Nezer
Antibacterial soap... kills bacteria... bad karma?
- Joined
- Dec 6, 2001
- Posts
- 1,273
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- 13
Well, being without HD600s can lead a man to do some crazy things.
I've often wondered if the bass roll-off in the K501s was a result of driver design of possbily a weak cable. The stock cable is rather flimsy and too long (IMHO).
So I decided to replace the cable with something a little more meaty and see if the bass response picked-up.
At luch today I went down to Ratshack and picked-up one of thier gold-series cables. Sorry I don't have the particular model as I left the packaging at work. This particular model had a straight 1/8" plug on one end and terminated in two male RCA connections. The RCA connections were red and white plastic encased though the actual plugs were gold in color.
When I got hom I chopped the plugs off as I am mot needing these and preceded to strip and tin the wires. I desoldered the old cable and put it aside and proceeded to solder the new cable into place. I ran one channel to each driver thus cutting that stupid over-the-headband-cheesy-wire-run out of the picture for the right channel.
After performing this mod I ran (not walked) upstairs with my first test to see what happened to the bass.
I can now safely, and absolutly mean it when I say the weak bass is NOT a function of the drivers but rather a poor cable.
By low-bass extension test is from Sting's A Brand New Day on the first track "A Thousand Years". The song opens with a fairly low-frequency bass rumble. With the new cable I'd swear it was even better represented than the HD600s with the Clou Red (but that could just be because I havent been able to listen to them in a few weeks). Regardless of performance against the HD600s the new cable *removed* and low-bass extension problems that existed before.
I'm still evaluating the cable as a whole and I have preminarly noticed that the top-end seems a little smoother and perhaps less grainy. It is also a bit more detailed than the stock. Okay, maybe significantly more detailed. The first thing that is jumping out at me is that drums have more 'air' and 'decay'. Impressive.
I don't think I'm going to be happy with this cable in the end because if $7 did this to the sound, what would a canabalized Cardas do?? I really wish I could get the Sennheiser jacks and mount them in this headphone as I now feel *any* weakness in these headphones was a result of the cable and NOT of the drivers.
One downside is that they lack the 'impact' of the HD600s but this may not be a bad thing fo all people. As a matter of fact I think they lack a bit of impact from before the mod. Who knows, maybe some burn-in well help.
I've often wondered if the bass roll-off in the K501s was a result of driver design of possbily a weak cable. The stock cable is rather flimsy and too long (IMHO).
So I decided to replace the cable with something a little more meaty and see if the bass response picked-up.
At luch today I went down to Ratshack and picked-up one of thier gold-series cables. Sorry I don't have the particular model as I left the packaging at work. This particular model had a straight 1/8" plug on one end and terminated in two male RCA connections. The RCA connections were red and white plastic encased though the actual plugs were gold in color.
When I got hom I chopped the plugs off as I am mot needing these and preceded to strip and tin the wires. I desoldered the old cable and put it aside and proceeded to solder the new cable into place. I ran one channel to each driver thus cutting that stupid over-the-headband-cheesy-wire-run out of the picture for the right channel.
After performing this mod I ran (not walked) upstairs with my first test to see what happened to the bass.
I can now safely, and absolutly mean it when I say the weak bass is NOT a function of the drivers but rather a poor cable.
By low-bass extension test is from Sting's A Brand New Day on the first track "A Thousand Years". The song opens with a fairly low-frequency bass rumble. With the new cable I'd swear it was even better represented than the HD600s with the Clou Red (but that could just be because I havent been able to listen to them in a few weeks). Regardless of performance against the HD600s the new cable *removed* and low-bass extension problems that existed before.
I'm still evaluating the cable as a whole and I have preminarly noticed that the top-end seems a little smoother and perhaps less grainy. It is also a bit more detailed than the stock. Okay, maybe significantly more detailed. The first thing that is jumping out at me is that drums have more 'air' and 'decay'. Impressive.
I don't think I'm going to be happy with this cable in the end because if $7 did this to the sound, what would a canabalized Cardas do?? I really wish I could get the Sennheiser jacks and mount them in this headphone as I now feel *any* weakness in these headphones was a result of the cable and NOT of the drivers.
One downside is that they lack the 'impact' of the HD600s but this may not be a bad thing fo all people. As a matter of fact I think they lack a bit of impact from before the mod. Who knows, maybe some burn-in well help.
