[nishan99]

I am talking about bass quality not quantity. So for example do the hd 800 and focal utopia have great bass punch ?
again regardless of the quantity.
One friend told me it's not and said it's related to the drivers extrusion capability for the driver to deliver a proper punch and slam. Then I watched Paul McGowan the CEO of PS audio say driver extrusion is bad and you don't want the driver to extrude and we should keep that at minimum, and this is from a guy who LOVES his bass and it's dynamics to the point he servo controlled his bass drivers and made them self power with tons of wattage dedicated only to the bass drivers.

Any idea on how to predict the bass quality of any headphones is much appreciated <3

 

[SoundHelmet]

A lot of pseudo technical stuff that gets passed in audiophile circles and forums. It ends up being misleading. Most of us don't make headphones and don't truly understand the physics and engineering that go into their creation. These things aren't simple and half baked understanding creates misinformation and myths.

For example, Paul said excursion is bad but he also says that most electrostatic speakers don't have good dynamics because they can't extrude very much. So is excursion bad or good? The answer is neither. It is a single parameter that an engineer will consider and optimize in the context of dozens of other parameters.

In summary, no you can't predict sound quality based on spec sheets and advertised technology.

That said, i understand it is fun to talk and think about the technology but we should just be careful when making purchasing decisions and giving advice based on incomplete knowledge

 

[tomb]

You can't really "predict" the bass quality of a headphone. You can look at reported measurements and specs, then perhaps make a reasoned judgment whether the bass will be sufficient to your tastes. There is no replacement for listening, however.

Basically, the bass quality is dependent on the physics of producing sound. You have some sort of driver that is powered to produce sound from a given signal. How that driver is designed, powered, and the signal it's fed, all determine the type of sound that results.

Some of what you are describing and asking about include the concepts of frequency response, sound pressure levels, and transient response. All things being equal with a dynamic driver, a greater excursion means a higher sound pressure level. Like all things in the physical world, there is a balancing act: a lot of excursion may require a lot of power and the material may have a greater chance of deforming and causing distortion. You can minimize the excursion with a larger diameter driver, but then that, too, becomes more difficult to maintain the exact shape while in motion. You can re-design the driver type to provide more sound pressure with less power and excursion (like the HD800), or you can re-design the driver so that large excursions are ridiculously easy and there is less chance of deformation with large excursions (like the Focal Utopia). Both can result in great bass.

The rest of your description seems to question the difference between sound pressure level of a driver versus the transient response. Some of this is amplifier-dependent, too, but transient response can be thought of as the driver quickness, while sound pressure response can be though of as power and frequency response, or the sensitivity at a given frequency. Both are needed to provide deep and tight bass.

The HD800 is one of the easiest headphones to equalize for greater bass. The capability is still there, but the bass response is a little subdued in its non-equalized response. However, the bass is very quick and there is no lack of extension (the HD800 is better in this than the HD800s, IMHO). The outstanding performance is a direct result of the proprietary ring-radiator driver design that Sennheiser invented. Sennheiser continued to use coils that resulted in 300 ohm impedance in the HD800, though, so you need an amplifier that can swing more voltage than current.

As for the Focal, it depends on the excursion of the driver to produce great bass. In their case, the driver design is such that tremendous excursion is possible with very little power. However, that also means that inherent damping is very, very low. This means you need an amplifier with a superior damping factor at the Utopia's impedance to properly control all that excursion. Most any amplification can push the driver out, but it takes a great damping factor to pull it back in. I haven't seen it myself, but Focal owners have described that you can see the drivers swing back and forth simply from moving the headphone in the air. At the same time, there are isolated reports of the drivers bottoming out in the cans, too. All that adds up to a very quick, highly detailed headphone driver, but it must have a quality amplifier at a much lower impedance than the Focal headphone.

Bottom line, you are going to always have the potential for great, high-quality bass with one of the flagship headphones. However, you also need to include the correct amplification in your requirements.

 

[nishan99]

A lot of pseudo technical stuff that gets passed in audiophile circles and forums. It ends up being misleading. Most of us don't make headphones and don't truly understand the physics and engineering that go into their creation. These things aren't simple and half baked understanding creates misinformation and myths.

For example, Paul said excursion is bad but he also says that most electrostatic speakers don't have good dynamics because they can't extrude very much. So is excursion bad or good? The answer is neither. It is a single parameter that an engineer will consider and optimize in the context of dozens of other parameters.

In summary, no you can't predict sound quality based on spec sheets and advertised technology.

That said, i understand it is fun to talk and think about the technology but we should just be careful when making purchasing decisions and giving advice based on incomplete knowledge

I think Paul was right, planars and estats speakers can't extrude like dynamics therefor they can't push enough air to the listened to deliver bass punch or slam. Instead planars and estats pressurize the air more than pushing the air (more like squashing the air than pushing it like some tweeter types) to produce bass, that's why their bass is very informative and accurate but not as representative or life sounding as dynamics bass. (I just realized that in this conversation, idk if it's even true but it does make sense to me ).
When he said the extrusion is bad he meant we should use more than one driver or servo control the single driver and he done both for their infinite IRS speakers with 16 freaking bass drivers and when you sum the extrusion of all these drivers it will be maybe hundred times more than any planar or estats. He and his friend Arnie believe in multiple drivers to lower their stresses and increase their efficiency, for woofers or tweeters.

 

[nishan99]

You can't really "predict" the bass quality of a headphone. You can look at reported measurements and specs, then perhaps make a reasoned judgment whether the bass will be sufficient to your tastes. There is no replacement for listening, however.

Basically, the bass quality is dependent on the physics of producing sound. You have some sort of driver that is powered to produce sound from a given signal. How that driver is designed, powered, and the signal it's fed, all determine the type of sound that results.

Some of what you are describing and asking about include the concepts of frequency response, sound pressure levels, and transient response. All things being equal with a dynamic driver, a greater excursion means a higher sound pressure level. Like all things in the physical world, there is a balancing act: a lot of excursion may require a lot of power and the material may have a greater chance of deforming and causing distortion. You can minimize the excursion with a larger diameter driver, but then that, too, becomes more difficult to maintain the exact shape while in motion. You can re-design the driver type to provide more sound pressure with less power and excursion (like the HD800), or you can re-design the driver so that large excursions are ridiculously easy and there is less chance of deformation with large excursions (like the Focal Utopia). Both can result in great bass.

The rest of your description seems to question the difference between sound pressure level of a driver versus the transient response. Some of this is amplifier-dependent, too, but transient response can be thought of as the driver quickness, while sound pressure response can be though of as power and frequency response, or the sensitivity at a given frequency. Both are needed to provide deep and tight bass.

The HD800 is one of the easiest headphones to equalize for greater bass. The capability is still there, but the bass response is a little subdued in its non-equalized response. However, the bass is very quick and there is no lack of extension (the HD800 is better in this than the HD800s, IMHO). The outstanding performance is a direct result of the proprietary ring-radiator driver design that Sennheiser invented. Sennheiser continued to use coils that resulted in 300 ohm impedance in the HD800, though, so you need an amplifier that can swing more voltage than current.

As for the Focal, it depends on the excursion of the driver to produce great bass. In their case, the driver design is such that tremendous excursion is possible with very little power. However, that also means that inherent damping is very, very low. This means you need an amplifier with a superior damping factor at the Utopia's impedance to properly control all that excursion. Most any amplification can push the driver out, but it takes a great damping factor to pull it back in. I haven't seen it myself, but Focal owners have described that you can see the drivers swing back and forth simply from moving the headphone in the air. At the same time, there are isolated reports of the drivers bottoming out in the cans, too. All that adds up to a very quick, highly detailed headphone driver, but it must have a quality amplifier at a much lower impedance than the Focal headphone.

Bottom line, you are going to always have the potential for great, high-quality bass with one of the flagship headphones. However, you also need to include the correct amplification in your requirements.

Thanks a lot!, I really learned a lot from your write up.

Be patient with me
So let's hypothesis, there are 2 drivers which are driven by the same electronics and interconnects with the same transient and other technical abilities except:

• one with 60mm driver size and one with 40mm
• the smaller driver has enough extrusion capability to match the loudness of the bigger driver of for example 100dB 100hz
• both have the same stiffness at that volume.

Regardless to the size of the bass but under the same amount, will the bass they produce have the same punch and slam? if not which one will be better? the bigger driver or the smaller one which extrude more ?
Or for example 2 drivers with the same exact specs except one is quicker and driven by the same electronics and interconnects, will the faster driver provide a better bass punch and slam ?

 

[tomb]

Your questions are biased. You define a condition where the smaller driver has enough extrusion to match the loudness of the larger driver. By your definition, they are equivalent.

Then - completely contradictory to defining equal conditions - you state than one is faster than the other. Which one do you think is better, given that you defined everything as equal, except you declared that one is quicker?

 

[TWerk]

The funny thing which makes me question the whole driver size and bass aspect, is that some IEM's can have very good solid bass impact with literally tiny drivers.

I've always loved the low end of my Yamaha EPH-100 IEM, and these have 6MM micro-drivers... absolutely tiny. Of course these are INSIDE the ear and seal the canal completely so this probably helps them to give the impression of a stronger bass by design of the airtight seal.

You might imagine a full size headphone with drivers magnitudes larger would be much more capable of low end impact, but that does not seem to be the case.

I enjoyed Tomb's points above, I know nothing myself of the physics that creates all of this, but I also appreciate a fast, hard hitting, and tightly defined bass response especially because a lot of my listening is modern EDM music.

 

[nishan99]

Your questions are biased. You define a condition where the smaller driver has enough extrusion to match the loudness of the larger driver. By your definition, they are equivalent.

Then - completely contradictory to defining equal conditions - you state than one is faster than the other. Which one do you think is better, given that you defined everything as equal, except you declared that one is quicker?

No contradictory or bias, I am just hypothesizing to know what driver design element affect the bass quality the most, is it the driver speed, size or extrusion capability.

 

[nishan99]

The funny thing which makes me question the whole driver size and bass aspect, is that some IEM's can have very good solid bass impact with literally tiny drivers.

I've always loved the low end of my Yamaha EPH-100 IEM, and these have 6MM micro-drivers... absolutely tiny. Of course these are INSIDE the ear and seal the canal completely so this probably helps them to give the impression of a stronger bass by design of the airtight seal.

You might imagine a full size headphone with drivers magnitudes larger would be much more capable of low end impact, but that does not seem to be the case.

I enjoyed Tomb's points above, I know nothing myself of the physics that creates all of this, but I also appreciate a fast, hard hitting, and tightly defined bass response especially because a lot of my listening is modern EDM music.

Yes you're basically abusing your ear canals and that's why I don't like IEMs, they are fatiguing and sometimes mildly painful when I use them for an extended period of time.
Try a milion BA IEM, you will not get a quality bass like a proper dynamic driver.

 

[TWerk]

Nishan - Curious if you personally have listened to many headphones yourself and your favorite bass on a headphone that you've heard?

 

[buke9]

A better question would be is bass your only concern with how a said driver would sound? Not sure too many makers are giving out extrusion limits or speed of their drivers so really don’t understand the question really as there isn’t a reference to go by. I too like to know how things work and why things do what they do . Most punch starts out higher in the frequency range so not just a bass thing a slap on a bass guitar or a bass drum the strike usually is what gets your attention and then you hear the bass. Just take a 20 or 50hz tone and turn it on and off and you are not getting punch . I think @tomb had it right there is no replacement for listening. You can read all the technical documents and white papers on things but it does come down to how does it sound to you.

 

[Davesrose]

I'm also not sure how pertinent quotes about loudspeaker drivers are to headphones! Loudspeakers have to push a lot of air: headphones don't. IMO, that means performance comparisons with dynamic, planar, and electrostatic are also different with headphones. All well recognized headphone brands have audio engineers who have accounted for all of this stuff, and they have found their balance. I think there's also more variation with particular preference of headphone, as headphones are more dependent on ear anatomy (which varies with people). With my planars vs dynamics, I find the planars go deeper down and have more kick in the deep bass regions (also confirmed with FR measurements where you see them not dipping so much in sub-bass). It's as close to feeling a kick drum without a sub-woofer as I've encountered. I think their excursion is also very minimal because their premise is a large film surface. I find my dynamic headphones to now be slightly more mids centric. I like my Focal Elex for portable (it's easy to drive) and it's exciting with pop/funk genres. I admit I've never tried twirling around with them focusing on drivers to see if I see movement! Meh, I think beryllium driver isn't so much for more excursion as less distortion (which is what I've read is the epitome for headphone design).

 

[nishan99]

Nishan - Curious if you personally have listened to many headphones yourself and your favorite bass on a headphone that you've heard?

Focal Elex no doubt! >>> ultrasone signature studio > Monoprice M1060 >> hifiman Ananda = BGVP DM6 >>> KZ AS10 >>> wx1000xm2

 

[nishan99]

A better question would be is bass your only concern with how a said driver would sound? Not sure too many makers are giving out extrusion limits or speed of their drivers so really don’t understand the question really as there isn’t a reference to go by. I too like to know how things work and why things do what they do . Most punch starts out higher in the frequency range so not just a bass thing a slap on a bass guitar or a bass drum the strike usually is what gets your attention and then you hear the bass. Just take a 20 or 50hz tone and turn it on and off and you are not getting punch . I think @tomb had it right there is no replacement for listening. You can read all the technical documents and white papers on things but it does come down to how does it sound to you.

You're right, but you can get those info from a knowledgeable reviewer or if the company brag about some certain specs, like how focal brag about their driver extrusion. When ever I want to know a certain product I go watch their video announcement on YT or interviews on the shows, on these videos engineers tend to brag about what they bring to the table and what's unique about their product so for example if they talk about how quick, responsive and detailed their the driver you can assume it's a fast drivers like how ZMF brag how fast the Verite is, and of course you need to back it up with independent reviewers opinion. So all these info is usually attainable if you search enough.

All these hypothesizes is for the sake to have a better understanding to the physics and engineering to our favorite items and I find it fun to know these things and it also gives us a some level of confident about initial prediction of a new product without listening to it and it's just an initial prediction after all

 

[ProtegeManiac]

I'm also not sure how pertinent quotes about loudspeaker drivers are to headphones! Loudspeakers have to push a lot of air: headphones don't. IMO, that means performance comparisons with dynamic, planar, and electrostatic are also different with headphones. All well recognized headphone brands have audio engineers who have accounted for all of this stuff, and they have found their balance. I think there's also more variation with particular preference of headphone, as headphones are more dependent on ear anatomy (which varies with people). With my planars vs dynamics, I find the planars go deeper down and have more kick in the deep bass regions (also confirmed with FR measurements where you see them not dipping so much in sub-bass). It's as close to feeling a kick drum without a sub-woofer as I've encountered. I think their excursion is also very minimal because their premise is a large film surface. I find my dynamic headphones to now be slightly more mids centric. I like my Focal Elex for portable (it's easy to drive) and it's exciting with pop/funk genres. I admit I've never tried twirling around with them focusing on drivers to see if I see movement! Meh, I think beryllium driver isn't so much for more excursion as less distortion (which is what I've read is the epitome for headphone design).

They're also measured at a much shorter distance from the drivers vs at least 1m for speakers (whether single fullrange driver or any other design), so in that use case, you're more likely to find a headphone that reaches 50hz at one end and 16,000hz at the other end before it really takes a nose dive, and that's working either free-air or sealed (not that you could wear a 3D printed earcup with what amounts to a transmission line that would offset the size, weight, etc on a driver that was specifically designed to operate either free air or sealed). The only thing consistent with either is that a fullrange driver on a headphone and a speaker is that both have a tendency to have a peak somewhere in the upper midrange or treble, which on older sources necessitates a notch filter while newer digital sources with headphone systems (or speaker systems, if you use such with those) can use digital EQ.