[IBJamon]

  Interesting point! I find it interesting the the open model (T20RP) is said to have more bass. This being said there can be an argument made that the open designs helps the extension in the lower band.

Yeah I think it's because they aren't truly open, but more like a port.  I wonder if anyone has managed to make a truly open headphone Fostex mod.
 
IBJamon

 

[mproiett]

  Yeah I think it's because they aren't truly open, but more like a port.  I wonder if anyone has managed to make a truly open headphone Fostex mod.
 
IBJamon

I think your point makes sense. The cups looks exactly the same for the 3.

 

[redrising98]

Picked up a pair for the t50rp mk3s at guitar center earlier today.  Initial impressions are quite good but these are my first pair of ortho cans so take the following with a grain of salt.  My other cans (mostly been using IEMs) are beyer dt770pro80s and akg q701s.  Used these mostly out of my iPhone 5s and out of a schiit magni (1st gen) for a little while.
 
Overall I was very impressed with the 'smoothness' that I found quite unique.  I never noticed that dynamic drivers sounded slightly 'grainy' but now going back to the beyers or ety ER4s I can definitely hear the sort of 'gritty' sound compared to the T50RPmk3s.  Soundstage is good though not anything mind-blowing.  Definitely smaller than the q701s and similar to high end IEMs (I think my heir 8.0s actually sound bigger).  Sounds wider than deep to me and while instruments sound distinct sometimes the layering becomes muddled.  Speed is very good and everything sounds quite crisp.  No 'veil' of the sound; female vocals come through especially clear.
 
In terms of frequencies, it overall sounds pretty flat to me.  Bass is fast and has good impact especially in the mid bass.  It extends pretty well and you definitely get some of the sub bass body shaking feeling. Tthough I've read that these don't have much bass I felt like they are almost comparable to my dt770pro80s in terms of quantity.  Mids sound exceptionally smooth and natural.  The textures of vocals sound especially good.  They don't sound boosted but they aren't recessed either.  It feels like the singer is not quite singing into your ears but is pretty close in front of you.  Highs are detailed and give clarity to the rest of the sound.  Some sibilance does come through at times but only when inherent to the track.  Seems to extend well (my hearing stops at 17khz though) and I didn't hear much peakiness in music.  There does seem to be a peak in the upper mids (someone mentioned around 10khz) if you listen to frequency sweeps though.
 
Other odds and ends: I like the semi-open nature as it allows me to still hear some environmental noises (keeps me alert to the dog and gf and thus out of trouble).  The pads are comfortable and I don't have any issues with clamping force or the headband.  I do have larger ears so they do touch the inside of the cups and that gets slightly painful after a few hours.  The two included cables are well built and thick.  Locking mechanism is interesting but seems sorta unnecessary.  Also would have preferred two cables plus adaptor instead of one 1/8" cable and a separate 1/4" cable.  Orange cabling does look cool and overall I dig the understated industrial look (even if beats sounded good I couldn't buy a pair due to their outrageous look).  Also I did have to exchange a pair as they had pretty bad driver imbalance (L side had no sub bass) and the current pair is not completely balanced (L sub bass starts just a few hz before R does) but maybe they need a bit of breaking in.
 
Next step seems to be getting new pads and possible modding?  Any of you good folk have any recommendations on pads?  Definitely prefer the velour of my beyers as my ears and me in general are really heat intolerant.

 

[IBJamon]

  Okay, new post, listening impressions on the HM5 pleather pads.
 
These pads are terrible for my purposes.  The bass is overpowering.  If you are a basshead you'd probably love it though.  The bass power is actually pretty impressive.  And they are very comfortable and block out sound really well.
 
Just my opinion, of course.  

  The stock pads sound better to my tastes.
 
I can't wait for the velours to get here.  Now I know I made the right call; they just have to get here!
 
IBJamon
 
Edit:  As I listen more, I have to admit they sound 'fun' this way, but again, not to my preference.  

I just got in the HM5 velour angled pads, and they are MUCH MUCH better than the pleather ones.  They are fairly close to the fabric ones from another headphone I have (Pioneer SE-A1000).  They take the edge off the bass, but it's still very much there.  For the highest frequencies, I still need a bit of EQ for my preferences, but they sound very good.  (I like a parabola slope upwards from about 7-8kHz+.  Say +1@7k, +2-3@10k, +5@14k, more for 20k, which I doubt I can hear)
 
And yes, they are Very comfortable.  I've only had them less than an hour, but so far, they're the most comfortable pads I've ever worn.
 
I highly recommend these pads.  Thank you all for your recommendations!
 
IBJamon
 
Edit: The more I listen the less I need the EQ; it depends on the song I guess.  

   It also seems to depend on the source.  Strange, eh?

 

[mproiett]

I just got in the HM5 velour angled pads, and they are MUCH MUCH better than the pleather ones.  They are fairly close to the fabric ones from another headphone I have (Pioneer SE-A1000).  They take the edge off the bass, but it's still very much there.  For the highest frequencies, I still need a bit of EQ for my preferences, but they sound very good.  (I like a parabola slope upwards from about 7-8kHz+.  Say +1@7k, +2-3@10k, +5@14k, more for 20k, which I doubt I can hear)

And yes, they are Very comfortable.  I've only had them less than an hour, but so far, they're the most comfortable pads I've ever worn.

I highly recommend these pads.  Thank you all for your recommendations!

IBJamon

Edit: The more I listen the less I need the EQ; it depends on the song I guess.      It also seems to depend on the source.  Strange, eh?

Are they difficult to fit on the T50rp? Did you notice any changes in the sound signature?

 

[IBJamon]

Are they difficult to fit on the T50rp? Did you notice any changes in the sound signature?

They aren't easy to get on, but I found a trick.  The Mk3's have a ridge, where the existing pads hook into.  Basically, as long as you start with say 2 sides, and make sure to put a finger and hold the edge on one side so it doesn't slip, you can get the other sides on with out too much effort.  They fit pretty well, actually.
 
As for the sound, it does change it a little bit, with a slightly less bass-heavy sound.  This is what I was hoping for when I ordered them, so it suits me just fine.    There is still plenty of bass to go around, just a slightly clearer balance now.  I prefer it.
 
I hope that helps!
 
IBJamon

 

[kapanak]

  I just got in the HM5 velour angled pads, and they are MUCH MUCH better than the pleather ones.  They are fairly close to the fabric ones from another headphone I have (Pioneer SE-A1000).  They take the edge off the bass, but it's still very much there.  For the highest frequencies, I still need a bit of EQ for my preferences, but they sound very good.  (I like a parabola slope upwards from about 7-8kHz+.  Say +1@7k, +2-3@10k, +5@14k, more for 20k, which I doubt I can hear)
 
And yes, they are Very comfortable.  I've only had them less than an hour, but so far, they're the most comfortable pads I've ever worn.
 
I highly recommend these pads.  Thank you all for your recommendations!
 
IBJamon
 
Edit: The more I listen the less I need the EQ; it depends on the song I guess.  

   It also seems to depend on the source.  Strange, eh?

I knew you'd like the angled velour. I'm glad it fits your ears and taste well. For me personally, velour feels a lot nicer on the skin and ears, and the taming of the excess bass is just bonus. Angled velours add a touch extra soundstage and also have more room inside for my ears. Further in the future, you can start trying new in cup and back of baffle mods, once others get their hands on these and experiment. I doubt the MKII mods apply directly to the new MKIII, so wait a bit

 

[IBJamon]

 
I knew you'd like the angled velour. I'm glad it fits your ears and taste well. For me personally, velour feels a lot nicer on the skin and ears, and the taming of the excess bass is just bonus. Angled velours add a touch extra soundstage and also have more room inside for my ears. Further in the future, you can start trying new in cup and back of baffle mods, once others get their hands on these and experiment. I doubt the MKII mods apply directly to the new MKIII, so wait a bit

I agree, and couldn't have said it better.  I can see mass loading being valuable at some point, but I'll let others more experienced take a crack at it for a while.  
 
IBJamon

 

[SeEnCreaTive]

Interesting point! I find it interesting the the open model (T20RP) is said to have more bass. This being said there can be an argument made that the open designs helps the extension in the lower band.

I think I explained it a few pages back.

But when it's open, the driver doesn't have to push against air when it moves, called air complaince. So big slow movements (bass) is easier. Open ports allow air to move more easily, closed... is well closed. Semi, is some ports are open allowing some air movement. But of course, when there isn't air pushing against the driver, sometimes it can move too easily, making bloaty bass, generally less tight. So the holy grail (for people in quiet rooms) is open headphones, amazing sound stage, and amazing control. (Perfectly flat response for some people, including me) But of course that's difficult

 

[kapanak]

The only other pads (in the same size category and versatility, not talking HD800 pads, etc) I've ever found more comfortable than regular or angled HM5 full velours are the Shure 1540 pads, which are double the price of the HM5 pads, use memory foam, are perforated and use Alcantara (think Porsche micro-suede seats). But the comfort and sound gains don't really justify the price. I just happened to have two pairs that comes with a Shure SRH-1540

 

[IBJamon]

Do you prefer these Fostex's over the (much more expensive) Shure?

 

[Asr]

Updated impressions on comfort:
 
So last night and tonight I used the headphones for a few hours (just about 2-3 hours or so), to find out how they felt for long listening sessions. Now I normally don't listen to music that long in a day, so I set up a different purpose for the MK3, and decided to plug my headphone amp (the Gilmore Lite) into my desktop PC's Sound Blaster X-Fi's line-out, so I could use the MK3 with that computer. Instead of listening to "music" per se, I tried the MK3 on other stuff like my PC games (Crysis, Far Cry, Half-Life 2), MP4 files of pop music videos from YouTube, including artists like Girls Generation, Meghan Trainor, Fifth Harmony, Bruno Mars, and Taylor Swift (ok so that's sort of a guilty pleasure of mine, heh), and some movies (like Black Hawk Down and Captain America: The Winter Soldier).
 
Sonically, the MK3 was pretty darn impressive with all that variety of material. It did work very well with those PC games and movies, although explosions were a little underwhelming-sounding and it lacked some mid-bass to really give convincing weight to gunfire. But it was overall very good in handling the sonic demands of gaming & movies, and I think I could definitely use the MK3 with my desktop PC for both purposes, well at least as long as I plug my headphone amp into the sound card. 

 
The only thing that really dragged my long-session computer experience down was when I finally stopped and took the headphones off my head—my ears were really sore and were hurting like hell both times (yesterday and today). There's definitely no way I can continue using the MK3 with the stock pads for long sessions, I'm going to have to either replace the earpads or return the headphones....
 

First of all, are you like me in that you wish to tame the bass a bit?  If you want velour only for comfort and not to tame it like I do, then the hybrid one may be a good choice.  If you want to tame it, then one of the other two.  I ordered the angled one originally, despite receiving the pleather one instead...  
Hopefully I'll be able to report back on how the velour angled one sounds on Friday.

 
I definitely want velour primarily for comfort, but some more bass/mid-bass might be nice too. Definitely don't want to tame the bass....

 

[IBJamon]

You may want to try the hybrid ones then.  I find the velour angled work great for me though.  It's a preference thing.  I suppose you could buy both and return one of them and report back which you like better.
 
As I've said before, I use my Hi-Fi speakers as my reference point, and it's a carefully tuned system.  It has just the right amount of bass/treble balance, and incredible clarity.  I use AMT mids/tweets, so it has much of the same (more?) clarity that these planars enjoy, and much more air.  I always enjoy it when an audio newb listens to it for the first time and 'has never heard anything sound so good'.  I think better balanced headphones would sell better if more people were exposed to Hi-Fi.  But then again, I have the dual subs on that system, which isn't quite so easy for headphones, so compromises are necessary evils if you want it all.
 
I still think there is a good amount of bass with the velours, and a more neutral balance, but taste is a funny thing.  In my opinion, the angled pleathers are way too much, and I would not recommend them at all, but maybe you would feel differently.  I would be curious if other people like them on the Mk3's.
 
I apologize for the rambling; I don't think the angled velours tame the bass too much, but it does a little.  I hope my ramblings have helped you somewhat.  And best of luck!  

 
IBJamon
 
P.S.  You could always go velour, and EQ them to your tastes as well.  It's not quite as plug and play, but most OSs/music players/sound card software has a simple EQ available, which can go a long way to make them how you like them.

 

[SeEnCreaTive]

Looks like we got a new t50rp modding thread dedicated to mk3s. Good.

Also new faces is always great

 

[IBJamon]

Has anyone else noticed that these velour pads can feel itchy after a while?
 
Another thing is I might start to prefer the sound of flat pads; I have the flat fabric (not velour) pads off of my Pioneers, and I kind of prefer them.
 
I will have to go back and forth a bit more, but I think I may prefer these to the angled ones after all.  Hmm.
 
IBJamon