[tayano]

Hi, don't know if this is the right section. I've always felt that I hear music louder in my left ear than in my right. I went to the doctor to clean my ear as I've thought that the 5% difference is due to the wax. But to my surprise my right ear was clean but he had to clean my left ear.

I explained to him that I feel that I have unbalanced hearing and he did a hearing test that showed that my hearing is equal good in booth ears. Don't know how good or precise the test was but both my ears did hear 20dba at the "important frequencies", the vocals. 30dba and up would mean hearing loss, but my hearing was good according to the doctor.

I'm pretty certain that I hear louder in the left ear and when listening to music I hear the vocal coming from the left. I can adjust the balance ~5% to the right and the soundstage becomes centered. I've also tried a mono-test and its clear for me that I hear louder in the left ear. By setting the balance to 5% I hear equally in both ears.
I've tried to switch place on the headphone to see if its faulty, but its not.

My questions:
1. Does using the "balance"-setting effect the headphones in the long term, since on driver is always playing louder.
2. Is it possible that it's psychological? Since the test shows no difference.
3. How do you do if its unbalanced? Ignore it?

Using the balance-settings limits me to my iPod 5 w/ rockbox and crossfeed.

 

[RagunaAsh]

I'm no expert, but:
 
1. Probably, but probably not to an extent that matters. While drivers do wear down, a 5% difference isn't very much, drivers are made to withstand hours upon hours of use, so I'd really expect other parts of the headphone to wear down before the drivers do! And if it does get to that point (in who knows how many years) you could buy new drivers, or just a new headphone all together.
 
2. I haven't had my hearing checked, but I'm pretty sure it's pretty good, and even I will get a very slight imbalance, and, for me, that's probably psychological. It might be the same for you, but regardless of the cause, it's still affecting your ability to enjoy the music!
 
3. Luckily, my DAP (Fiio X3) has balance control, so when the soundstage feels off, I just adjust the balance a notch. Most high quality DAPs and a lot of amps have balance control, so I've not had an issue with that. I definitely couldn't ignore it; it would drive me up a wall to the point that I wouldn't even want to listen to music!
 
Just my $0.02, hope it helps!

 

[epicFAIL]

it's hard to imagine how can one adjust something about ~5% on a touchscreen with hands...let alone somebody noticing a 5% difference in sq
5%?
no
more like 20%, or atleast 10%.

still, if you can maybe it's some sort of mind set ; the minor difference may be only there when YOU are looking for it.
It happens with me too.