[Elysian]

Quote:

HE-6 is bright, sibilant and bassless

 
Um, no.  It's actually somewhat reminiscent of the SR007, except with more impactful bass slam, a more forward presentation, and less resolution.  The HE-6 is the first planar I've liked since using Stax as my main rig.
 
My hunch is most typical headphone amps are incapable of properly driving the HE-6.
 
You can amp the HE-6 for as little as $225.

 

[grokit]

Even less than that, if you're willing to hack up the stock SE adapter into speaker leads :veryevil:

 

[Face]

Quote:

100% LCD-3
HE-6 is bright, sibilant and bassless
 
ooops.. just see that you ordered the HE-6... Good Luck!

My experience is the opposite of yours.  Sounds like you have an inferior amp.

 

[Canadian411]

My HE-6 is definitely not bright, sibilant, or bassless. It has excellent bass, maybe the best.

 
Which amp and DAC are you using with HE6 ?

 

[brat]

Quote:

 
 It's actually somewhat reminiscent of the SR007, except with more impactful bass slam, a more forward presentation, and less resolution.

My omegas do not sound like HE-6 at all. They are smooth, dark and musical, Maybe not the ultimate "audiophile" choise but I like them.
 
I had the chance to compare side by side HE-6, HE-500, HE-400, HE-300, LCD-3, T1, PS1000, LCD-2, HD-800 and K1000 on some balanced Auralic amp and Hifiman flagship EF-6. HE-6 was definitely the most bright and thin sounding of all. And the winner was...... HE-90 plugged in HEV-90

 

[zenpunk]

Quote:

Thanks for the responses, so what are the main differences in sound between the two? Ive read that a properly amped HE-6 sounds very good and detailed. 
 
What Amp / DAC are you using for the LCD-3?
 
Regarding the HE-500 I am selling those on eBay

The HE-6 and Little Dot MKVI+ is an incredibly detailed  and dynamic combo but you will  have to use a decent balanced DAC as fed  SE it is quite average. The provided 6080C are very nice but you will have to get better 6SL7 driver tubes.

 

[grokit]

My HE-6 is definitely not bright, sibilant, or bassless. It has excellent bass, maybe the best.

Which amp and DAC are you using with HE6 ?

I am currently using a bargain-basement setup, but even when my system is done transforming the headamp will be the same, an Alesis RA150. It's a pro audio dual mono speaker amp that puts 7.2 wpc into 50 ohms. I am feeding it with a balanced signal from my Matrix Mini-i DAC, which in turn is fed by a Firestone Bravo USB/Spdif converter.

 It's actually somewhat reminiscent of the SR007, except with more impactful bass slam, a more forward presentation, and less resolution.

:eek: My omegas do not sound like HE-6 at all. They are smooth, dark and musical, Maybe not the ultimate "audiophile" choise but I like them.

I had the chance to compare side by side HE-6, HE-500, HE-400, HE-300, LCD-3, T1, PS1000, LCD-2, HD-800 and K1000 on some balanced Auralic amp and Hifiman flagship EF-6. HE-6 was definitely the most bright and thin sounding of all. And the winner was...... HE-90 plugged in HEV-90

This is definitely caused by a lack of proper power to the HE-6, it's surprising to me that this is with the EF6.

 

[LFF]

If you have a mid-tier set-up with low to mid-fi sources then the LCD-3 is perfectly suited for such a set-up. It is very forgiving of poor sources and it doesn't need a clean, powerful amp to sound ok.
 
If, however, you have a high end rig with gobs of power, the HE-6 is what you want. The usual complaints of sibilance, brightness and lack of bass are true only if you are under-powering the HE-6. When properly amped, the HE-6 is really in a class of it's own. The bass not only extends to lowest of the lows but it remains tight and controlled. The mids are never recessed or inaccurate and the highs are extended and controlled as well. The HE-6 is a world-class, first rate headphone that demands an accompanying system of the same rate and class. Without it, the HE-6 will seriously disappoint.
 
Let's also not forget that with the HE-6, you don't have to worry about veiled units, failed drivers and other quality control concerns which are rampant in the Audeze LCD-x camp.

 

[Loevhagen]

...but some DIY the HE-6 more "veiled"...

 

[Elysian]

Quote:

Let's also not forget that with the HE-6, you don't have to worry about veiled units, failed drivers and other quality control concerns which are rampant in the Audeze LCD-x camp.

 
Great post, and I agree with everything LFF said above.
 
Are the HE-6s much more reliable than the LCD-2 and LCD-3?  The thing I like about my Stax is that I see many posts from people still happily listening to 20-30 year old Stax headphones.  I haven't run across any reliability complaints about the HE-6, but I haven't dug too deeply.
 
Any idea why Hifiman doesn't have these manufacturing problems?  Is it a technology difference, or just different development processes between Audeze vs. Hifiman?
 
brat: It sounds strange that the HE-6 sounded the bright among all those headphones on the EF-6.  It certainly did not sound bright at all on the Trends amp.  I would imagine the EF-6 would do a better job driving the HE-6 than the Trends.

 

[grokit]

If you have a mid-tier set-up with low to mid-fi sources then the LCD-3 is perfectly suited for such a set-up. It is very forgiving of poor sources and it doesn't need a clean, powerful amp to sound ok.

If, however, you have a high end rig with gobs of power, the HE-6 is what you want. The usual complaints of sibilance, brightness and lack of bass are true only if you are under-powering the HE-6. When properly amped, the HE-6 is really in a class of it's own. The bass not only extends to lowest of the lows but it remains tight and controlled. The mids are never recessed or inaccurate and the highs are extended and controlled as well. The HE-6 is a world-class, first rate headphone that demands an accompanying system of the same rate and class. Without it, the HE-6 will seriously disappoint.

Let's also not forget that with the HE-6, you don't have to worry about veiled units, failed drivers and other quality control concerns which are rampant in the Audeze LCD-x camp.

I would beg to differ on that one point, my current HE-6 setup rocks and it comes in at less than $700 total retail brand new.

 

[LFF]

Quote:

I would beg to differ on that one point, my current HE-6 setup rocks and it comes in at less than $700 total retail brand new.

Let's not compare price to first rate/first class.
 
I know of many a bargain that cost very little and beat the crap out of higher priced systems. LCD-3 is a perfect example....$2000 and it sounds like $400-$600 to me depending on what variety you get.

 

[purrin]

Quote:

Any idea why Hifiman doesn't have these manufacturing problems?  Is it a technology difference, or just different development processes between Audeze vs. Hifiman?
 
brat: It sounds strange that the HE-6 sounded the bright among all those headphones on the EF-6.  It certainly did not sound bright at all on the Trends amp.  I would imagine the EF-6 would do a better job driving the HE-6 than the Trends.

 
I get the feeling that Audeze has really pushed the envelope in terms of trace density and film thickness. I don't think the design is inherently bad, but as with anything that pushes the envelope, there are always initial reliability issues to sort out. HiFiMan takes a more conservate approach, hence their poorer efficiency, but possibly greater reliability.
 
Speaking of the HE-6's brightness. I am surprised that the HE-5LE is never discussed. It lies somewhere between the HE500 and HE6 in terms of technical ability, but is less bright.

 

[MacedonianHero]

Quote:

 
Great post, and I agree with everything LFF said above.
 
Are the HE-6s much more reliable than the LCD-2 and LCD-3?  The thing I like about my Stax is that I see many posts from people still happily listening to 20-30 year old Stax headphones.  I haven't run across any reliability complaints about the HE-6, but I haven't dug too deeply.

 
You might want to dig a little deeper. I've known of several pairs that developed dead channels and/or severe channel mismatches over time. I'm not sure if its an ortho thing or something else going on?
 
Quote:

 
I get the feeling that Audeze has really pushed the envelope in terms of trace density and film thickness. I don't think the design is inherently bad, but as with anything that pushes the envelope, there are always initial reliability issues to sort out. HiFiMan takes a more conservate approach, hence their poorer efficiency, but possibly greater reliability.
 
Speaking of the HE-6's brightness. I am surprised that the HE-5LE is never discussed. It lies somewhere between the HE500 and HE6 in terms of technical ability, but is less bright.

 
Actually thinner traces / substrate materials equate to better reliability with regards to repeated flexing (could however be trace/space is really small; but I'm just hypothesizing here). Kinda an area of expertise for me (flexible circuits). Not sure what the issues were back in Jan/Feb. And Audeze ain't saying. It does look that over the past few months though that things have improved....hopefully.
 
Quote:

I would beg to differ on that one point, my current HE-6 setup rocks and it comes in at less than $700 total retail brand new.

 
Agreed. The HE-6 sounded great from the speaker taps off my Pioneer receiver as well. With regards to scaleability, the HE-6s need good clean power to sound good. The LCD-x can sound good from even a uDac-2. But both scale with better upfront gear quite well.
 
It's all relative with regards to what sounds good though. Jude called the LCD-3s the best value headphone at $2k as it offered much of the satisfaction of the SR009s (I have not heard these yet) at less than half the price. For me, they're still my go to headphone. The HE-6s were fantastic, but I decided against dropping more $ on amping and shelving (for the amp) to keep them around. I prefer my HD800s to the HE-6s, so I decided to part with them. Sometimes though, I kinda wish I had them around.

 

[Anaxilus]

Thinner makes sense wrt the relationship between rigidity/brittleness and flexibilty if one is concerned w/ excursion.  Does that necessarily translate to better fatigue characteristics though?   Does that necessarily hold for lateral stress when tensioning?  This would put a constant, disproportionate stress on varying areas of the driver.  In fact, it seems too complicated and dependent on the particular variables and an elements modulus and other factors to make a sweeping generalization right?  The T50RP uses massive traces and even bigger ones for the original version.  Both are rock solid w/ nearly never any driver failures.  They also use smaller drivers than Audeze as well.  The fact remains that the issues w/ the failure of LCD3 drivers and signature changes over time are not what I'd consider normal, let alone exemplary performance when compared to Fostex, Hifiman or even the LCD2.  If thinner traces make the LCD3 drivers more reliable, then something else is wrong.  Perhaps the film thickness.