[Mad Lust Envy]

I know some of you guys rubbed off the Hifiman HE-400 logo on the side
What'd you did you guys do to get it off?

Thumbnail. Both the logos and L/R marker rub off with very little force of the nail.

 

[MrMateoHead]

Quote:

Everybody says the drop in upper mids takes away from vocals.  I don't think they do.  I compared vs the LCD2 and the LCD2 isn't some magical deity in comparison when it comes to vocals.
 
Dropping the HE-400's mid-upper treble will take away some of the sibilance found in its vocals though.

The "upper mids" drop of the HE-400 is NOT were the critical human voice frequencies are. There was an interesting web link I had explored earlier breaking up the components of voice. The spoiler is that the HE-400 is generally flat or slightly boosted in critical vocal areas.
 
Sibiliance has not been a problem to my ears - and trust me, I hate sibiliance. What I suspect some people are not realizing is that the HE-400 are extremely revealing headphones - you will generally hear what was recorded. I have listened to tracks that made the HEs sound "warm", and tracks that come across a little "cold".
 
Its very important in audio that, when you think you have found a problem, you put the listening in context. By that I mean, if sibilance isn't a problem 90% of the time, than your song was likely the problem.
 
Now, I don't want to sound like an HE-400 apologist, because they are not perfect. But voices, in conclusion, sound great and super natural to me (if a little forward at times).

 

[gopanthersgo1]

How many revs. are there on this headphone? I'm getting Rev. 2 today, is that the best one?

 

[attika89]

Quote:

How many revs. are there on this headphone? I'm getting Rev. 2 today, is that the best one?

Yes, that is the latest.
 
it is often called Rev 4, but it is basically the Rev 2, you can find a little description in the OP

 

[gopanthersgo1]

Yes, that is the latest.

[COLOR=A9A9A9]it is often called Rev 4, but it is basically the Rev 2, you can find a little description in the OP[/COLOR]

Ok, thanks!

 

[Oldandslow]

Quote:

Guess we'll just have to agree to disagree. 

 
The distance that the J$s puts the ears away from the drivers accentuates treble and bass relative to midrange, it's not even a matter of damping. Midrange becomes more prominent (relative to treble and bass) when your ears are closer to the drivers, try it, it is an apparent effect even sans earpads. 

I couldn't agree more about the mid range coming up with eardrums closer to the headphone diaphragm. I had G-cushion pads on my Grado RS-1s, and when I used them after not hearing them for a few months, they sounded entirely different than I remembered. I took the large cushions off and installed "flats". The mid-range jumped out! They sounded much better.
 
I'm receiving the HE-400s next Wednesday. I played around with the Foobar 2000 equalizer. Does anyone do this for each headset they use? Here's what I came up with:
 
 

 
For this HE 400 response graph:
 
 

Does this look correct, or do I need changes? I'll probably leave the equalizer "flat", but I like to try different things.

 

[TMRaven]

Quote:

The "upper mids" drop of the HE-400 is NOT were the critical human voice frequencies are. There was an interesting web link I had explored earlier breaking up the components of voice. The spoiler is that the HE-400 is generally flat or slightly boosted in critical vocal areas.
 
Sibiliance has not been a problem to my ears - and trust me, I hate sibiliance. What I suspect some people are not realizing is that the HE-400 are extremely revealing headphones - you will generally hear what was recorded. I have listened to tracks that made the HEs sound "warm", and tracks that come across a little "cold".
 
Its very important in audio that, when you think you have found a problem, you put the listening in context. By that I mean, if sibilance isn't a problem 90% of the time, than your song was likely the problem.
 
Now, I don't want to sound like an HE-400 apologist, because they are not perfect. But voices, in conclusion, sound great and super natural to me (if a little forward at times).

 
 
Yes I agree that most of the human vocals (even female ones) are centered in the lower-mid midrange-- where the HE-400 are NOT recessed.  I have seen your link before, but I don't know where I could find it either.  For the most part, headphones I've heard with more upfront vocal had to do more with their soundstage representation than their frequency response.
 
The upper midrange affects things more like the energy and bite of percussion, electric guitars, the cry of violins etc-- all harmonics. 
 
While I can agree that the sibilance found in most vocals tends to be a fault of the recording and mastering processes, lowering the HE-400's treble around 10-15khz a little bit does help this problem quite a bit.  It's not just that the HE-400 is an unforgiving headphone, it's that it has an un-naturally elevated high treble.  HD800 apologists have been using the same unforgiving argument for years now, even though HD800 has an elevated shelf of treble from 6khz onwards. 
 
Yes, I do know that most naturally occurring sibilance isn't found in the 10-15khz region, but it's still nice to have treble more natural so that most recording and masterings sound more natural on the headphones on the process.
 
For the most part I find HE-400 to be not very sibilant-prone unless it's a highly filtered pop song etc.

 

[TMRaven]

Quote:

I couldn't agree more about the mid range coming up with eardrums closer to the headphone diaphragm. I had G-cushion pads on my Grado RS-1s, and when I used them after not hearing them for a few months, they sounded entirely different than I remembered. I took the large cushions off and installed "flats". The mid-range jumped out! They sounded much better.
 
I'm receiving the HE-400s next Wednesday. I played around with the Foobar 2000 equalizer. Does anyone do this for each headset they use? Here's what I came up with:
 
 

 
For this HE 400 response graph:
 
 

Does this look correct, or do I need changes? I'll probably leave the equalizer "flat", but I like to try different things.

 
 
I'd EQ with Purrin's graphs.  Tyll has an awesomely huge databases and there's nothing wrong with his graphs, but they require a little bit of interpretation because what's flat on his graphs isn't flat in realty.  Purrin's are calibrated by ear to be flat, so what's flat on his graphs is more flat in reality.  It's a more useful tool when trying to EQ towards flatness.

 

[chewy4]

Tyll's graphs are calibrated to be flat as well... He gives both the compensated and raw graphs. Same with headphone.com's graphs.
 
Purrin's seem to be different than everyone elses. They're still useful but I'd rather trust the majority when making adjustments rather than a homebrew HRTF.

 

[TMRaven]

No, they are not calibrated to be perfectly flat, otherwise his 'ideal' graphs would be completely flat lines.  If you've read through any of his articles on measurements, you'd see that his ideal graphs are flat to 1-2khz then have a dip around 2-8khz with a little spike centered around 10khz.  I don't have the article on hand anymore, but I remember his saying that the compensation (provided by the manufacturer of the dummy head) is what he uses, and he admits it's not the most accurate.
 
On the other hand, if his raw graphs were supposed to be what represents flat to our ears, then HE-400 would be among the most flat headphones out there, which clearly isn't the case.

 

[jerg]

From personal experience, purrin's compensation seems to be more accurate. I say this because I did some extensive by-ear parametric equalization of my M50s a couple of years back (with absolutely no measurement references), and now the only FR measurements that corresponded almost perfectly to my EQ curve is purrin's M50 measurements. InnerFidelity M50 FR is wayyy off.

 

[chewy4]

Quote:

No, they are not calibrated to be perfectly flat, otherwise his 'ideal' graphs would be completely flat lines.  If you've read through any of his articles on measurements, you'd see that his ideal graphs are flat to 1-2khz then have a dip around 2-8khz with a little spike centered around 10khz.  I don't have the article on hand anymore, but I remember his saying that the compensation (provided by the manufacturer of the dummy head) is what he uses, and he admits it's not the most accurate.
 
On the other hand, if his raw graphs were supposed to be what represents flat to our ears, then HE-400 would be among the most flat headphones out there, which clearly isn't the case.

That's not his ideal frequency response, that's the HRTF used to make it sound flat to the eardrum.
 
Here's his article on it: http://www.innerfidelity.com/content/headphone-measurement-proceedures-frequency-response
 
They both use a similar but different compensation. The goal is the same though.
 
Although one quote I an curious about:
 
Quote:

I would prefer to have an HRTF calibration curve for the special conditions of two speakers placed 30 degree of axis as that is what the headphones are trying to simulate, but no such calibration exists.

 
That's not what Purrin is doing is it?

 

[TMRaven]

Actually, it sorta is.  Purrin's graphs are calibrated by ear based off his very flat measuring near-monitor speakers.  His graphs are about halfway in-between Tyll's compensated and raw graphs.

 

[chewy4]

Are his speakers 30 degrees off axis though?

 

[TMRaven]

You'd have to ask him!  Point is, his measurements are closer to flat.  Both systems are great to use as long as you know the properties of their compensation and how to interpret them.