[Newk Yuler]

Listening to The Wonderful Sounds Of Female Vocals double SACD, although the CD tracks because I don't have an SACD player. I bought the SACDs last year on recommendation from Analog Planet (vinyl) for a newly produced near-reference example of easy listening female vocals which isn't a big thing for me but I do have a lot of respect and appreciation for talented, silky female singers.

https://www.discogs.com/Various-The-Wonderful-Sounds-of-Female-Vocals/release/12426981

Arya is doing an excellent job with this velvety material. It's all very well recorded and Arya's timbre seems very loyal to the recordings. There is nothing lacking. Very easy listening. Nothing fatiguing.

 

[dan3952]

+1 on that, bud.

I owned the Clears for 9 months and I thought they were very comfortable. Then I bought the Arya and found out what true comfort is.

I may be next

 

[franz12]

+1 on that, bud.

I owned the Clears for 9 months and I thought they were very comfortable. Then I bought the Arya and found out what true comfort is.

I have to agree. Focal headbands are too stiff and ear cups are smaller. Both Clear and Utopia caused discomfort after a few hours.

 

[bagwell359]

Those Hifiman's headphones with the metal strap headband must be some of the poorest designed headphones ever.
I admit I like the sound of the He1000 se and I even consider buying them, but I shudder every time I have to look at this contraption.
Right now I own the Clear and if I look at those or even better the Focal Stellia, I see that there have been top designers at work.
With Hifiman I see Asian laborers, working in a sweat shop.
Isn't strange that a direct neighbor, the Japanese, are so suberb when it comes to design, but the Chinese on the other hand are really struggling with modern design?
I wonder why Hifiman has been so cheap as not to employ the help of a good designer. It almost angers me, as poor design, like poor architecture, can be torture if you have to look at it every day.

Besides the 'shades' I don't think HFM pays a lot of attention to the cans outside of the driver. For instance I have a pretty big head and the HEX V2 (and associated models like Arya) cups are huge, cover so much ground that there is bass loss because the pads aren't flexible enough to fill in where the contour of my head changes. Then there is the wide variety of locations the cups can fit, some - nay most of which do not get the treble to focus well enough to make the image as regular shaped, big, and on the same plane as it can be.

Of course most manufacturers are similar. It's the M$ model, get it to market, wait until Rev 2 or 3 if you don't want to be a victim of bleeding edge. Sigh.... HFM overpriced the HEK and HEX coming out, newer versions, repricing, and trickle down models including from MD has really screwed the initial adopters at resale time. Arya is latter in the chain of this technology, but, I've got to believe a V2 is coming before 9/20.

BTW if you fuss with the HEX V2 a bit, it's still a big somewhat diffuse sound, but the bass is ginned up nicely (tissue paper wedged into any gaps between head and pad), and the details/recording cues become well more obvious. Still haven't heard the Arya, but, it could be that these are still issues.

 

[imran27]

I just did some calculations that for Burson Play (8 ohms output impedance), consider the loading of the output impedance, I would need 86% more volume for Arya than I would need for DT 1990 to get similar loudness levels.

And this is true, I normally use 20 ish for 1990 but I had to use 36 ish for Arya.

Without considering loading of output impedance, you would normally need 50% more volume for Arya than the DT 1990

 

[ahmedie]

I found that hifiman planer sound very similar to stax offering and they come close to stax sound-stage / image / speed technical performance. Planer bass is very extended while stax can match or even exceed planer bass with expensive energizer. hexv2, arya, ananda etc lacks seriously in dynamics compared to stax offering...since stax is hugely dynamic compared to them...Also stax treble and mid is simply better. I think hifiman only win vs stax in bass department in case cheap equipment....Also in they look better and comfort is better I guess

ananda sounds very similar to l300/l700
hexv2 sounds very similar to 404/407

 

[bagwell359]

I found that hifiman planer sound very similar to stax offering and they come close to stax sound-stage / image / speed technical performance. Planer bass is very extended while stax can match or even exceed planer bass with expensive energizer. hexv2, arya, ananda etc lacks seriously in dynamics compared to stax offering...since stax is hugely dynamic compared to them...Also stax treble and mid is simply better. I think hifiman only win vs stax in bass department in case cheap equipment....Also in they look better and comfort is better I guess

ananda sounds very similar to l300/l700
hexv2 sounds very similar to 404/407

I used to have a 303 Classic. More def than the HFM's you bring up. The best estat I have heard is the Voce, and it can't move as much air as a large number of orthos. Estats are good at microdynamics, but macrodynamics? Not so much. But except for the Voce, all other estats exhibit extreme amounts of definition - draws attention but its not natural. And yes the cost of entry into estats is extreme - that's not a disadvantage for orthos.

 

[Wifiman]

I found that hifiman planer sound very similar to stax offering and they come close to stax sound-stage / image / speed technical performance. Planer bass is very extended while stax can match or even exceed planer bass with expensive energizer. hexv2, arya, ananda etc lacks seriously in dynamics compared to stax offering...since stax is hugely dynamic compared to them...Also stax treble and mid is simply better. I think hifiman only win vs stax in bass department in case cheap equipment....Also in they look better and comfort is better I guess

ananda sounds very similar to l300/l700
hexv2 sounds very similar to 404/407

Agreed, once compared Hekv2 with L700 and 009, IMO the L700 sounds a lot like especially at higher frequency a 'detail plus' Hekv2 and the L700 is a bit faster too. But in terns of Arya, I think it's faster than both. The details and dynamic of 009 are not at the same level of even the susvara. If im gonna to upgrade my Arya I think I ll go for staxs than any higher price planar.

 

[chimney189]

I don’t get how the Arya can be faster than the HEKv2 when the Ayra uses an HEKv1 driver .. almost every review states that the HEKv2 is faster than the HEKv1 or the Arya in this instance.

 

[dan3952]

I don’t get how the Arya can be faster than the HEKv2 when the Ayra uses an HEKv1 driver .. almost every review states that the HEKv2 is faster than the HEKv1 or the Arya in this instance.

Chances are, it's not faster, it shares the same driver. It would be physically impossible for one to be faster than the other. See if anybody has done impulse or sine wave tests on those. Inner Fidelity has published data sheets on some, but not all. That would trump anecdotal reports, at least to me. Only a new, thinner driver, could be faster.

 

[kid vic]

Chances are, it's not faster, it shares the same driver. It would be physically impossible for one to be faster than the other. See if anybody has done impulse or sine wave tests on those. Inner Fidelity has published data sheets on some, but not all. That would trump anecdotal reports, at least to me. Only a new, thinner driver, could be faster.

I thought the Arya got the Nano-diaphragm? In theory that could make it faster.

http://store.hifiman.com/index.php/arya.html

 

[dan3952]

I thought the Arya got the Nano-diaphragm? In theory that could make it faster.

http://store.hifiman.com/index.php/arya.html

It's time I read up on these things. The plethora of new models coming out all the time, certainly don't help with my understanding. All I was able to find thus far is that the HE1000 v2 also has a nano diaphragm (without having researched the specs of any of the others yet). I don't suppose the HE1000 SE with its higher price point, would have one too?

In the engineering world, with every product there would be an accompanying data sheet with lots of numbers on it. Those are missing here. I don't know how much thinner the "nano" one is, compared to their other products.

 

[kid vic]

It's time I read up on these things. The plethora of new models coming out all the time, certainly don't help with my understanding. All I was able to find thus far is that the HE1000 v2 also has a nano diaphragm (without having researched the specs of any of the others yet). I don't suppose the HE1000 SE with its higher price point, would have one too?

In the engineering world, with every product there would be an accompanying data sheet with lots of numbers on it. Those are missing here. I don't know how much thinner the "nano" one is, compared to their other products.

Looks like your right and the v2 also had the nano-diaphragm. This is so confusing

 

[kid vic]

The HE1000se has the nano-diaphragm plus something from the Susvaras magnet structure.

 

[Wifiman]

Maybe it's something to do with the different magnet not the diagram, the diagram should be same in all 3. The transient is faster than V1 or V2(these 2 sounds 99% identical to me).