[Capunk]

Can this mod done on Denon D2000?
Does anyone ever try?

 

[stevenkelby]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dreadhead /img/forum/go_quote.gif That's True I bought the Head Room stock balanced cable for the HD-650's but I really couldn't tell difference between it and the stock Senn cable in SE mode. I'll dig out the stock cable and give it a try again because I don't want to be close minded. Thanks to both you and other poster. I've done the wood plug trick plenty of times before on other projects but this hole is so tiny I thought it wouldn't work but hey it's worth a swing. It's not the hole in the wood cup that's the issue it's the plastic ones and if I want a new plate I'd need to by a new driver and etc which is more trouble than it's worth to me.

Nice one. Hang onto it and try again if and when upgrading your source too.

If it's into plastic, put a drop of CA (cyano acrelate, superglue) in the hole, then the screw. Will hold for ever until you want it undone. I used to put a drop on all screws into plastic on RC helis, they never vibrate loose but still come undone when you want.

 

[Dreadhead]

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevenkelby /img/forum/go_quote.gif Nice one. Hang onto it and try again if and when upgrading your source too. If it's into plastic, put a drop of CA (cyano acrelate, superglue) in the hole, then the screw. Will hold for ever until you want it undone. I used to put a drop on all screws into plastic on RC helis, they never vibrate loose but still come undone when you want.

I case you thought I was being funny the headroom comes with a balanced to SE converter.

I don't think I'll be upgrading from a DAC1 anytime soon, the sound is just amazing and I think I'd need to spend well over 3 grand to get noticeably better technically. I can't justify that really. I want no warmth or any other color just straight what was recorded. Most people find that boring but I really enjoy it (maybe I'm boring).

Sailing season starts next month.... sails... my other money drain... oh wait camera gear too.. damn...

 

[stevenkelby]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dreadhead /img/forum/go_quote.gif I case you thought I was being funny the headroom comes with a balanced to SE converter. I don't think I'll be upgrading from a DAC1 anytime soon, the sound is just amazing and I think I'd need to spend well over 3 grand to get noticeably better technically. I can't justify that really. I want no warmth or any other color just straight what was recorded. Most people find that boring but I really enjoy it (maybe I'm boring). Sailing season starts next month.... sails... my other money drain... oh wait camera gear too.. damn...

Ah. Sorry, didn't know you had a DAC1. I guess the cable just doesn't do anything audible for you then! Never tried it myself, thanks for the info.

Good luck with the screws!

 

[Dreadhead]

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevenkelby /img/forum/go_quote.gif Ah. Sorry, didn't know you had a DAC1. I guess the cable just doesn't do anything audible for you then! Never tried it myself, thanks for the info. Good luck with the screws!

Thanks again for the super-glue tip I'll try it out tonight or tomorrow.

 

[Fing]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vcoheda /img/forum/go_quote.gif we really need another head-fier who owns an R10 to get a hold of these modded D5000s to compare the two. Maybe Markl could loan his pair out to some R10 owners.

I've tried various elements of Markl's mod and ended up keeping the dynamat in the earcups, around the driver and on the earpad frame (no choice really

)

I didn't go as far as perforating a sheet of dynamat and placing it on the plastic surrounding the driver.

Putting in fibreloft in the earcups and experimenting with various thicknesses of foam in the earpads didn't really improve the sound for me - it seemed to emphasise treble and reduce everything else to a greater or lesser degree, which was not what I was wanting.

As for how it compares towards an R10, well I wouldn't say they were on that level. I'm not entirely happy with the bass light version of the R10 I own (I never listen to it) and given the choice I'd probably listen more to the D5000 on a SP Extreme. I expect this verdict to change once I balance this pair of R10 into a Supra XLR.

Compared to the bass-ey version of the R10, well it's no contest. It's a much better headphone. More refined, more complete sounding and the best dynamic headphone I have ever heard so far.

The dynamat mod does help reduce the "flabby" bass I heard on the D5000 from when I first got them and there's no denying that with a bit of work with source or amp, the D5000 can be made to sound very good. They beat my L3000 on classical for instance, which admittedly isn't hugely difficult but it's an achievement, nonetheless.

 

[Dreadhead]

I really have to hear these R10's because I just can't believe they are worth 6 grand comparative to the 650 or the moded D5000.

I can believe they are better in some ways but how a design that is more than a decade old outperforms these more modern designs in all ways is beyond me.

I'd think that the "it's expensive it's got to be good" would be feeding it but a lot of people complain that the low bass version as well. It's all very interesting.

Oh well a mystery for another day. Maybe I'll get the chance at some meet.

 

[Dreadhead]

Balanced/modded and being driven by the GS-X these phones are amazing!

 

[vcoheda]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fing /img/forum/go_quote.gif As for how it compares towards an R10, well I wouldn't say they were on that level. I'm not entirely happy with the bass light version of the R10 I own (I never listen to it) and given the choice I'd probably listen more to the D5000 on a SP Extreme. I expect this verdict to change once I balance this pair of R10 into a Supra XLR. Compared to the bass-ey version of the R10, well it's no contest. It's a much better headphone. More refined, more complete sounding and the best dynamic headphone I have ever heard so far. The dynamat mod does help reduce the "flabby" bass I heard on the D5000 from when I first got them and there's no denying that with a bit of work with source or amp, the D5000 can be made to sound very good.

interesting.

 

[Fing]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dreadhead /img/forum/go_quote.gif I really have to hear these R10's because I just can't believe they are worth 6 grand comparative to the 650 or the moded D5000. I can believe they are better in some ways but how a design that is more than a decade old outperforms these more modern designs in all ways is beyond me. I'd think that the "it's expensive it's got to be good" would be feeding it but a lot of people complain that the low bass version as well. It's all very interesting. Oh well a mystery for another day. Maybe I'll get the chance at some meet.

Value is another thing. Headphones like the R10 or HE90 have their price driven up by their exclusivity, which is something people have always been willing to pay through the nose for.

The best value high-end headphones are probably headphones like the AKG K1000, Omega 2 or Sennheiser HD-650 backed up with decent source and amping. If value is all you're looking for, then auditioning these would be a good idea.

I find it harder to recommend a closed headphone as value tends to get a little skewed by the lack of high end headphones available, hence the in part, the continuing popularity of headphones like the R10 and L3000.

For it's price, the Denon D5000 is certainly a good headphone and definiitely better value than the the R10 and L3000, if you plot technical ability against price on a graph.

However, technical ability itself isn't a linear function. It tends to fall under the law of diminishing returns. Well worn adages like 'the devil is in the detail' and 'the last 20% of the work takes 80% of the effort' spring to mind.

I know I'd listen to headphones a lot less if all I had were the D5000. Whilst good, they don't make me want to put on my headphones in the same way that those others do. The R10 puts me a lot closer to the music and maybe it's my failing hearing, but I find I need all the help I can get to reach that level these days.

"Hearing with your wallet" doesn't really come into it, though I have to admit they are certainly 'reassuringly expensive'.

I've taken apart an R10 and a Denon D5000 and seen inside an ATH-W5000 via the modding thread, as well as having owned a pair.
This leads me to believe that at the time they were first made, the R10 was built to a very high standard as well as introducing a number of innovations like the large angled drivers, peculiarly shaped earcup housing, damping, choice of materials, ergonomics and so on.

The fact that they are still so highly regarded so many years later is testament to the success of their basic design and the difficulty in incorporating some of those elements in subsequent headphones.

Of course they're not perfect. Deteriorating foam padding around the driver, reputed cable quality and using glue to hold the earpads / driver together aren't great design choices.

However, when I put on a pair of R10, I get the feeling that it's not so much a headphone I'm listening to as a hand-crafted musical instrument where every facet of sound has been carefully scrutinized and tuned for maximum refinement and pleasure.

 

[markl]

Quote:

How would you compare the bass quality and extension of your Denon mods to those of the L3000s? It's exciting to hear that your mods are more detailed than the R10s. How do you think they compare to the Qualias in that department?

Well for me, while the L3000 bass is certainly fun, there's obviously way too much of it, which is really only a problem when it interferes with parts of the lower midrange. That phone did not seem to have the same damping issues as the stock D5000. I would put the amount of bass response of the mod-ed D5000 at about the half-way point between the R10 and the L3000, in other words, exactly where it should be.

I did not like anything about the Qualias at all, I thought they were a travesty so I'm not the one to ask about those phones...

 

[markl]

Quote:

It's interesting at first you wonder if there is any there at all because compared to the stock phones it's much less but it's there and it sounds right and seems in balance with the rest of the sound.

Hi Dreadhead, there are two possibilities, one that you are so used to reverberant feelings that the phone used to give off and they are not there anymore, you are left with the pure sound of the bass, and not rattling and vibrating that is tactile and tingly but not actual bass info. I am coinfident you will find that all the musical information is still there, but will take some adjustment. I get big slabs of bass on my mod-ed pair when the music demands it, a ton more than my R10 delivered, and it also goes A LOT lower than the R10.

The other possibility is that you used a tad too much of the fiberloft in the ear cups. As I point out in the instructions, this is hard to get right, and you only need a couple drops of it, that photo is misleading.

 

[markl]

Quote:

Putting in fibreloft in the earcups and experimenting with various thicknesses of foam in the earpads didn't really improve the sound for me - it seemed to emphasise treble and reduce everything else to a greater or lesser degree, which was not what I was wanting.

It's funny, here's where personal taste comes in as well as your point of reference. I was so used to the extreme amount of air up top that the R10 (bass-lite version) has, that to me, one of few criticisms of the mod-ed D5000 is that it just doesn't *quite* have enough up top. Now the bass-light R10 exaggerates the highs, there's no getting around it, but after 7 years of listening to it, I adjusted and that's what sounded "right" to me. The mod-ed D5000 actually has the highs dead on the money (IMO), but I'm hoping that with the APS silver/copper cable (which just arrived attached to another shiny new D5000), I may get back a tad more of the sense of air and space that the old R10 had, even if that means the mod-ed phone deviates from neutral ever so slightly.

It's going to take me a few weeks to get the APS cabled D5000 burned in and mod-ed, but I will follow-up here once it's done.

 

[joneeboi]

You have a great thread going here, markl. If I were in the market for headphones, I'd put the D2Ks near the top of the consideration list for its receptiveness to modding. My SR60s personally have received: the GS1K pad replacement treatment (and the pads were glue-modded for extra bass), thumb screw installation, driver grille replacement, Dynamat driver modification for bass punchiness, and last of all and most recently, a new beyerdynamic DT770 headband. Recabling is on the to-do list, but Markertek didn't include my 12 feet of three different heatshrink colours. But yeah, modding is the way to go.

Thanks for your contribution to head-fi.

 

[Dreadhead]

Quote:

Originally Posted by markl /img/forum/go_quote.gif Hi Dreadhead, there are two possibilities, one that you are so used to reverberant feelings that the phone used to give off and they are not there anymore, you are left with the pure sound of the bass, and not rattling and vibrating that is tactile and tingly but not actual bass info. I am coinfident you will find that all the musical information is still there, but will take some adjustment. I get big slabs of bass on my mod-ed pair when the music demands it, a ton more than my R10 delivered, and it also goes A LOT lower than the R10. The other possibility is that you used a tad too much of the fiberloft in the ear cups. As I point out in the instructions, this is hard to get right, and you only need a couple drops of it, that photo is misleading.

Hi Markl, Thanks for the reply

I actually did some A/B with my balanced 650's and some sweep tests with tone generation software and the bass response is right where it should be as you say

. Thanks so much for posting this mod. It really turns them into an amazing set of phones!

Did you find they need more volume to bloom? I had to take my GS-X from medium gain to high gain to get things right. I don't mind but I'm just asking.

Thanks,
Chris