[markot86]

Like I said, I will change my impressions accordingly if they do change; right now I'm on about 60 hours and I still can't detect anything different =/. Maybe I'm not burning them in correctly? What do you all use to burn them in?

 

[philodox]

Just put music on at moderate to high volume and let it play... I left my NOS K340's burning in for a couple weeks when I got them.

 

[lmilhan]

Sorry to hear that your are disappointed with your new phones. I know that feeling is a real drag (happened to me a few times, mostly with Sennheisers, and a few BeyerDynamic models).

Although I haven't heard the K601s, I can say that I found that item number 3 that you mention certainly exists in the K701s. In order for the K701s to sound thier best, I found that I had to turn them up beyond my listening comfort level.

I would suggest giving the 601s a bit more burn-in time just in case. If you find that you still don't like them I would suggest sending them back for a refund (assuming the place you bought them from will allow that), or sell/trade them here at Head-Fi. I don't think you will have trouble selling them - so all is not lost.

 

[LTUCCI1924]

warpdriver
HI: How are you? WHY because to me its the fom the great new big thing at the time. And for the money that the 701 cost I think there are many lest expensive cans that sound great for way less money. True I have not heard or want to hear the 701. This buy buy buy stuff with all the new whats happing now stuff is beyond me after a lot of buying and buying cans only to get much better value and great sound for way less money. Now this is just my opinion and do as any of you will do. But for me after over 3-4 years I have learn a few things here. But please enjoy what ever you do with this stuff.

 

[warpdriver]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LTUCCI1924 warpdriver HI: How are you? WHY because to me its the fom the great new big thing at the time. And for the money that the 701 cost I think there are many lest expensive cans that sound great for way less money. True I have not heard or want to hear the 701. This buy buy buy stuff with all the new whats happing now stuff is beyond me after a lot of buying and buying cans only to get much better value and great sound for way less money. Now this is just my opinion and do as any of you will do. But for me after over 3-4 years I have learn a few things here. But please enjoy what ever you do with this stuff.

My only point was that the 701's don't sound like the 601's, so it should not affect your decision to audition them and make a judgement based on that.

If you know of any headphones that sound nearly as good as the 701's for less money, let me know, because I'm still looking. My HD600's are being sold, no Grado's qualify for me, the Senn HD580 is great value but too veiled. My 880's are the closest to being perfect but I'm still looking to improve on them.

If the K701's sound midway between the HD650's and 880's, I'll be a happy man and stop buying for a while.

 

[JaZZ]

Quote:

Originally Posted by warpdriver If the K701s sound midway between the HD650s and 880s, I'll be a happy man and stop buying for a while.

That's how I would characterize it, more or less.
.

 

[lini]

Quote:

Originally Posted by warpdriver Why? It's like listening to HD600's and questioning HD650's greatness. Or listening to SR325i's and questioning RS2's greatness? You can only question their "greatness" if you've listened to them. Just even looking at the frequency response graphs show the 701's to be a completely different species than the 601's

Then again, maybe not - for example, over here both the K601 and K701 as well as a few other new contenders have been reviewed in the last issue of Stereo - according to their impressions, both AKGs seemed to share quite a bit of their sonic signature, and they rated the K601 with 86 % (same as HD 650, btw!) and K701 with 89 % on their headphone ranking. And their frequency response diagrams made quite obvious to me, where to espect the similarities and differences. K601 also distorts a little more than the K701 in their measurements, though still not much on an absolute scale. Personally, I'd exspect different amp synergies for the K601 and K701...

Greetings from Hannover!

Manfred / lini

 

[markot86]

We'll see whether I will continue to like these headphones, but assuming that the harshness leaves, there's still a problem that I'm facing, and that's a serious lack of bass and slight brightness. With my schedule and the fact that these things leak a TON of sound, there's no way I can accumulate over 300 hours of burn in on these babies before the 30 day return period; I'll give them about 100 hours, and if they don't sound at least satisfactory, I'll be returning them.

I feel like the biggest problem with these headphones is that they try to be an all around headphone like the k701 but fall short; a jack of all trades yet a master at none. In my opinion, these are just a tad too bright of what I would call neutral, making classical sound almost too lively and fake. For rap and rock, these headphones lack the bass impact needed to make these genres sound good. For Jazz, the lack of bass extention makes hearing much of the low end a major strain. This strain causes me to turn up the volume at a much higher level than I like to.

And these aren't minor problems, but in fact major ones if you ask me. This isn't something that I feel like burn in could fix (of course, I don't know exactly how much 300 hours of burn in will do, I feel like it won't do much more than 50 will but I could be mistaken). Looking at the graphs, it seems that the k701's have more bass than the 601s, which may actually change the sound drastically; after all, my "brightness" complaints may all be there just because of the lack of low end balance.

However, my advice to anyone looking at the k601's would be: go k701 or go home. I wish I had so that I could give AKG's newest offerings a fair shot, seeing as accounts of the 701's vs the 601's state that the 701's improve on everything that the 601's are.

I definately feel like the 601 series in the akg line up will be the ugly duckling that no one will want, much like the SA3000. I was hoping that the 601's were going to voiced in such a way that wouldn't make one crave for the 701's, but I feel like this is not the case at all. Whether the 701 is a much better headphone is unknown to me, but I feel like anyone who owns the 601 will easily spot these issues, particularly in the bass area.

 

[lmilhan]

Judging by what you are saying, I have a feeling the K701s wouldn't do it for you either. You would probably still be disappointed, just a little less so!

 

[Blackmore]

Quote:

Originally Posted by markot86 Having gotten these with my micro dac and micro amp with DM, all I can say is that these headphones have several flaws that in my mind make this headphone not suitable for a mid-fi rig. Note: These headphones have been religiously burned in now for over 50 hours, and I honestly can't tell any difference between these headphones when they were burned in and when they were not. If my opinion changes as the burn in continues, I will modify this thread accordingly. List of reasons: 1) These really lack bass, A LOT. I'm not a basshead by any means but boy do these leave something to crave. In many of my jazz tracks, I can barely hear the bass play, let alone distinguish what notes it is playing at comfortable volume levels; this is especially problematic because the micro amp is known for a slight bass boost. 2) Is it just me or are these headphones, well, harsh? Headroom recommends the k601's as an alternative to the k701's if one doesn't want any "scratchiness" in their music, but when listening to these headphones I can't but notice that in my system there is some heavy simbilance, moreso than even my sr-60's . One possible reason why I feel like this might be the case is because I listen to these headphones at much higher sound levels than I do my grados to cancel out the lack of bass, but other than that, I can't really think of a reason. This leads me to my next point. 3) These are NOT a low volume headphone; period. With the recent scare of hearing damage, I cannot recommend these to anyone that wants to listen at a low volume. Maybe I'm being a little too hard on these headphones, but I guess I expected way too much from the akg contender to the hd600. I wish I had a k701 to compare these to on hand to tell you if these problems are fixed in the 701, but all i can say is that if headroom describes these as not so "scratchy" I can only imagine how harsh sounding the k701's must be.

You need a good amplifier to get the best of them

 

[bmorrison]

Quote:

Originally Posted by lini over here both the K601 and K701 as well as a few other new contenders have been reviewed in the last issue of Stereo - according to their impressions, both AKGs seemed to share quite a bit of their sonic signature, and they rated the K601 with 86 % (same as HD 650, btw!) and K701 with 89 % on their headphone ranking. And their frequency response diagrams made quite obvious to me, where to espect the similarities and differences

lini,

Do you know if there's a link to this article anywhere? I tried looking for it on the stereo.de website and had no luck. Of course, not speaking any German didn't really help me out. If there's nothing available, would it be possible to scan the article? I always enjoy a good frequency response graph.

 

[layman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bmorrison If there's nothing available, would it be possible to scan the article? I always enjoy a good frequency response graph.

Request doubled

 

[markot86]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Blackmore You need a good amplifier to get the best of them

haha

You're not running these headphones in balanced mode? what were you thinking?! of COURSE you won't like them!

Using stock cable? No WONDER you don't like them. Somebody throw this man a cardas/equinox/zu cable =P

 

[gshan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by markot86 ... 3) These are NOT a low volume headphone; period. With the recent scare of hearing damage, I cannot recommend these to anyone that wants to listen at a low volume.

When I first listened I felt that the midrange was recessed. It's probably just boosted on my other cans. Ended up compensating with more volume, but that naturally led to fatigue.

I'm listening at a reasonable volume now, and they are getting better. Imo the midrange doesn't sound muffled/veiled; it's just not presented upfront like a D66/SR60/KSC.

No problems with the bass amount here, and I've recently discovered trance/dance works well on them. On some electronica tracks the mids just seem really congested and an unseparated mess with my forward-midrange phones.

Hopefully there will be more reviews on these, or I can make it to a meet. (edit: and use them on every source and amp that I can find there

)

 

[gshan]

markot86, would it be possible for you to draw a few quick comparisons with your HD600?