[Bakath]

They are both so good and you can just use which best fits your mood, all bases are covered.

 

[raymogi]

They are both so good and you can just use which best fits your mood, all bases are covered.

Amen to that. I started with the leather but has been using the alcantara almost exclusively now because it's more comfortable to me.

 

[tradyblix]

I'm having a hard time choosing between the leather and the Alcantara pads. Both of them feel and sound awesome.

It does seem clear that the Alcantara make the sound a little farther off and a little less detailed. They are both good but big difference in presentation. I tend to prefer the leather coming from the Utopia. I have always loved that microsuede material since I first encountered it on the HD700 tho.

Alcantara has some great sound too tho, just more of an adjustment when coming from or being used to a forward bright headphone.

 

[PeteSTRADAMUS]

It does seem clear that the Alcantara make the sound a little farther off and a little less detailed. They are both good but big difference in presentation. I tend to prefer the leather coming from the Utopia. I have always loved that microsuede material since I first encountered it on the HD700 tho.

Alcantara has some great sound too tho, just more of an adjustment when coming from or being used to a forward bright headphone.

I do agree on the detail part. You hear a little less of micro stuff on Alcantara.

 

[Transcendent Melody]

Hi everyone that owns a meze empyrean i just wanted to check if anyone else notices some popping or crumpling sound when using the leather pads when you do tilt or move your head from side to side? Its almost like this pressure build up from moving the head is causing the driver to flex or move in a certain way. Also using of the alcantara pads fixes this problem immediately. Any help would be greatly appreciated thanks in advance all

 

[CreditingKarma]

Hi everyone that owns a meze empyrean i just wanted to check if anyone else notices some popping or crumpling sound when using the leather pads when you do tilt or move your head from side to side? Its almost like this pressure build up from moving the head is causing the driver to flex or move in a certain way. Any help would be greatly appreciated thanks in advance all

I don't have the empyrean but this happens with audeze cans as well. I haven't noticed it yet with the abyss.

 

[Transcendent Melody]

I don't have the empyrean but this happens with audeze cans as well. I haven't noticed it yet with the abyss.

I see so would this be normal for such headphones and would this damage the drivers? Thanks in advance. Also using the alcantara pads fixes this problem instantly haha.

 

[kumar402]

Hi everyone that owns a meze empyrean i just wanted to check if anyone else notices some popping or crumpling sound when using the leather pads when you do tilt or move your head from side to side? Its almost like this pressure build up from moving the head is causing the driver to flex or move in a certain way. Also using of the alcantara pads fixes this problem immediately. Any help would be greatly appreciated thanks in advance all

Ya it happens with mine only when I press mine against the head real hard. Not while tilting or moving head but I guess if seal is tight it may happen. Nothing with Alcantara

 

[Transcendent Melody]

Ya it happens with mine only when I press mine against the head real hard. Not while tilting or moving head but I guess if seal is tight it may happen. Nothing with Alcantara

Yeah i guess i do have a good? Fit with the leather pads. Alroght glad to know that my unit isnt broken haha thanks for the help

 

[kumar402]

Yeah i guess i do have a good? Fit with the leather pads. Alroght glad to know that my unit isnt broken haha thanks for the help

I don’t think it’s an issue. Anyways you have 2 yrs of warranty

Never had a problem with Tidal....

They stream FLAC. FLAC is a widely acceptable lossless format. Its not like they’re running it through their own filters or something.

MQA is something of a different beast, I will admit. But you arent using anything in your chain that can deal with it so you prolly cant hear that.

Whatever makes you happy at the end of the day tho....

i will chime in my experience with Tidal and Qobuz. I have liquid Platinum and it has very high gain. With HD800s I was always around 8:30 -9 on volume dial. I moved to Qobuz and same album I was able to play at around 10 and it sounded smoother to my ears.
May be they are using different masters

 

[Transcendent Melody]

I don’t think it’s an issue. Anyways you have 2 yrs of warranty

i will chime in my experience with Tidal and Qobuz. I have liquid Platinum and it has very high gain. With HD800s I was always around 8:30 -9 on volume dial. I moved to Qobuz and same album I was able to play at around 10 and it sounded smoother to my ears.
May be they are using different masters

Yep glad they extended the warranty as the slip they provided inside the box was stating its 1 year of non transferable warranty and i was like if i want to change headphones what am i supposed to do haha.

 

[tradyblix]

I can't comment on Qobuz as it's not available in my country and is pricier than Tidal even if I used a VPN or something. Plus it doesnt' have the same music library. Not sure about different masters or if that makes sense since there should only be one master from the record company, not multiple ones with one set better that only a French company has access to ? Hmm dunno about that one.

If there are differences it's probably due more to the high bitrates perhaps ? That's a topic for another thread tho, I see the discussions online and I don't really see alot of convincing evidence there.

In any event, there are very few streaming services available, and I've gotten great results out of even Spotify and Apple Music. I would like the Gapless playback on Tidal that Spotify can do with xfade. I just think Tidal is better (slightly) than lossy streaming and haven't had the issues described above with weirdness. If Qobuz is your jam, by all means use it ! It's commendable they have hi-res files without MQA. Would be nice to see a proper technical article and investigation on the services and stream rates and what not, instead of anecdotal reports.

As far as pads affecting drivers, I haven't really noticed that yet. It reminds me of the "Grado Grattle" situation where a stray hair could vibrate and people thought it was driver problems

However, I've been babying the Empyreans since they're new so not been squashing on the pads and hearing pops yet I think i might have heard something from the leather maybe but it doesnt persist during music listening....

 

[tradyblix]

Oh, hmmm. Maybe I can use Qobuz. I think it just doesn't work properly with my VPN, like Tidal does. Okay I added a trial to Audirvana and I'll see if I can find a difference tonight on the same albums. Wish me luck !

I'll use the Empyrean

*edit* I had some issues related to my vpn getting it working through audirvana, but I got it cleaned up. It might be that I'm already upsampling everything to DSD, but each service sounded pretty comparable to me.

The most interesting thing is the different libraries that are available.

 

[kumar402]

Oh, hmmm. Maybe I can use Qobuz. I think it just doesn't work properly with my VPN, like Tidal does. Okay I added a trial to Audirvana and I'll see if I can find a difference tonight on the same albums. Wish me luck !

I'll use the Empyrean

*edit* well, that didn't last too long, I immediately ran into issues with it. I guess I'm sticking to Tidal for now

the difference is not huge to fret over, stick with tidal. Since I had the option so I switched to Qobuz but in case if I have access to tidal only I wouldn't sweat over it as both are good.
Also I listen to lot of Bollywood tracks and neither have good collection of bollywood so end of the day I end up using Apple Music

 

[kumar402]

When i got these headphones, I also ordered Woo Audio Headphone stand for it but somehow I never felt comfortable putting these on headphone stand and ended up creating a bed for it in a glass display case I got from Ikea, Please don't laugh at me . That Woo Stand is now exclusive for my HD600 and 800s. Right now my Wife is away and I am not sure what her reaction will be when she comes back.