MaloS
Headphoneus Supremus
- Joined
- Dec 8, 2004
- Posts
- 4,670
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- 13
Quote:
Mkay, I listen to great deal of electronica, metal, rock, jazz, classical, and few other things. I get warmth out of Westone 3, and SE530 is one of the warmest things around. Both provide greater deal of clarity than any dynamic in-ear on the market. Also Westone ES2 is known for its warmth and visceral bass while maintaining excellent clarity, and ES3X even more so.
"My point with the car stereos is that some do test out their mixes in car stereos (obviously not a junk car stereo system) as well as on headphone/earphones and speakers. In other words, they want to get a sense of what the music sounds like on those systems."
Well, ya, sure, noone disagrees with you there. But only small portion of music is mixed specifically to sound good on a compromised audio system (i.e. popular music, stuff that hits the radio). Plenty of records from all genres come around with absolutely astonishing sound on a properly tuned set of studio monitors - but sounds no better than typical radio tune when played back in a car (in terms of SQ).
"I ended up listening to a lot of classical during my college years and the Ety's came in quite useful as I was taking classical music. So in that sense, I can see where BAs may be a bit better but even then, if I was to go back and want to enjoy the music more than analyzing it, I would still go for the good dynamics."
Is Ety the only BA you experienced? Even if we added SE530 to that list, you have not heard what the rest of the market sounds like. Its like listening to HD650 and Edition 9, and then coming to the conclusion that all dynamics have big powerful bass. That would be ignoring existance of of Beyer DT150 or Alessandro MS1 (or even K1000 if you want to go there). Also I have no idea how you listen to orchestral classical with stock Ety's (ignoring apuresound ety - I am aware that the difference is substantial) - left hand of the pianist, all the low register horns, tympany - all those don't sound right.
BA can sound powerful, clear, and pleasantly warm at the same time - without having questionable bass resolution. Alot of dynamics fail to do all that (few do succeed - same deal as with BAs).
In the end - I think you are trying to blame alot of things on the underlying technology - but the problem you are complaining about has more to do with the tuning of the frequency response of the headphone. On the other hand - your opponents in this argument are arguing that dynamics fail to provide certain characteristics that do happen to be the inherent flaw of dynamic drivers (clarity/resolution that results from drivers that have lightning-fast transient response...very very few dynamic headphone drivers do that).
Your argument is similar to someone saying "BA's cannot go higher than 16 khz". BA's are a newer thing on the audiophile market, and many people have not yet heard more recent models of earphones that cross that barrier. They also have not heard BA earphones that solve the issue of having visceral deep bass, and many think of the way etymotic sounds when talking about BA's - which is also not representative of the driver, just representative of psychology of one company.
Originally Posted by dookiex /img/forum/go_quote.gif I don't listen to much classical but what I do listen to is rock, jazz, big band jazz, doo-wop (think that's how you spell it), punk, electronica, dub, acid jazz, blues, reggae, and a bit of hip-hop. Come to think of it, most music needs warmth and BAs do not provide warmth without sacrificing clarity and when you have clarity it comes at the price of killing a good bit of the warmth. Never tried planar so I can't make a call on that. My point with the car stereos is that some do test out their mixes in car stereos (obviously not a junk car stereo system) as well as on headphone/earphones and speakers. In other words, they want to get a sense of what the music sounds like on those systems. I can understand the BA argument if all you listen to is classical and listening in the sense of analyzing not just the music but individual instrument characteristics on a very granular level. I ended up listening to a lot of classical during my college years and the Ety's came in quite useful as I was taking classical music. So in that sense, I can see where BAs may be a bit better but even then, if I was to go back and want to enjoy the music more than analyzing it, I would still go for the good dynamics. |
Mkay, I listen to great deal of electronica, metal, rock, jazz, classical, and few other things. I get warmth out of Westone 3, and SE530 is one of the warmest things around. Both provide greater deal of clarity than any dynamic in-ear on the market. Also Westone ES2 is known for its warmth and visceral bass while maintaining excellent clarity, and ES3X even more so.
"My point with the car stereos is that some do test out their mixes in car stereos (obviously not a junk car stereo system) as well as on headphone/earphones and speakers. In other words, they want to get a sense of what the music sounds like on those systems."
Well, ya, sure, noone disagrees with you there. But only small portion of music is mixed specifically to sound good on a compromised audio system (i.e. popular music, stuff that hits the radio). Plenty of records from all genres come around with absolutely astonishing sound on a properly tuned set of studio monitors - but sounds no better than typical radio tune when played back in a car (in terms of SQ).
"I ended up listening to a lot of classical during my college years and the Ety's came in quite useful as I was taking classical music. So in that sense, I can see where BAs may be a bit better but even then, if I was to go back and want to enjoy the music more than analyzing it, I would still go for the good dynamics."
Is Ety the only BA you experienced? Even if we added SE530 to that list, you have not heard what the rest of the market sounds like. Its like listening to HD650 and Edition 9, and then coming to the conclusion that all dynamics have big powerful bass. That would be ignoring existance of of Beyer DT150 or Alessandro MS1 (or even K1000 if you want to go there). Also I have no idea how you listen to orchestral classical with stock Ety's (ignoring apuresound ety - I am aware that the difference is substantial) - left hand of the pianist, all the low register horns, tympany - all those don't sound right.
BA can sound powerful, clear, and pleasantly warm at the same time - without having questionable bass resolution. Alot of dynamics fail to do all that (few do succeed - same deal as with BAs).
In the end - I think you are trying to blame alot of things on the underlying technology - but the problem you are complaining about has more to do with the tuning of the frequency response of the headphone. On the other hand - your opponents in this argument are arguing that dynamics fail to provide certain characteristics that do happen to be the inherent flaw of dynamic drivers (clarity/resolution that results from drivers that have lightning-fast transient response...very very few dynamic headphone drivers do that).
Your argument is similar to someone saying "BA's cannot go higher than 16 khz". BA's are a newer thing on the audiophile market, and many people have not yet heard more recent models of earphones that cross that barrier. They also have not heard BA earphones that solve the issue of having visceral deep bass, and many think of the way etymotic sounds when talking about BA's - which is also not representative of the driver, just representative of psychology of one company.