**Hifiman HE-400 Impressions and Discussion Thread**
Jul 23, 2013 at 10:08 PM Post #11,538 of 22,116
I bought the MS1 because I loved the sound of my buddy's pair but mine were insanely harsh in comparison. In fact, the entire sound signature was vastly different. His had much better bass and tame highs while mine had no bass at all and the harshest treble ever. Sibilance on par with the HE-400. Luckily, the MS1000 mod turned them into an amazing pair of headphones. To give an idea of how bass light these were, popping 4 bass holes in the back of the drivers brought them to nearly the bass level of my friend's pair which were unmodded. I should note that I did in fact put the MS1's through at least 100 hours of break-in with pink noise, so whoever wanted to pull out their break-in soapbox can simmer down! 
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Jul 23, 2013 at 10:15 PM Post #11,539 of 22,116
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I've posted impressions of the lyr and the he400 many times. Although the he400 is easy to amp for an ortho, it will scale up modestly with better gear. The lyr gives it a smooth lush sound and makes the bass even better....more dynamic. Of course this change will vary based on the tubes that you use. 
 
If I was only driving the he400 and other easier to drive hp's, it would be hard to justify the expense of the lyr. If you have other hp's that need the power of the lyr it's a very good choice.

I'm not as much concerned with it's power ability (6 watts - nuts!) but with the tube sound and orthos. I know my A1 can't give these enough juice, so I haven't ever tried a tube amp with a high power output. Have you tried the Magni with them? Don't bother reposting info on a comparison if you already have, I'm simply procrastinating the search!
 
Jul 23, 2013 at 11:01 PM Post #11,540 of 22,116
It's the aggressive and ringy upper midrange with the treble that makes grados harsh for me.  Nearly all the headphones I like have either neutral or recessed upper midrange.  Mainly because I find that anything with even the slightest amount of elevated midrange sounds nothing like a pair of speakers in a room.
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 12:32 AM Post #11,541 of 22,116
I just heard something in a song on an album that i have been listening to for like 20 or 30 years! I thought a lyric was something and it turns out it is not what i thought it was! These headphone are incredible for the money! (Can't wait for the Lyr to get here and take the damn treble spike down a bit!) DragonFly gets it done but it needs a bit of help.  Definitely some listening fatigue going on tonight!
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 2:52 AM Post #11,543 of 22,116
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I'll go with a tilted sonic characteristic toward the high frequency, but never harsh to me. That's one thing I always liked about the SR80I that ive had for years, they never sounded harsh no matter what I played on them. Oh well, guess we all hear things differently.

+1. Bright yes. Have the Sr 325i . Never felt the treble was harsh though. Same way, I don't feel the treble in the 400 harsh as well but that's me.
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 3:57 AM Post #11,544 of 22,116
Its interesting... Im not sure if its HP burn-IN or Brain Burn-In but i found the HE-400 a lot brigter when i got them.
After a few months (like 8) I still lower the treble slightly, but very little (when i started using the HP i was at -6 treble and +4 bass on the Fiio E17 as DAC, now its either 0 on both or just -2 on Treble).
 
I dont know if you guys are also gamers, but the clear sign that i had to lower the treble a bit was playing mass effect 2 and shooting a gun called "Tempest". It has a high pitch sound and on the HE-400 withoutt some EQ was clearly painfull to my ears.
 
Here you can hear the weapon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcBIua0H8SM  (watch in full HD)
 
After i Recived some great EQ config  made by beaver316, that issue went away and i also enjoy music more (aka i can get the song louder withouth it beeing plainfull... As in, i have to be carefull not to increase the volume too much cus i dont feel it hurts at all).
 
I feel the treble could be a bit lower on these HP, but overall i still love them, and its nothing that cant be solved by a little EQ (and those planars EQ crazy good, i did some random testing and i have to say im impressed).
 
After so much time with these, im only waiting for a Schiit Bifrost UBER to be delivered to my local store. Its my last componenent for this audio setup.
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 5:06 AM Post #11,545 of 22,116
I would describe the he400 as "darkbright".... What I mean by this is that everything below 1500hz is very prominent and the midrange from 1500-5000hz is quiet relative to the lower midrange which gives the midrange a dark sound.... Then there is a pretty big spike at 8khz> which makes the treble bright and slightly harsh, SO I would call these "darkbright". Something like DT990 or grado are just plain "bright". However all you really need to do is EQ everything from 8khz upwards down and you have basically got a dark headphone which is not really harsh in the treble but has extremely good bass and midrange. I have not heard the HE500 but they must sound quite bright in the upper midrange compared to the HE400.
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 5:08 AM Post #11,546 of 22,116
Quote:
Its interesting... Im not sure if its HP burn-IN or Brain Burn-In but i found the HE-400 a lot brigter when i got them.
After a few months (like 8) I still lower the treble slightly, but very little (when i started using the HP i was at -6 treble and +4 bass on the Fiio E17 as DAC, now its either 0 on both or just -2 on Treble).
 
I dont know if you guys are also gamers, but the clear sign that i had to lower the treble a bit was playing mass effect 2 and shooting a gun called "Tempest". It has a high pitch sound and on the HE-400 withoutt some EQ was clearly painfull to my ears.
 
Here you can hear the weapon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcBIua0H8SM  (watch in full HD)
 
After i Recived some great EQ config  made by beaver316, that issue went away and i also enjoy music more (aka i can get the song louder withouth it beeing plainfull... As in, i have to be carefull not to increase the volume too much cus i dont feel it hurts at all).
 
I feel the treble could be a bit lower on these HP, but overall i still love them, and its nothing that cant be solved by a little EQ (and those planars EQ crazy good, i did some random testing and i have to say im impressed).
 
After so much time with these, im only waiting for a Schiit Bifrost UBER to be delivered to my local store. Its my last componenent for this audio setup.

 
What I do for gaming is use the Xonar STX equaliser and lower 8khz and 16khz by 4db and then they do not sound harsh at all, they are pretty good for games.
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 8:01 AM Post #11,547 of 22,116
Quote:
 
What I do for gaming is use the Xonar STX equaliser and lower 8khz and 16khz by 4db and then they do not sound harsh at all, they are pretty good for games.

They are. However if you use an external DAC (in my case Fiio E17 instead of my creative X-Fi titanium) I can only get the singal lower by the FIio treble settings or some software eq (not to mention when i get the bifrost).
 
The X-Fi is a great Sound card but I actually havent tried it with the headphone amp (i assumed the sound will carry on the distortion and cycles of the CPU, and other electronics inside the case).
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 8:11 AM Post #11,548 of 22,116
Quote:
They are. However if you use an external DAC (in my case Fiio E17 instead of my creative X-Fi titanium) I can only get the singal lower by the FIio treble settings or some software eq (not to mention when i get the bifrost).
 
The X-Fi is a great Sound card but I actually havent tried it with the headphone amp (i assumed the sound will carry on the distortion and cycles of the CPU, and other electronics inside the case).

 
Sell the external dac and get a xonar STX tbh... You can use it as a headphone amp or connect the Bifrost to the RCA.. I went through 3 external dacs worth up to about £300 then bought an STX and it is similar / better than any of them really... Any differences are subtle anyway between dacs....
 
Jul 24, 2013 at 1:02 PM Post #11,549 of 22,116
Grados Can be largely (!) dependent on pads.

The shown graph of the HE-400 are a graph of the rev. 1. The rev 2 graph are to be found elsewhere.
 

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