for those of you that weren't there, lofty had a sweet mini-meet at his beautiful digs. this mini-meet was somewhat focused on ortho/planar comparisons with the audeze lcd2(rev.1) and lcd3 present, along with the he6 prototype cans (too bad i wasn't real clear on all this before hand or i'd have brought along my production he6s to join the crew. oh well - mebbe next time). other cans in attendance included the hd800, sony mdr r10, akg k701, fostex (t20?), and sm3 iems. common source was a cambridge audio 840 which was mostly run thru a havana dac. there was also an ipod setup (not sure how it was outputted tho). amps included an rsa apache, virtue audio one.2, Ari's great silver ghost diy job (fantastic amp!) and a few others whose names i'm not recalling at the moment including a very nice little diy portable which sounded lovely with a few of the cans (i'm sure the other attendees will fill in these blanks). somehow i managed to miss out on the music reference rm10 pictured above. one of the points of this small meet was to minimize both distractions and variables to make comparisons more meaningful. with the lcds though one variable was cabling and another was whether they were run single ended or balanced. that said i'll share a few impressions after first thanking Howard (lofty) for his and his lovely wife's most gracious and generous hospitality!
the lcd3s vs the 2s are a bit more extended and better defined throughout the range. folks commonly comment on the fullness, extension, and texture of the lcd2s bass but the 3s are more defined and textured at the bottom end, and indeed through the midrange and highs as well. they are also more extended at the top. these are important, if not huge differences. i also find the 3s more comfortable with their softer pads and subjectively they feel just a bit lighter. personally i also find their zebra wood more aesthetically pleasing. the he6 protos are more comfortable (thought the hd800 is much better than the planars in this regard. of course they're much better than most phones wrt comfort!) and pleasingly brighter on top. they too have a full, punchy, defined and pleasing bass. some folks will clearly prefer the sonic signature of the hifiman ortho while others will lean towards audezes approach. it's hard to go wrong with either imo, and i think most, though not all, head-fiers will concur with this. the he6 protos were driven very nicely by the virtue audio amp. this amp should silence the needlessly extended discussion about the difficulty of driving these cans. the amp was smaller than all the can amps except for the portable, is less costly than many/most can amps, and drives them effortlessly. Ari's hd800s thru the amp he built is one of the nicest hd800 rigs you're likely to hear, and it seems to garner near universal praise at meets. i listened very briefly to the sm3s and thought them very pleasant and well worth spending some more time with.
