[Wishmaker]

The 'hand crafted in Japan' moniker made me smile.
Sadly, my joy was short lived.
They are back in the box they came in.
I have already contacted the shop and await a resolution.
If this is DENON quality control then we are completely out of touch with reality as for 1500 EUR, I do not accept this.

 

[SilverEars]

The 'hand crafted in Japan' moniker made me smile.
Sadly, my joy was short lived.
They are back in the box they came in.
I have already contacted the shop and await a resolution.
If this is DENON quality control then we are completely out of touch with reality as for 1500 EUR, I do not accept this.

The little white tags they provide for each headphone was pretty unique that I have not experienced with other headphones. I don't know if it's similar to how Japanese auto have an emblem with the name of the person that worked on the car. Odd, but uniquely interesting touch that adds a connection between the purchaser and the producer of the headphone I guess.

The bamboo cups look very clean, but also seems too clean looking compares to the wooden version. It looks very cleanly designed, assembled, etc.. etc.. You really feel it when you hold it (you understand the build quality much better when held). I can't say I had similar feeling hold TH900. The parts of the D9200 for assembly is obviously better quality. The metal frame better machined and shaped, to the leather material. I do prefer the look of bamboo more as it shows of the look and seems more natural.

 

[Wishmaker]

The little white tags they provide for each headphone was pretty unique that I have not experienced with other headphones. I don't know if it's similar to how Japanese auto have an emblem with the name of the person that worked on the car. Odd, but uniquely interesting touch that adds a connection between the purchaser and the producer of the headphone I guess.

The bamboo cups look very clean, but also seems too clean looking compares to the wooden version. It looks very cleanly designed, assembled, etc.. etc.. You really feel it when you hokd it. I can't say I had similar fweling hold TH900. The parts of the D9200 for aseembly is obviously better quality. The metal frame better machined and shaped, to the leather material. I do prefer the look of bamboo more as it shows of the look and seems more natural.

Yes, the package is mesmerising. The tag is a nice touch. The smell reminded me of my brand new leather interior in the car. I used gloves to open the box and to see them.
Then I noted the scuffs on the cups and my excitement disappeared.

 

[newtophones07]

The 'hand crafted in Japan' moniker made me smile.
Sadly, my joy was short lived.
They are back in the box they came in.
I have already contacted the shop and await a resolution.
If this is DENON quality control then we are completely out of touch with reality as for 1500 EUR, I do not accept this.

Just ask the shop for a discount of a few hundred bucks and enjoy your new cans. Its wood, soft bamboo at that, sometimes nature creates indentions.

At least run them for a few hours to see of you like them. I find them amazing, just wish the pads were deeper and had more foam.

 

[Mink]

The 'hand crafted in Japan' moniker made me smile.
Sadly, my joy was short lived.
They are back in the box they came in.
I have already contacted the shop and await a resolution.
If this is DENON quality control then we are completely out of touch with reality as for 1500 EUR, I do not accept this.

This is a tough one. If these scuffs gradually appear after use you may not even notice it, you certainly wouldn't care. But when new you want them to be immaculate, I can feel your pain. Is the wood treated? You can try to oil/grease the marks with your finger tip, and I don't mean to use some vegetable oil right away, but use the natural oils of you skin and rub over the scuffs and see if that does someting, if it darkens/even out the scuffs a bit? Many times these sort of marks are easily fixed.

 

[SilverEars]

Just ask the shop for a discount of a few hundred bucks and enjoy your new cans. Its wood, soft bamboo at that, sometimes nature creates indentions.

At least run them for a few hours to see of you like them. I find them amazing, just wish the pads were deeper and had more foam.

I don't see this with Denon based on the way D9200 was built. I immediately noticed the build quality with these, and I can tell this was an example of Japanese assembly line precision. That's got be one of the one slipped through the QC cracks, but Japanese QC is something else. Although I can't say the same for Fostex. Fostex seems to be a little looser (besides the unnecessary amount of time taken to make the TH900 cups). As far as taste in the sound tuning, that's a different matter. lol I can't recall much of Japanese tuning I really liked. I really don't like Sony tunings, etc..

Recently, I've seen docu about Japanese car assembly, and it's quite interesting. They stop the assembly if one of the assembly workers find something at fault. Talk about QC!

 

[Malevolent]

I'm about to take receipt of a Denon D9200; it should arrive on Monday or Tuesday. I'm excited to get them!

This will be an upgrade from my current D2000.

 

[Wishmaker]

This is a tough one. If these scuffs gradually appear after use you may not even notice it, you certainly wouldn't care. But when new you want them to be immaculate, I can feel your pain. Is the wood treated? You can try to oil/grease the marks with your finger tip, and I don't mean to use some vegetable oil right away, but use the natural oils of you skin and rub over the scuffs and see if that does someting, if it darkens/even out the scuffs a bit? Many times these sort of marks are easily fixed.

I am not against wear and tear. I do not expect these to stay mint after years of usage. What I do expect is a damage free product when I take it out of the box.

The grooves in the cups are damage from possible impact against something. One has deep marks and the second cup has a mark like the wood had a defect.

If I were to put them for sale someone would want a huge discount on them because they are damaged. This is not a light cosmetic mark that will blend with the colour.

The shop received an order for a brand new headphone. I told them specifically that their B stock does not interest me. I paid the extra 200 EUR to avoid the B Stock and demo units.

My Denon D2000 and 5000 were pristine out of the box.

 

[Malevolent]

I am not against wear and tear. I do not expect these to stay mint after years of usage. What I do expect is a damage free product when I take it out of the box.

The grooves in the cups are damage from possible impact against something. One has deep marks and the second cup has a mark like the wood had a defect.

If I were to put them for sale someone would want a huge discount on them because they are damaged. This is not a light cosmetic mark that will blend with the colour.

The shop received an order for a brand new headphone. I told them specifically that their B stock does not interest me. I paid the extra 200 EUR to avoid the B Stock and demo units.

My Denon D2000 and 5000 were pristine out of the box.

Yes, the marks on your cups don't look normal, especially for a device that is fresh, out of the box. At the very least, QC would have taken notice of such a glaring issue.

I hope that you are able to get this sorted out amicably.

 

[Wishmaker]

I cannot believe these passed quality control, especially that they are hand crafted. The shop
found a pair of headphones with one of their suppliers and got them for me. They were either under the assumption these were new or they knew they aren’t but gave them to me anyway.
This would be crappy as Thomann is not a tiny boutique when it comes to music products. This infuriated me even more as when I placed the order they said 2-5 business days. Then they said earlier August and now they send me something which is not according to what was advertised for the price I paid. Had I chosen a B stock model I would run them without an issue and provide my impressions.

 

[RoyGB]

The little white tags they provide for each headphone was pretty unique that I have not experienced with other headphones. I don't know if it's similar to how Japanese auto have an emblem with the name of the person that worked on the car. Odd, but uniquely interesting touch that adds a connection between the purchaser and the producer of the headphone I guess.

The bamboo cups look very clean, but also seems too clean looking compares to the wooden version. It looks very cleanly designed, assembled, etc.. etc.. You really feel it when you hold it (you understand the build quality much better when held). I can't say I had similar feeling hold TH900. The parts of the D9200 for assembly is obviously better quality. The metal frame better machined and shaped, to the leather material. I do prefer the look of bamboo more as it shows of the look and seems more natural.

Ironically the cups are made by a luxury auto bamboo interior company because of their knowledge of bamboo workmanship. The grainyness of the wood is actually intentional to give it a more 'woodlike' texture.

The name of the person on the tag is Denons chief audio engineer (or something similar). Pretty much the he helped extensively with the design and tuning and was the set of ears that gave approval to the 9200's to go into production. From what I can tell, there are only 1 or 2 people that assemble all the 9200s.

I posted some japanese articles a few pages back in the thread. Google translate does a good enough job if you are curious and want to know more.

 

[Wishmaker]

I had an interesting discussion with the shop.
They claimed these were new and that Denon quality control was to blame.
Wood cups have defects so I should accept it.
I said I need a new pair which does not look like it was banged against something.
3-4 weeks.
Maybe one day I get to enjoy these AHD9200.
If not I put another 1500 and get the Stellia and be done with poor quality products.

In the interim, enjoying some LOSSLESS DAFT PUNK ALIVE 2007 album on Foobar ASIO with my AHD2000. My head is going to bleed from the bass with these mark Lawton pads !

 

[Malevolent]

I had an interesting discussion with the shop.
They claimed these were new and that Denon quality control was to blame.
Wood cups have defects so I should accept it.
I said I need a new pair which does not look like it was banged against something.
3-4 weeks.
Maybe one day I get to enjoy these AHD9200.
If not I put another 1500 and get the Stellia and be done with poor quality products.

In the interim, enjoying some LOSSLESS DAFT PUNK ALIVE 2007 album on Foobar ASIO with my AHD2000. My head is going to bleed from the bass with these mark Lawton pads !

Well, I hope my own D9200 won't have any of these cosmetic defects. I should be getting mine sometime this week; I'll report in again once I get my hands on them.

Anyway, I hope you get your replacement unit soon.

 

[newtophones07]

I had an interesting discussion with the shop.
They claimed these were new and that Denon quality control was to blame.
Wood cups have defects so I should accept it.
I said I need a new pair which does not look like it was banged against something.
3-4 weeks.
Maybe one day I get to enjoy these AHD9200.
If not I put another 1500 and get the Stellia and be done with poor quality products.

In the interim, enjoying some LOSSLESS DAFT PUNK ALIVE 2007 album on Foobar ASIO with my AHD2000. My head is going to bleed from the bass with these mark Lawton pads !

Man that sucks. To pay that much cash, in store, and yet they arrived damaged and the store won't make good, would just bum me out. Fell your pain. Sound wise they are worth it, that's for sure. Enjoy the Stellia's when you get em.

 

[duranxv]

So I had the chance to try out both the Fostex TH900 Mk II (stock pads and cables) vs. the Denon AH-D9200 (also stock pads and cables). I intentionally kept both at stock configurations because I figure if you're going to be spending over $1000 on headphones, they should be designed well enough without having to mod the hell out of them for a good sound. Thankfully, both sound great with their stock cables and pads. I didn't use a fancy amp/DAC to be honest (Sound BlasterX G6 since I'm more into gaming than music), but again, I found these headphones very easy to work with.

I managed to snag a new Mk II for about $1200, and I got the Denons for about $1600. The two headphones are very comparable, but here's the TLDR version: The Denon 9200's are great - but their price tag vs. the TH900 doesn't justify the purchase.

I tested both headphones for both music (mainly movie soundtracks and 70's/80's/90's/early 00's Rock music) and gaming (RPG's, FPS, RTS's, atmospheric games, etc.)

Some specifics:

Bass - The Denons have very tight and controlled bass, can really handle the lows very well, but I just found the Fostex to be deeper feeling and just more fun. You FEEL more with the Fostex vs. the Denons. Both headphones handle deep bass like champs.

Midrange - Both perform well in the midranges. I think the Denon is bit more technically precise, given that they're closer to reference headphones (as others have stated) than the TH900, but I didn't notice a massive difference (again - it doesn't justify paying $400 more). Neither headphones' bass frequencies bled into the midrange.

Treble - I will admit, without proper EQ, the TH900's treble is exhausting. The Denon's are better out of the box when it comes to those piercing highs. However, with the right EQ, I was able to control the massive V shape of the Fostex's and bring them more in line so that the highs don't assault the ears. For gaming, the V shape is better - for music, not as much depending on what kind of musical experience you're looking for.

Surround sound - The TH900 sounds more *open* and a bit more clear than the Denon's do. Perhaps this is because of the semi-closed design, but the sound just sounded "bigger" with the Fostex's than the Denon's. In FPS games like Call of Duty, I found that the Fostex was more accurate in positioning than the Denon's. They seem to be better designed for surround sound than the 9200's. I was able to tell the location of people above me or behind me more often with the TH900 than with the Denon. I tested both pairs of headphones' surround sound capability using Dolby Atmos for Headphones, and DTS Headphone X. In a game like Jedi: Fallen Order, the clarity of the TH900 brought out the ambience slightly better than the Denon 9200. I felt slightly more immersed with the TH900 than the 9200.

Portable devices - Both are very easy to drive. I was able to play each of them on a regular Sony mp3 player with no issues. No amp needed. For the Fostex, however, I needed an 1/8" adapter to plug it in, while the Denon conveniently had a dual plug in at the end of the cable. You can simply remove the 1/4" plug and the 1/8" is under it. Very convenient.

Comfort and looks - The TH900 wins hands down. They're more comfortable to wear, and I guess I'm just partial to red, lol. The bamboo of the Denon was nice, but the TH900 just looks and feels better in my opinion with that red birch cherry wood. My main gripe is that the cable length of the Fostex is too damn long, while the Denon's are much more reasonable.

Overall: The Denon AH-D9200 sounds really good, and if you're looking for a very precise and controlled sound, it may edge out a tiny bit over the TH900, however, I just don't think that little bit extra precision is worth the extra $400 you would pay vs. the TH900 Mk II's, especially because you can rein in the TH900's treble with the proper EQ. That's just my opinion, and I know these things are really subjective, but I hope this helps. I wanted to give back after asking so many questions on this board about all the different headphones out there Thanks everyone for all the help and advice!