[DivineCurrent]

Another thing I forgot to add to my little spiel, is soundstage. I had the pleasure of trying the HD800S at a store, and found out how immense the soundstage is, at least compared to everything else I have heard. I had to take them off to make sure the music wasn't playing through the speakers in front of me. When it comes to soundstage, I want to take a guess and say angled drivers and distance from your ears play the biggest part in the illusion. I tried equalizing the HD650 to HD800 response, but didn't get nearly that immense of a perceived soundstage. So, maybe the angled drivers sound reflects off the pinna shape of the ears and trick the brain into thinking it's further away than it actually is? I'm sure the larger driver diaphragm helps too.

 

[WoodyLuvr]

The soundstage and imaging (timbre) of my H6s is, dare I say it, nearing that of the HD800 and they have small drivers (40 mm) comparatively.

 

[castleofargh]

headphones are wrong on many levels, so having a little bit more of the external ear bouncing the sound into the ear canal can participate to make the experience a little more believable.
the ultimate answer is a custom sound. involving more of our body is the second best choice IMO after actual customization of the sound to our own body. I believe that simply because headphones will never involve our entire body. with proper HRTF compensation, angle, driver size etc wouldn't matter as long as we have acceptable fidelity from the transducer.
sadly it's kind of a new concern and most audiophiles still think that even an EQ "degrades" music thanks to terrible preconceptions about audio. so they're really not motivating the manufacturers to give a crap and think about solutions to make headphone audio actually good at an individual level(or with proper stereo).

 

[bigshot]

I'm always puzzled when people talk about headphone soundstage. I have very good headphones, but I don't hear any soundstage at all. It's all smack dab down the middle of my head. With my 5.1 speaker system, I can use multichannel recordings and DSPs to create very large, well organized soundstage. I've never heard anything remotely like that using cans.

 

[WoodyLuvr]

I see your point @bigshot maybe better for me to call it "in-my-head stage" that produces a sound that sounds the closest to speakers (pseudo sound stage) that sounds the closest to the real performance & recording environment (real sound stage).

Now with that said I sincerely believe I have experienced some level of sound stage with my headphones... I mean a very real speaker-like experience.

I think a good example of this headphone experience would be to listen to Enya's Watermark (a premier demonstration recording originally mastered by Barry Diament in 1988). The depth and layering (spatially and sonically speaking) is simply incredible; pleasingly deep while still being detailed and clear with no murkiness; and the imaging (I think I would like to use sound stage here)... the sound stage is fantastic as it stretches far and wide between (and even back behind) the left and right channels. This "behind" imaging I speak of is best described as when one hear's the back row instruments in an orchestra where they are accurately distant (lower in volume, but still vibrant and clear) and in their right places. This deep layering and imaging I am hearing is nearing speaker surround sound levels. Another track that best demonstrates this would be The Longships on the same album by Enya... at the the beginning... the sounds are literally floating down from above you and from afar.

If my headphones can't reproduce sound stage and layering like speakers how am I to intrepet and explain the layering and depth that I am hearing?

 

[WoodyLuvr]

headphones are wrong on many levels...

Even though they may be wrong on many levels are there not any headphones that sound good to you regardless? Yes, speakers are better in so many ways but I definitely enjoy certain headphones (especially with electronic and ambient genres) and the clear details they provide that I sometimes miss in a speaker system.
Also, I appreciate that headphones don't suffer from room acoustics.

sadly it's kind of a new concern and most audiophiles still think that even an EQ "degrades" music thanks to terrible preconceptions about audio. so they're really not motivating the manufacturers to give a crap and think about solutions to make headphone audio actually good at an individual level(or with proper stereo).

Not quite understanding your point here... new concern meaning headphone drivers or EQ'ing?

Yes, totally concur that it would be awesome if we could customize our cans to our individual needs. A novel idea that should be technologically/realistically possible right?

 

[castleofargh]

I enjoy a great many things despite them being wrong
what I meant is that we most likely will not get the proper signature, or even the proper stereo separation. not because headphones can't, but because albums are massively mastered for speakers and the 2 aren't the same. and also because our ears are calibrated to our unique body and the headphone removes part of that tuning but doesn't compensate for it.

so by rather new concern I meant using DSPs to compensate those variables for increased fidelity and realism. the main issue technically being about taking our measurements, after that the tech is already well known indeed. at least for most basic compensations. for non linear behaviors of the driver, we might have to wait a little longer. but something can probably be improved with DSP even there. so I feel like this is the future, because it has the potential to go well beyond the slow incremental evolution we have seen on drivers in the last decades.