They just came back today, if only I got a package for everytime I woke up late for one class and came late to another...
Superficial things first: Zach has been great as far as customer service was concerned, keeping me informed of the situation up until providing those great pictures. I would take some myself, but my room is full of dirty and mess so we'll leave that for another time. The box came back to me packed with more material than when I sent it, he even wrapped the w5000 case in plastic for me. The job is incredibly well done, the solder joints look a *little* cold, but they're very clean and covered in some sort of insulation material to keep them from shorting I guess. The cable feels very professional, I really like the nylon (?) fiber sheathing. One nitpick I might have (because I don't really know better) is that the xlr terminations are not heatshrinked, so the wires wiggle quite a bit inside the casing, I guess xlr's were designed for thicker wires it seems. However this is relatively minor in the larger view of things. The furutech plug looks like it could withstand nuclear fallout...
As I mentioned before, still doing single ended off a gcha. The first thing I noticed is that bass impact is pretty monstrous now, as is high frequency. The treble is close to overpowering, but I'm banking on having it calm down as I run it through the regular tracks. The bass is incredibly refined after coming from the 900LTD, extension is about the same but it's very controlled. I'm not going to make sweeping claims about my memory of the stock configuration, to put things in perspective. I mean I do remember but it's just as easy to take this as a straight review rather than a comparison, right?
Clarity is amazing, after listening to the 900LTD (only) for so long, I realized that it smears treble a bit, making cymbals sound sloppy. The AD2000s in this respect are squeaky clean, it really adds character to acoustic guitar when I can hear the contact of the strings. In a similar fashion, complex passages are rendered effortlessly, allowing me to concentrate on each individual voicing. On that note, space in pretty incredible as well, a characteristic of the stock configuration taken to another level. Across the entire frequency range I get an enormous feeling of spaciousness and air as I listen to dvorak's new world symphony and smetana's moldau. This sense of space and air may have something to do with the presence of transient decay, which seems to last forever. The soundstage extends to the sides much farther than the front and back, however there definitely is more of an emphasis on music being placed "behind" me. I think this is something I have experienced with the k701 as well.
One other thing I noticed is that it's not too forgiving on badly encoded songs, my ears start to ring after a minute or so when I start up some of my older mp3s.
As of right now I'm incredibly satisfied and I feel like I've got a new pair of headphones. Hopefully this will make more of zach's jobs appear here on headfi. Now I just have to get myself a Storm Pandora and I'll be 2/3 of the way there.
Actually that brings up one of my questions, does anyone have any thoughts on NOS DACs with respect to the high frequencies? As I currently understand it, the high frequencies should get slightly folded over due to the use of "softer" filters, which would pair well with these headphones. Alternatively, would tube amplfiers be a better choice for taking a bit of the edge off?
Hope you had a good read and thanks for any input!
