[DDF]

Mine are boomy and muffled, but the boom is just outrageous. Its a one note pitchless drone thats so bad, on some songs I can't even hear the second guitar.

Source gear is modded dac ah, MSB link dac, PCDP (Sony) and iRiver MP3 player, its the same on everything (with or without a go vibe 5).

I tried pulling the inner pads and it helped, but I'm still running huge bass eq to make them remotely neutral. There's also poor detail or resolution.

For reference, my main sealed phones are DT770s, and the K81s DJs have at least 2x the upper bass!

Is this common or maybe mine are faulty? I only have about 5 hours on the 81s.

 

[camille]

Quote:

Originally Posted by DDF Is this common or maybe mine are faulty? I only have about 5 hours on the 81s.

solution would be for more burn-in for the K81s

 

[kugino]

you're not alone. they k81dj are very boomy...and your dac-ah doesn't help.

get them recabled and they become a completely different headphone - tight bass, better detail, and a lot easier to listen to.

 

[flamerz]

I agree that my K81DJ's are much more bassy than my 770's. However, I don't think that my 770's are overly bassy, it's just that the midrange is recessed. That's after burn in, of course. I really need to get my K81DJ's recabled, as the wire near the termination is messed up. Why do I have to be so stingy with money!?

 

[Duc]

Just got mine today.

Heh, definately a dose of boomage. Right now I'm not really in the mood for bass, but I know where to turn...

How long have you had your's running?

 

[flamerz]

Well I got mine from markl... I'm sure they were burned in for hundreds of hours.

 

[Meyvn]

I don't know what's going on with you guys. I've heard at least two pairs of DT770 and both of them were WAY too bassy for me; the K81DJ isn't nearly as bad in that department IMO. They are a bit too bassy for home use, but portably the outside noise corrects this. I've had NO problems hearing guitars or anything. I'd guess it's bad synergy. On my iPod I have no such issues, and I'm a detail freak. As to the recable, I'd recommend going for a used HD580 or HD600 cable here on the forums. Bet you could get one cheap as dirt. That's what I'm doing when I run out of K81 cable.

 

[Fatality_]

At first mine sounded extremely bassy, but after a few days they didn't.. maybe i just got used to it

 

[norseman8485]

It gets better after 50 hours of burning in.

 

[Fang]

I have tried it before and I find it to be very bassy as well but maybe it was because it was fairly new when I tried them.

 

[facelvega]

It's this overblown upper bass that made me stop recommending these headphones. Perhaps once you own them and get accustomed to it, their virtues shine through. Perhaps.

 

[bonethugz]

i think they bass are just right to me. maybe they're my portable cans? i never use them at home. my home cans are k601 and dt990.

ps: i amp the k81 with a pa2v2

 

[DDF]

Thanks guys, it seems experiences with these are all over the place. I don’t want to be too negative here, but I think some other views are called for after all the K81DJ raves.

To me, the 81s are sonic boom of "bloom" compared to my 770s, and the K81s seem to have a big recess above 4 kHz. Treble detail and refinement is pretty poor too. Turning down the volume so the bass isn’t too loud or distracting, and other instruments fade into the background because the detail is pretty low.

I played with them more last night, and I found a few things out. These headphones are abnormally fussy about where they're positioned. They need to sit really low, and way back on the ear. This gives a straight shot for the earpiece into the ear canal. The opening in the pads is so small.

The second issue with these is that the tight headband pressure just creates far too much bass and lower mid accentuation. Finally, the internal foam pads just kill everything above 10 kHz.

So, what helps is to wear them lower and further back, remove the pads and live with the excess mid treble but still no real top end, then perform the headband loosening tweak and sacrifice a bit of isolation for a more natural tonal balance.

Doing that, they’re better but still over hyped and unnatural. The boom is ridiculous and there’s no refinement or real top end. Still disappointing at this point. I’ll give them more break in but these have a long way to go.

If you're a basshead, these would rock, but too much of the rest of the music gets trampled in the process.

 

[jilgiljongiljing]

Have u tried EQ'ing? Cos all I needed to do was tweak the EQ to my liking. K81's are very responsive to EQing so u can really tune the sound to the way u like it.

 

[HFat]

If someone's feeling adventurous, there's a mod that tamed the bass on the later K26Ps. From memory, you had to open the back of the cups (taking care not to rip the wires off the PCB) and block the holes in the driver housing. They sounded a lot more balanced this way... but dead and really poor-sounding in general. Headroom lost some credibility over this one IMO.