[rpaul]

Other than enhancing their physical appearance, what are the main advantages of getting a pair of DT990 Pro woodied and/or recabled by Headphile?

Will the sound drastically change?

 

[Salt Peanuts]

The general consensus around here is that 990/250 uses the same drivers as 770/250. And while 770/250 do sound bit different from 770/80, they are not THAT much different (770/80's are bit less bright).

The following is what I found with my Headphile modded 770/80's (and what I wrote in one of the meet impression threads), which has screened woody, making them open cans.

My modded 770/80's sound completely different from stock 770/80's. Their sound signature is completely different from the stock and in a good way, IMO. I had a chance to compare my modded pair to a stock pair at the recent Boston meet and the difference was night and day. With the stock pair, all I heard was mushy bass and rather thin mids and highs. On my modded pair, the sound was much better balanced overall and mids/highs were more full sounding. As Wayne has put it, after he listened to my pair, they've become more "midrage" cans. I do remember Larry mentioning to me at one point that Beyers seem to benefit a lot more from recable than most other cans he's worked on.

 

[rpaul]

I can understand the effect recabling might have...but how (much) does the wood make a difference? And do the different types of wood provide different sonic characteristics?

 

[markot86]

Theoretically different types of wood add different qualities to the sound. Because different types of woods have different densities and slightly different chemical compositions, some types of wood will attenuate frequencies that others don't. Practically, however, I doubt anyone has been able to sit down and listen to multiple woodies of the same type of headphone (except larry himself) to compare and contrast the different sonic qualities of the wood, and my guess is that these differences are very small.

 

[Salt Peanuts]

Have no idea how much difference the wood housing makes. They sure do look great, though. Also, in my case, having my 770/80's woodied allowed them to be screened, turning them into open cans (or closed if I use the included wood discs to cover the screens).