Neumann NDH 30

[Rob80b]

.....more fun H-Fi sounding with its emphasis on soundstage, and half the price. I imagine it will be a huge hit!

That's a good question...I'm starting to believe that headphones that attempt to produce a more speaker like presentation, therefore out of the head experience, emulating speakers, gets frowned upon by the headphone only crowd and are considered "wonky" as that is and will be their FR graphs just by the nature of their sound reproduction.

 

[Mike F]

That's a good question...I'm starting to believe that headphones that attempt to produce a more speaker like presentation, therefore out of the head experience, emulating speakers, gets frowned upon by the headphone only crowd and are considered "wonky" as that is and will be their FR graphs just by the nature of their sound reproduction.

Could be, and maybe some won't like the inevitable issues with ear cup placement, as with the NDH 30. However, I think it will probably be tuned to appeal to a wider audience and probably less brutally honest than the NDH 30. Pure speculation of course, but it will be interesting to find out.

 

[plyr]

The problem with this headphone is that the hunt is over, no need to even talk about headphones ever again.

edit: Sorry, was thinking out loud...

 

[jamesjames]

Seeing Axel Grell had a hand in the Neumann anyone else catch this?
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/axel-grell-headphone.967413/
I would think a totally different target group though than the NDH20 /30s ....

Apparently for Drop.
https://www.techpowerup.com/306163/...po-targeting-approximate-usd-300-unit-pricing

These put me in mind of the Sony MDR MA900 - right down to the skeletal headband - no longer available new but great headphones I think. They've been described as a budget K1000 or MySphere - and do have an angled and open driver housing. But, like the Grell phone, actually have ear pads as well. (I know that sounds odd - you need to see how this all goes together.) I have the Sony and the MySphere - two of the handful I rate more highly than the NDH30 - so I hope we eventually see these Grell phones for sale. The HD800(S) and T1 phones also angle their drivers of course (two others I particularly like) - but the more radical designs do seem to bring some additional magic sometimes.

Edit: I see the Sony for sale used for a few hundred dollars from time to time - quite the bargain if you like this sort of thing.

 

[Mike F]

These put me in mind of the Sony MDR MA900 - right down to the skeletal headband - no longer available new but great headphones I think. They've been described as a budget K1000 or MySphere - and do have an angled and open driver housing. But, like the Grell phone, actually have ear pads as well. (I know that sounds odd - you need to see how this all goes together.) I have the Sony and the MySphere - two of the handful I rate more highly than the NDH30 - so I hope we eventually see these Grell phones for sale. The HD800(S) and T1 phones also angle their drivers of course (two others I particularly like) - but the more radical designs do seem to bring some additional magic sometimes.

Edit: I see the Sony for sale used for a few hundred dollars from time to time - quite the bargain if you like this sort of thing.

There are actually very many headphones that have used angled drivers. Sony's 7509HD and 7520 studio headphones both have angled drivers for example. What's new (AFAIK) about the NDH 30 and the new Grell headphone is the use of both an angled but also (significantly) offset dynamic driver in an open design. Or does the MA900 also have an offset driver?

 

[jamesjames]

Yes, that's right of course re angled drivers. No offset drivers on the Sony - it was more the overall look of the thing - and the radical open design of the Sony - perhaps it was the visible driver in the Grell model that set off the train of thought. That said, I'm never quite sure how far off 'centre' the driver needs to be before its 'offset'. I noticed my T1 driver was surprisingly forward of centre when using it recently ...

 

[Mike F]

I think the driver in the HD 800 could also be said to be offset, but nothing like to the extent that the NDH 30 driver is, or the driver in this new AG model seems to be.

 

[headstef]

I think that an angled design is meaningful only when it is also off-centered to the front. In this way the sound wave-front "hits" the (already angled) external ear more uniformly or simultaneously at each part of it. This is closer to how natural sounds arrive when the originate from the wide frontal area. Consequently a better soundstaging ability can be expected from such designs.

 

[Mike F]

Comparing my NDH 30 with my HD 800 (again!).

 

[headstef]

Comparing my NDH 30 with my HD 800 (again!).

This is unfair! Two against one!

 

[jamesjames]

I find this an interesting point - and I'm not sure what to think. The MySphere is I think the best set of phones I own - it's significantly more convincing re natural sounds than anything else I've encountered. Obviously, it takes angled/adjustable drivers to an extreme - but the open design is critical also I think. The AKG K812 and Audio Technica ADX5000 are stellar in terms of imaging - yet have non-angled drivers. The HD800S, T1 and MA900 are all excellent - and have angled drivers. The ADH 30 is also quite good. I experimented with binaural recordings for years before moving to crossfeed - and think these approaches work equally effectively with all the phones I've mentioned. I now listen with analogue crossfeed always, which I find to be tremendously important in terms of sound quality and imaging. So, I can't even identify a correlation, let alone relationship, between angled drivers and any particular result ...

 

[chesebert]

These put me in mind of the Sony MDR MA900 - right down to the skeletal headband - no longer available new but great headphones I think. They've been described as a budget K1000 or MySphere - and do have an angled and open driver housing. But, like the Grell phone, actually have ear pads as well. (I know that sounds odd - you need to see how this all goes together.) I have the Sony and the MySphere - two of the handful I rate more highly than the NDH30 - so I hope we eventually see these Grell phones for sale. The HD800(S) and T1 phones also angle their drivers of course (two others I particularly like) - but the more radical designs do seem to bring some additional magic sometimes.

Edit: I see the Sony for sale used for a few hundred dollars from time to time - quite the bargain if you like this sort of thing.

MA900? It has a wonky FR with bass rolloff starting at 60hz. Not sure if that kind of FR works for all genres of music. I note lack of bass is a common problem of all earspeakers, including RAAL.

 

[jamesjames]

MA900? It has a wonky FR with bass rolloff starting at 60hz. Not sure if that kind of FR works for all genres of music. I note lack of bass is a common problem of all earspeakers, including RAAL.

Have you listened to it?

 

[kman1211]

Have you listened to it?

While there was potential with them, such as their imaging, etc. I personally found the MA900 unrefined and grainy to the point it was painful to listen to, I owned one in the past. I did not like them.

 

[chesebert]

Have you listened to it?

No. However IMO all earspeakers are fundamentally broken. I have listened to K1000 and both RAALs, they all are missing the bottom 2 octaves from 60hz down. IMO earspeakers are genre specific cans - in other words, they generally sound bad with most music.