[Philimon]

What would equal the sound you get from the hp-100 today 2022 .

I found a lot of similarities between Yamaha and Grado (both modded and unmodded) both in terms of tone and attack/decay. Yamaha is for the most part better than Grado with more resolve / less grain. Grado advantage would be a little more dynamic bass, unique Grado guitar coloration, and an open / airy sound.

In the above scenario I am referring to Yamaha YH2 and up, vs Grado RS2. Grado below Reference series is too lofi grainy. Ive not heard Yamaha YH3. Ive heard YH100, YH1, YH2, YHD1, YHD2, and YHD3.

Grado’s new RS2x looks like a nice improvement over RS2e and its what I plan on purchasing next.

btw I thought YH100 was worse than YH1 and YH2. YH100 had the worst tone and worst resonance. But your ears and preferences are different than mine. And mods go a long way.

 

[stevenmichael]

I found a lot of similarities between Yamaha and Grado (both modded and unmodded) both in terms of tone and attack/decay. Yamaha is for the most part better than Grado with more resolve / less grain. Grado advantage would be a little more dynamic bass, unique Grado guitar coloration, and an open / airy sound.

In the above scenario I am referring to Yamaha YH2 and up, vs Grado RS2. Grado below Reference series is too lofi grainy. Ive not heard Yamaha YH3. Ive heard YH100, YH1, YH2, YHD1, YHD2, and YHD3.

Grado’s new RS2x looks like a nice improvement over RS2e and its what I plan on purchasing next.

btw I thought YH100 was worse than YH1 and YH2. YH100 had the worst tone and worst resonance. But your ears and preferences are different than mine. And mods go a long way.

Thanks I just looked at the price of the Grado’s RS2x and they are right around 550.00 dollars . Do the think the sound from the yh100 is right there with a 550.00 priced headphone ?

 

[Philimon]

Thanks I just looked at the price of the Grado’s RS2x and they are right around 550.00 dollars . Do the think the sound from the yh100 is right there with a 550.00 priced headphone ?

No and neither is worth $550. This is audiophile (crazy hobby) territory with high levels of diminishing returns. Im interested in RS2x for reasons beyond just sound. I like the form factor. I have a long history with Grado so nostalgia factor. And its unique sound qualities are worth the price of entry for me, I have other headphones to fill the big gaps.

I'd recommend Emu purpleheart / walnut (see mods on SBAF), Porta Pro, and Yamaha YH1/2 (modded, but this is not a general recommendation since there is extra risk in buying vintage headphones). I might add Grado SR60 with f-pads to this recommendation list but I've not tried that combination specifically, just a hunch based on experience with other Grado using those pads. There are other good headphones I'm sure that are worth your time in the value hifi category but I'm only recommending one's I've personally heard. Personally, I'd try skipping SR60 with f-pads, and go straight to SR225x (comes stock with f-pads) with slightly better driver (diminishing returns, depends on how much youre willing to pay for slightly improved bass distortion). I'd say the gap between RS2 and SR225 is much larger than the gap between SR225 and SR60, which is why I am going RS2(x).

 

[Philimon]

To put this another way, I thought the YH100 was not so good. Id recommend trying lots of other headphones to see if there is a different flavor you’d prefer (which I think would be easy to find). For planar there is Verum, HFM Sundara 2020, HE6se, and Audeze LCD2C, etc. For electrodynamic check out Focal Elex. Or some classics for a base / reference point: THX00 and HD600.

edit: How could I forget to mention T50RP in this thread. Modded T50RP might be for you. See the open alpha thread.
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/open-alpha-t50-3d-printed-headphone-project-from-mrspeakers.825868/

 

[khbaur330162]

Ughhhh. You're not the only one @Philimon , other people have laughed at me for using YH-100's as endgame headphones. Idk, I can't deny what I'm hearing. I bought new RCA cables to go between my DAC and amp and YH-100's got like Arya detailed level, imho, they cut really deep into the track now.

I would not overlook YH-100 for T50RP. Both are sibilant so if you're gonna deal with ringing anyway on the 10-15% of music that's trash mastered with hot "ssss" region, you might as well get the better headphone, imho. YH-100's transplanted sound more organic by a fair margin than T50RP to my ears. I am hoping these new Chinese pads I bought can have good soundstage like Brainwavz Oval sheepskin, but muted sibilance like Dekoni Elite. If I can just tame the 2kHz ringing a bit more yet retain good qualities they will be amazing, imho. I can't argue that Verum's, Sundara's, HE6se and LCD2C's aren't all better than YH-100, though, never heard any of those, but transplanted YH-100's make me wanna sell Hifiman Arya V2's. Arya's have very nice natural soundstage due to humongous driver size, bass is also nice. But then I switch to YH-100's and I'm like, "Do I prefer this tuning?!" ... "Do YH-100's sound more effortless? Less restrained than Arya???" YH-100's are honestly so good, imho, given proper attention, they just eek a tiny bit more detail out of the recording compared to YH-1 and HP-1A. I swear if I find the right pads for these drivers these headphones will start emitting light or something, they are on the cusp of greatness!!!

 

[stevenmichael]

I have a old 1970 sony TA-1144 amp I'm using to power a few headphones I have . I don't have any good ones yet, but I have come across a yh-100 for under 100.00 . I wanted to start collecting some older good sounding headphones for the 70's ,80's and 90's and maybe one new like the Sennheiser HD6xx . After I read this thread it sounds like the yh-100 might be one to get for my collection . As long as they sound pretty good out of the TA-1144 amp I'll be happy . I'm just playing cd's right now from a cheap cd player I plugged into the back of the TA-1144 .

 

[khbaur330162]

@stevenmichael Does your Sony receiver have tone controls for bass boost? This helps, imho, they are a little bass light, so long as tone controls are done well you should get ultra clean bass this way (and it only gets better with high quality RCA cables between source and amp).

$100 for YH-100's is a great place to start on a DIY project, that's actually nuts, I'm jealous. If you a buy a new-old-stock Sony DR-ZX701ip off eBay for $38 shipped & taxes within conus YH-100 drivers are drop in replacement, both are 55mm, stock Sony drivers literally twist out of the baffles, it's stupid easy to transplant, just requires soldering and you have to cement drivers in place... I used Loctite epoxy putty to cement the drivers in place and seal all baffle vents. You need to make sure front wave is completely sealed from the back wave for bass to extend flat down to 10Hz. But the angled driver baffles of these Sony headphones give YH-100's really organic soundstage/imaging, imho. Sounds nutso FOR A WHILE with the right pads (more on that later). I'm kinda used to it now but for the longest time I'd plop them on my head and play 2 seconds of music and my brain just couldn't let go of how organic the imaging sounded. It's even better with angled pads haha, literally crazy, imho, but the angled pads have some midrange coloration which has to be forgiven.

I will keep you posted on Chinese lambskin earpads. They were <$25 I believe, so very reasonable. They are due for delivery sometime soon? Coming from China so who knows... I just had a feeling about these pads that they'd be perfect. We will see. I'm super hopeful they solve all problems with YH-100's in this Sony frame, haha. Basically, if the music is mastered well YH-100's in DR-ZX701ip frame will sound really good, but if they add treble and upper mids coloration to the master in order to make the song more exciting, it's extremely noticeable and sounds way colored and terrible and even has a good chance of being sibilant. Sad to say a lot of mainstream music is mastered like this... I had an absolute honeymoon phase with YH-100's where I thought they did nothing wrong, but now I know they do have 2kHz ringing, or whatever frequency it is exactly, and they just don't play well with some material. I don't mind that much, tbh, still, they sound great with all my best stuff, so whatever.

If you want I can post a YouTube video on how to build these headphones, just give you a better idea of what exactly you'll be doing and what materials and tools are required. I could even send you some of the required modding materials, I'd just charge you a small percentage of whatever it all cost me, but it'd be exactly what you need, all cut to size, etc.

 

[stevenmichael]

Yes make a video. I bet a lot of people would like to see that . The amp has bass l/r adjustment and treble l/r adj .

 

[Philimon]

Something I shouldve done was measure the Yamaha drivers without cups on a flat coupler. So, just driver + baffle + pads. Next time.

 

[khbaur330162]

Here is link to 55mm pinched ortho build video (sorry, it's a bit rough, but check the links in description):
-edit-
I just wanted to say that these Sony DR-ZX701ip's, the Akasa Paxmate, and the Arctic Cotton Bamboo Batting are all, AFAIK, no longer produced, so making a pair of these headphones will become increasingly more difficult as supplies run dry. Alternatives would have to be found such as different sound absorbing foam or driver housings altogether.



Here is Ortho Roundup Review done by me for more detail on other headphones:






@Philimon I think 2kHz ringing is driver related, not housing. My housings are filled with acousti-fill to increase chamber volume and also I lined the housings with sound absorbing foam. Also the driver housings are full sized driver housings, not the small dinky stock housings. I still have 2kHz ringing galore depending on pads. I returned Dekoni Elite pads because they were $60+ and they didn't soundstage. I just need to find the perfect pads, haha. 2kHz ringing can be solved, IMHO, with the perfect pads, but what those even are Idk. I tend to like the sound of genuine leather. Maybe some kind of Micro-suede leather hybrid.

 

[khbaur330162]

@stevenmichael Download and play this song through YH-100's, boost bass on your amplifier to max and make sure neither of the drivers buzz. At 1:11 it goes into this mad bass pummeling section, it should destroy whichever driver is the culprit, you will hear a clicking in the driver, a buzz more or less. If you have any other complex bass tracks definitely run them through the YH-100's before purchase. These oldies can be real goodies, but there's also issues with some.

 

[stevenmichael]

Here is link to 55mm pinched ortho build video (sorry, it's a bit rough, but check the links in description):
-edit-
I just wanted to say that these Sony DR-ZX701ip's, the Akasa Paxmate, and the Arctic Cotton Bamboo Batting are all, AFAIK, no longer produced, so making a pair of these headphones will become increasingly more difficult as supplies run dry. Alternatives would have to be found such as different sound absorbing foam or driver housings altogether.



Here is Ortho Roundup Review done by me for more detail on other headphones:






@Philimon I think 2kHz ringing is driver related, not housing. My housings are filled with acousti-fill to increase chamber volume and also I lined the housings with sound absorbing foam. Also the driver housings are full sized driver housings, not the small dinky stock housings. I still have 2kHz ringing galore depending on pads. I returned Dekoni Elite pads because they were $60+ and they didn't soundstage. I just need to find the perfect pads, haha. 2kHz ringing can be solved, IMHO, with the perfect pads, but what those even are Idk. I tend to like the sound of genuine leather. Maybe some kind of Micro-suede leather hybrid.

I just watched and saved your video earlier today trying to find some info on the yh-100's . Its a small world . Thanks for offering to help me if I get them .

 

[stevenmichael]

@stevenmichael Download and play this song through YH-100's, boost bass on your amplifier to max and make sure neither of the drivers buzz. At 1:11 it goes into this mad bass pummeling section, it should destroy whichever driver is the culprit, you will hear a clicking in the driver, a buzz more or less. If you have any other complex bass tracks definitely run them through the YH-100's before purchase. These oldies can be real goodies, but there's also issues with some.

I would never listen to music with that much bass . I like older music and classical music especially classical guitar like this . If I stay from low bass will I be okay the way they are with out changing anything ?

 

[khbaur330162]

I have heard my RP-18's buzz with bassy orchestral music. Honestly it depends on the track and headphones. Just ask to listen to them for some time before purchase and try to assess. Sometimes the buzz crops ups hours and hours into listening.

 

[Philimon]

Something I shouldve done was measure the Yamaha drivers without cups on a flat coupler. So, just driver + baffle + pads. Next time.

So I ordered a YH-1 to try this. And to try with EQ with whom I am now good friends.