass and makes it feel like there is more brightness to the treble. This was my way of attempting to kill 2 birds with one stone rather than going cable/adapter shopping.

I might be willing to trade my 9200 silver cable for the 7200 copper cable if anyone is interested. Probably not for a couple of weeks though if I do decide to trade.

Figured it was worth a shot to ask and see if I could gather some opinions on vocal performance of the 7200

I have a D7200 and for me vocal performance is super important and would gladly trade my D7200 with your D9200, but I say it again, I would not consider D7200 in your case, not at all. It does not portrait vocals as well as others in the same price range or even among many $400 phones.

 

[RoyGB]

would gladly trade my D7200 with your D9200

You might want to re-read my original post. I just want to trade cables, not the cans. Hope you didn't get your hopes up too much. Thanks for the input on the vocal performance, the hunt will go on i suppose...

I'm going to stick around in this thread. Really curious to see what @Maxx134 is cooking up with those drivers.

 

[RoyGB]

@Klonatans Since I kinda derailed your question when I popped into this thread I'll try to add my two cents to your issue.

From my experience, the denon drivers benefit from burn in. My 9200's do sound different now than when they were brand new. Others have shared the same sentiment as well over in the 9200 thread. A quick search might yield something in this thread as well. What I noticed is more bass extension and the treble seemed to calm down a bit and it seemed less peaky but IDK entirely on that last point. Give your new pair some time and then do another comparison. It could also be the pads. Worn in pads tend to provide a better seal. Furthermore, worn in pads do alter the shape slightly and the driver could be closer to your head due to pad wear. Just all idle speculation into your issue.

It could also be a QC thing. Check out this video from Denon Japan for the construction of the D9200. At around 1:11 they show the headphone going through a QC check for audio and it shows acceptable FR ranges and the FR of both L and R on that headphone and the left channel only matches 63% to their reference response (or 63% to something. Maybe the other driver. It does not tell us exactly what). I don't know what the QC process is like for the 7200 considering a different factory but it is safe to assume that it is equal to or less than the QC of their flagship made in their Japan facility. It could just be that your headphone does sound sonically different to your old pair but still passed QC.

 

[Klonatans]

@Klonatans Since I kinda derailed your question when I popped into this thread I'll try to add my two cents to your issue.

From my experience, the denon drivers benefit from burn in. My 9200's do sound different now than when they were brand new. Others have shared the same sentiment as well over in the 9200 thread. A quick search might yield something in this thread as well. What I noticed is more bass extension and the treble seemed to calm down a bit and it seemed less peaky but IDK entirely on that last point. Give your new pair some time and then do another comparison. It could also be the pads. Worn in pads tend to provide a better seal. Furthermore, worn in pads do alter the shape slightly and the driver could be closer to your head due to pad wear. Just all idle speculation into your issue.

It could also be a QC thing. Check out this video from Denon Japan for the construction of the D9200. At around 1:11 they show the headphone going through a QC check for audio and it shows acceptable FR ranges and the FR of both L and R on that headphone and the left channel only matches 63% to their reference response (or 63% to something. Maybe the other driver. It does not tell us exactly what). I don't know what the QC process is like for the 7200 considering a different factory but it is safe to assume that it is equal to or less than the QC of their flagship made in their Japan facility. It could just be that your headphone does sound sonically different to your old pair but still passed QC.

I gave the faulty D7200 some 100 hours burn-in but the boomy, loose bass and the distant recessed mids didn't change even a slightest bit. Both my old 7200 and my girlfriend's 7200 sounded glorious right from the beginning and they haven't changed their sound signature during years in service, so I assume it's indeed a bad batch or a major manufacturing defect. I already returned it and received a refund (I hope Amazon will send it to Denon for inspection rather than resell it as B-ware). Now thinking how to get a good specimen.

 

[RoyGB]

Have a listing up for my D9200 Silver Cable if any of yall's want to trade for the copper cable.
Couple of people who have both mentioned they like the silver cable with the 7200's.
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/wtt-denon-d9200-silver-cable-for-equivalent-copper-cable.933376/

 

[Maxx134]

I would be interested in the experiences with these fake drivers. They don't look bad. Curious how they sound.

I'm currently working on them now,
as I just fixed someone 7200 today, I decided to work on mine.

I'm going to stick around in this thread. Really curious to see what @Maxx134 is cooking up with those drivers

The currently like 1 mm smaller and metal so I have to put some glue inside as the metal slides around..

I gave the faulty D7200 some 100 hours burn-in but the boomy, loose bass and the distant recessed mids didn't change even a slightest bit. Both my old 7200 and my girlfriend's 7200 sounded glorious right from the beginning and they haven't changed their sound signature

This is very bad news..
sounds like it may be cheaper parts from 5200..

Here are some pictures of how I mod my 7200..
Look:
I use a tiny piece of dynamat directly opposite the plastic for wire solders.

Also the thin strip of wool around the ported holes..

Now look at my use of sorbothane:

Sorbothane needs to be under tension to work, either compressed, or expanded.
Here we see that it is stretched over the perimeter of the driver..

Disregard the removal of the paper on top of the driver, as I use my own porting and Driver modification.

Wood cup has creatology foam (under that existing foam), which also has a center hole in it so the sound can reach the wood..