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Orthodynamic Roundup
Jun 7, 2015 at 3:53 AM Post #24,001 of 27,179
damp the heck as in remove some of the highs and let the other driver deal with those, or however it gets done to bring it out but it's a waste of time with those prices.
 
Jun 7, 2015 at 2:30 PM Post #24,002 of 27,179
well, yammy drivers are loose and floppy, so they start out making really floppy bass. and the treble gets lost. 
 
so you start out with a response curve that has a big hump in the midbass. Damping pushes down on that hump. 
 
What wualta and i have called "critical damping" is the point where the whole driver has been damped to a point where that hump is flat. Aside from the flat-ish response, this also reduces the tendency of the diaphragm to resonate and flutter, which can bring the speed and accuracy of the driver to near-electrostatic levels. Or at least near-electret. 
 
At that point, the treble may still be droopy, which is when we add some reflective material right behind the driver, say a sticker right on the back of the driver. 
 
If you got past that point in damping, the low end drops off, and it gets faster. but without the low end, it becomes just like a monitoring headphone, like an SR-X III. Great for finding fault in the master recording, not as much fun to listen to for many genres. We call this "over damped". 
 
 
I think it's a useful experiment for anyone modding their own orthos to try progressively damping harder and harder to see what it sounds like. I suspect that a lot of beginners are using various tricks to tune for a response curve, without care for (and without fixing) what is objectively wrong with the original, under-damped design. 
 
Jun 7, 2015 at 6:12 PM Post #24,003 of 27,179
...I feel like a dumbarse doing this, but these just aren't getting the love I think they should get from me...if anyone is keen let me know...
 
http://www.head-fi.org/t/770786/new-old-stock-tds-5m-red
 
Jun 7, 2015 at 6:17 PM Post #24,004 of 27,179
fleasbaby said:
  ...I feel like a dumbarse doing this, but these just aren't getting the love I think they should get from me...if anyone is keen let me know...
 
http://www.head-fi.org/t/770786/new-old-stock-tds-5m-red
Click to expand...

Gorgeous...
if I had those, I would just look at them... so they would be totally wasted on me 
biggrin.gif

 
Jun 7, 2015 at 7:42 PM Post #24,005 of 27,179
Jun 8, 2015 at 8:45 PM Post #24,006 of 27,179
Just noticed this posted up: http://www.innerfidelity.com/images/YamahaHP1.pdf
 
I believe that one should be stock. Looks pretty good, though I felt that there was an emphasis around 500Hz and lower was getting louder as frequency lowered in sinesweeps. 
 
Measurement from kalbee of YH-1: http://www.head-fi.org/t/111193/orthodynamic-roundup/22230#post_10016864
 
Jun 9, 2015 at 7:15 PM Post #24,007 of 27,179
Was listening to my Fostex T30's and reading some of the comments on dampening the last few posts. The bass with no dampening certainly sounds a little flabby compared to my Sansui SS-100. It's not muddy or anything but you can tell the difference comparing the two. But adding all the stock stuff always raised up the bass volume to skew the signature too much for me.

Then I got looking at what was said about overdamping crushing down the low end and looking at the amount of damping in my SS-100's that have a very similar driver. So I put everything back in and overdamped the hell out of the T30's with some material I had laying around.

Closed in the soundstage a bit, but that was just the ticket. There's still a little excess spark in the treble, but this is a lot closer to the signature I was looking for. Will continue to keep fiddling with it.
 
Jun 9, 2015 at 11:02 PM Post #24,008 of 27,179
Does your T30 have the original pads? the xb700 pads were a godsend for mine. except i can't wear them for a long time, or they get sweaty. 
 
Soundstage vs. SQ is usually the hard battle in orthos. At least if you've heard electrostatic transducers and know what is possible. 
 
I don't expect anyone to read this whole thread, or even the first few hundred pages. But we have a standard test for What Is Wrong with many orthos from stock - particularly yamahas. 
 
A big, sharp transient - such as a speck of grit on a record player. Preferably during silence. 
 
On any reasonably good headphone, you hear this as "Tick!" 
 
On an underdamped yamaha, it's more of a "Thokk!" -- the floppy diaphragm keeps moving after the signal has come and gone. 
 
Fostex, PMB, and many other designs aren't quite as loose as the yamahas so it's less apparent. My akais are taut like a drum, which has a whole different set of issues. 
 
Jun 11, 2015 at 9:01 AM Post #24,012 of 27,179
...so I just remembered promising pictures of the insides of my TDS 16 (non-Smela) a little while back. I actually did remember to document the process when I opened them up, so without further ado:
 

 

 

 

 
Nothing crazy in there. Just some miraculously not-gunky foam, thin black fabric that looks like it was cut from a dress-shirt in a Goodwill store and some slightly rusty-looking drivers.
 
I have been trying the Sony NCR earpads on them, but they kill something magic in the sound. It might just be that pain is good for pleasure in the world of headphones as well. My ears quiver at the thought, but the stock pads do sound livelier and clearer.
 
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