[ab_ba]

Hey any buzz out there about the list price for the HE-1000's, or when they'll be released?
 
If they're below $2000, I'm buying them they day they are available. Between 2k and 3k, I'll let the early reviews come in, give it a few months, then decide. Over $3k and I'll probably have to give it a year or two then re-survey the landscape. 

 

[ab_ba]

Drat. $3K. These would have to be end-game universal-acclaim headphones for me to consider them at this price. And even then, it'll be a year or two, and hopefully a price drop or two. I hope hifiman does a lot of sales, I wish them all the best, but I won't be able to be a customer anytime soon.
 
In my ideal world, I'd have a chance to demo these alongside Laylas, and decide where to put my money. Given the convenience of cIEMs, the HE1000s would have to be a lot more to my liking to favor them over Laylas. (I spend 2-3x as much time listening to my JH-13's than I do my HE500s.)

 

[OneTallGuy]

$2000 or less ...  Will buy within 3 months. 95% guarantee.
 
$2500 or less ...  May purchase after 6 months of reviews, comments by owners, and amp requirements.
 
over $2500 ...   NFW.  Will not purchase under any circumstances.
 
OneTallGuy

 

[miceblue]

I'll chime in my two cents here. Probably cost for research and development, and fabrication of the headphones are what makes this headphone so expensive. This is a completely new level of fabrication with a diaphragm of nanometre scale. Even though STAX has micron-level diaphragms, they've essentially had the last 40 years to perfect the manufacturing process.

I have no idea what kind of research Dr. Bian did for his PhD thesis (I can't seem to find any scientific publications with his name), but my guess is that very little of it applies to this headphone. If anything, nanotechnology is still fairly new and mysterious; most people probably only know of the nano scale from the buzzword "carbon nanotube." Getting a driver diaphragm material on the order of a nanometre at that large of a surface area is probably no trivial task, let alone putting the conductive traces on it which are required for any planar magnetic speaker technology. This isn't an electrostatic headphone where the micron-thick membrane is just that, essentially suspended between two stators, you actually have to put traces on the diaphragm.

People who D.I.Y. electrostatic speakers always emphasise having a very clean working environment with minimal dust. If you get a piece of dust on your electrostatic driver, you're pretty much going to get distortion of the driver in that one spot. Imagine what a piece of dust (micron-level size) would do if it gets on the HE1000's nano-scale diaphragm.

 

[davidsh]

Dust on a planar isn't as problematic, though. On a stat many problems arise due to the high voltages eg. noises, imbalance and diaphragm discharge. Due to the high polarising voltage on the diaphragm it also attracts dust particles.

What is the exact thickness of the HE-1000 diaphragm?

 

[gurus]

I'll chime in my two cents here. Probably cost for research and development, and fabrication of the headphones are what makes this headphone so expensive. This is a completely new level of fabrication with a diaphragm of nanometre scale. Even though STAX has micron-level diaphragms, they've essentially had the last 40 years to perfect the manufacturing process.

I have no idea what kind of research Dr. Bian did for his PhD thesis (I can't seem to find any scientific publications with his name), but my guess is that very little of it applies to this headphone. If anything, nanotechnology is still fairly new and mysterious; most people probably only know of the nano scale from the buzzword "carbon nanotube." Getting a driver diaphragm material on the order of a nanometre at that large of a surface area is probably no trivial task, let alone putting the conductive traces on it which are required for any planar magnetic speaker technology. This isn't an electrostatic headphone where the micron-thick membrane is just that, essentially suspended between two stators, you actually have to put traces on the diaphragm.

People who D.I.Y. electrostatic speakers always emphasise having a very clean working environment with minimal dust. If you get a piece of dust on your electrostatic driver, you're pretty much going to get distortion of the driver in that one spot. Imagine what a piece of dust (micron-level size) would do if it gets on the HE1000's nano-scale diaphragm.

 
There is nothing nano in/about this headphone.

 

[miceblue]

The diaphragm is of nanometre thickness. Am I missing something?

[video]https://youtube.com/watch?v=fzyDw9o0pzQ[/video]

 

[davidsh]

The diaphragm is of nanometre thickness. Am I missing something?

Question is what is meant with nano? 500nm? Besides, I imagine that the metal tracers weigh more than the diaphragm itself.

 

[miceblue]

Dust on a planar isn't as problematic, though. On a stat many problems arise due to the high voltages eg. noises, imbalance and diaphragm discharge. Due to the high polarising voltage on the diaphragm it also attracts dust particles.

What is the exact thickness of the HE-1000 diaphragm?

Question is what is meant with nano? 500nm? Besides, I imagine that the metal tracers weigh more than the diaphragm itself.

Dust could interfere with how the traces are put on though. A speck of dust could prevent the trace from sticking on to the diaphragm at that point, and thus likely reduce the durability of the driver.

And the traces don't necessarily have to be metal per se. Semi-conductive nanoparticles have been used for some sensors, and so it wouldn't be too farfetched of an idea to think that the traces could be "stamped" onto the diaphragm. Likewise, carbon nanotubes have been used in speaker diaphragms in research, which aren't considered a metal either.

 

[gurus]

The diaphragm is of nanometre thickness. Am I missing something?

(Missing) The Truth.
 
The edge (thickness)  of any nano (thick)  material is not visible to the naked eye.  Not so in the video. For a regular video camera to capture that would be a scientific break through bigger than the nano diaphragm.

 

[miceblue]

(Missing) The Truth.

The edge (thickness)  of any nano (thick)  material is not visible to the naked eye.  Not so in the video. For a regular video camera to capture that would be a scientific break through bigger than the nano diaphragm.

But you're making the assumption that the diaphragm is perfectly flat and stiff; obviously in the video it's not stiff at all. And that material also has a huge surface area. Even if you dropped a piece of tissue paper, you would never get it to line up perfectly with the camera such that the thinnest side is perfectly flat and parallel with the lens.

 

[SodaBoy]

But you're making the assumption that the diaphragm is perfectly flat and stiff; obviously in the video it's not stiff at all. And that material also has a huge surface area. Even if you dropped a piece of tissue paper, you would never get it to line up perfectly with the camera such that the thinnest side is perfectly flat and parallel with the lens.

Lol seriously, I thought this was obvious too. You explained it better than I ever could though.

 

[gurus]

 
Lol seriously, I thought this was obvious too. You explained it better than I ever could though.

Thanks for shedding some light on this nano edge technology for the HE1000, SIC ( figure that one out)
 
And all along I was under the impression that this was nano technology.
 

 

[SodaBoy]

 
(Missing) The Truth.
 
The edge (thickness)  of any nano (thick)  material is not visible to the naked eye.  Not so in the video. For a regular video camera to capture that would be a scientific break through bigger than the nano diaphragm.

 

  Thanks for shedding some light on this nano edge technology for the HE1000, SIC ( figure that one out)
 
And all along I was under the impression that this was nano technology.
 

A snarky response could not hide the fact that you were hilariously wrong.
 
You cannot evaluate the edge thickness of the diaphragm from the video. To show only the edge profile, the diaphragm would need to be positioned as a perfectly flat plane perfectly parallel to the plane of sight. At no point was the diaphragm positioned as a perfectly flat plane parallel to the plane of sight in the video. It was moving through the air, it was not perfectly flat, and it was not parallel to the plane of sight.
 
"The stealth fighter canopy haz a 20nm gold coating?! No wai but I can see the coating clearly, and we all no u cant see nanometer stufs!"

 

[JRoyen]

If the HE-1000 are indeed the first nanometer planars with few technological consequences and measure ruler flat from 10Hz to 1kHz a premium can be charged. A planar with the characteristics of an electrostat while possibly being easier to drive? The devil is in the details.
 
The HE-500 currently selling for $500 is very generous. So I don't begrudge Fang for turning a profit. I'm very impressed with what he's created in just eight short years. Eventually Oppo will be looking in this direction as well. The PM-3 is a chance to get their foot in the door for later products.
 
Now whether many will pay an actual 3K premium is debatable. At $2000USD, I would at least consider the HE-1000. Above that price, I would patiently wait for the resale market.
 
I'm looking forward to Tyll getting a hold of the HE-1000 and testing them. He's among the few audiophiles who uses his head and not his wallet to determine worth. I do notice more audiophiles than ever willing to be soaked and pay on credit. If you are selling a $1500 headphone at a loss a few short months later, you didn't do enough research or have an unrealistic vision of what headphones represent.