[Marleybob217]

Quote:

Brass instruments just sound artificial. No amount of EQing will fix this colouration.

Hmm I think the HE400 sounds very realistic apart from the treble peak, which is very easily eq-ed away. And pad mods help too. 
I never really listen to brass instruments though, but everything else sounds very natural.

 

[jay567]

Quote:

+1
 
I really like how brass instruments sound with the HE-400, artificial or not.

Me too. Also with cymbal sounds, I was once a drummer but it sounds good enough for me tbh.

 

[soundeffect]

I can't wait to get mine to hear and fully understand what everyone is talking about with the whole treble and upper mid issue. I'm hoping it's minor or I'm going to have to read the whole jerg mod 10 more times.

Mine should be in by Monday and if lucky this Sat. can't wait!

 

[TexasBuck]

Quote:

I can't wait to get mine to hear and fully understand what everyone is talking about with the whole treble and upper mid issue. I'm hoping it's minor or I'm going to have to read the whole jerg mod 10 more times.

Mine should be in by Monday and if lucky this Sat. can't wait!

I don't find the treble to be harsh at all.  The only "flaw" I've ever found with the HE-400's is:  I've found a few songs where I wish the vocals were more upfront.  Otherwise, I love them.  I might eventually try the HE-500's but I've never been happier with a headphone than I am with the HE-400's.  I like them so much, I sold the other 3 phones I had because the HE-400 were all I was listening to.

 

[soundeffect]

I hope I will like them as I have a feeling I will. My next stop after this is is to go to the next Texas meet and try some of the other higher up headphones and some amps/dacs to see what else is up there. I might stop here for a little while and pick up a good amp like the lyr.

 

[Anvil]

Quote:

Lol yup you bought em from me

u waited till the last second to bid I will pm all the proof of purchase I needed when I got them repaired if you remind me

 
Naw, I waited until the last half hour on a whim, wasn't really expecting to actually win the thing given how much these things seemed to be in demand.

 
As for the reminder, I'll get on it.

 
Edit: While I'm at it, has anyone tried the HE-400s with the Millet Starving Student? I have one I bought a couple of years ago that I can use, even though I was planning on grabbing one of either an NFB-11.32, O2, or the Schiit Stack before getting new headphones. That plan obviously has fallen apart though so I'm asking now.

 

[DutchGFX]

Quote:

 
Naw, I waited until the last half hour on a whim, wasn't really expecting to actually win the thing given how much these things seemed to be in demand.

 
As for the reminder, I'll get on it.

 
Edit: While I'm at it, has anyone tried the HE-400s with the Millet Starving Student? I have one I bought a couple of years ago that I can use, even though I was planning on grabbing one of either an NFB-11.32, O2, or the Schiit Stack before getting new headphones. That plan obviously has fallen apart though so I'm asking now.

Just my $.02
 
O2 is entirely overated, its good for a sub $200 amp, but thats all it is. And I feel it bottlenecks my system.
 
Only reason I kept it and sold my E17 was because on the plane I look like a total badass with the O2 on the slidout tray lol

 

[MattTCG]

^^ I agree with everything you've said about the o2. It just didn't do much at all for me. It looked, felt and sounded like a budget solution to me. I've sold off all my portables but I'd have kept the e17 over the o2 any day especially for travel. 

 

[Okamoto]

Quote:

^^ I agree with everything you've said about the o2. It just didn't do much at all for me. It looked, felt and sounded like a budget solution to me. I've sold off all my portables but I'd have kept the e17 over the o2 any day especially for travel. 

NwAvGuy is gonna write a gigantic article on his blog bashing you for that post.

 

[MattTCG]

^^ Probably true. But his bashing of me will seem minuscule compared to what I get everyday from my wife. 

 

[soundeffect]

^^ Probably true. But his bashing of me will seem minuscule compared to what I get everyday from my wife. 

Everyday, EVERYDAY?

I get tempted all the time to get the E17 because of the flexibility of having treble and bass boost, five adjustment at that. That can come in handy to make quick adjustments for multi headphones.

 

[Yeti tunes]

Just got mine about 3 days ago and I'm really liking them so far. I've never a headphone the is this solid on all fronts before, I feel like it adapts pretty well to everything I throw at it.

 

[MrMateoHead]

Quote:

Just my $.02
 
O2 is entirely overated, its good for a sub $200 amp, but thats all it is. And I feel it bottlenecks my system.
 
Only reason I kept it and sold my E17 was because on the plane I look like a total badass with the O2 on the slidout tray lol

Lol. While this isn't the "O2 haters thread", I would patently disagree that its 'over-rated'. By who, exactly? Also, I am curious about how it is a 'bottleneck' - it has proven to be a good pair to the HE-400 over time. More than enough power.
 
Anyway, I am wondering if it is time to start an HE-500 lover's thread, since this one is slowly turning into a discussion of all the other headphones aside from the HE-400 that rule.
 
I myself have gone from pad swapping, to fine-EQing, back to flat, and currently use a 6 db boost at 50 hz (through the windows mixer) because I've been bass crazy. While its hard not to fiddle with these, I still love the spacious, detailed, and slightly aggressive sound. I will never defect! The law of diminishing returns says it can't be THAT much better at the top, and frankly the money I am saving is buying new CDs!

 

[wje]

Quote:

Just my $.02
 
O2 is entirely overated, its good for a sub $200 amp, but thats all it is. And I feel it bottlenecks my system.
 
Only reason I kept it and sold my E17 was because on the plane I look like a total badass with the O2 on the slidout tray lol

 
Quote:

^^ I agree with everything you've said about the o2. It just didn't do much at all for me. It looked, felt and sounded like a budget solution to me. I've sold off all my portables but I'd have kept the e17 over the o2 any day especially for travel. 

 
Quote:

NwAvGuy is gonna write a gigantic article on his blog bashing you for that post.

 
Quote:

Lol. While this isn't the "O2 haters thread", I would patently disagree that its 'over-rated'. By who, exactly? Also, I am curious about how it is a 'bottleneck' - it has proven to be a good pair to the HE-400 over time. More than enough power.
 

 
About a year or so ago, I had a good exchange of messages with another member regarding the O2.  Since I'm a believer that one just isn't enough, I had about 3 of them over a period of a few months.  Our discussion basically ended up where we both agreed that we liked a bit of color in the sound of our amps.   While the true goal of an amp should be that it doesn't color the sound at all, I've realized, it may not be complete purity that I'm always after.  I guess I just want something that sounds good to me, and allows me to get a great connection with the music I'm listening to.
 
As to the over-rating, or the over-hyping, one can see how it really has gone and turned out that way.  On the DIY forum, there are endless threads about it.  People marvel at getting a bargain, especially when numbers prove that the lesser cost item can out-perform a higher priced one.  That is just the way many of our minds work.  In the case of the O2, the test numbers when compared to the Benchmark @ $800 or so, presented the O2 as being quite favorable.  This is what generated a lot of hype.  Another such comparison that I can make -- but, I'll do so without criticism of the actual product would be the modified Fostex headphones.  As soon as someone coined the term that they were (sound-wise) in the league of the LCD2 from Audeze, but that sound was achieved out of a $80 pair of headphones with $15.00 in modification supplies, again we had another situation where things have gone viral.
 
In closing, I think the whole O2 situation would have been more interesting to watch if it had been marketed differently.  Take a $100 amp, put it into a much higher-end case and market it to true audiophile snobs for $1,299.  It would sell because of the purity of sound and a non-colored sound.  At $100, true audiophiles are skeptical.  However, at $1,299, then their skepticism is less so, and they're likely to bite. 

 

[Joong]

Does HE-400 has a memory effect?
I have been using both He-400 and He-5LE for last months.
After using for a month of HE-5LE and started to listen to He-400s, which began to sound a muddy feeling for a while and then seemed to comeback to original SQ.
With He-5LE I did not have experience of the fluctuation in SQ.