Ah, welcome to my thread. You ask a question, I answer. You comment, I respond. Guess it's my turn now...
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I just want to say I have a few issues with this review. Other than the fact that the "review" seems heavily biased against the A900X from the start, it honestly sounds like the A900X "review" was done on either a fresh out of the box set or an in store demo. Why?
Nope, I owned both models for a few weeks before writing this comparison. And I don't just randomly "have" a bias. It formed after I found they underperformed compared to the K550.
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Well, let's look at the impression of the "wings". As someone who owns both an 8 year old set of A500s and a week old set of the A900X, I can tell you with absolute certainty that the A900X wings are better and more well constructed than the A500.
The A500 wings are stiff and don't confrom to your head as well as the A900X wings. The A900X wings can pivot in more directions to fit the shape of your head better. I can't even feel them on my head the way I can feel the A500 wings pushing down on my head.
I too, have owned my share of AT wing headphones. I have owned the AD700 for 3 years, and bought but sold/returned the A700, AD900 (twice on two separate occasions), and the A900X. I found all their wing designs FAR superior to the A900X's cheap and flimsy rendition. As far as "conformity", I found the older wings are indeed more stiff, but it helped significantly with preventing the weight of the headphone from dragging down on your head. No problems with the AD700 or AD900, and in fact, they utilize one of my favorite headband styles to date, while the A900X uses one of the worst. Go figure.
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The weight and clamping force comments also indicate a fresh out of box review or in store demo review. After a week, the A900X is lighter on my head and more comfortable than my A500s ever were. I don't even feel them there now. At first it felt like they were clamping on my ears a bit. Never once did they feel like they would slide off, but they did have a little bit of force. Now they fit near perfect. I can, and have, worn them for hours with no discomfort of any kind. And I wear glasses and live in the desert.
After a week, the A900X just sort of rests on your head very lightly. No clamping, no loose sliding. None of that.
Again, I had them for a few weeks, and know my way around fidgeting with and fitting AT wing headphones. I did plenty of experimentation with no success, yet had great success with the AD700 and AD900 in doing the exact same things.
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I take issue with the comments on build quality as well. These feel better than my A500s in every way. My A500s were used and abused heavily over the course of the last decade and still are as close to new as an 8 year old heavily used pair of headphones can be. Theres not a single aspect of the A900X that leads me to believe they won't be able to at least match that level of performance, use, etc.
Okay great. I'm glad they feel better than your A500. But what makes your point more valid than mine, honestly? You compare your A500 to the A900X, and like the A900X better in every way. I did the same but with the A900X and K550, and like the K550 better in every way. So? I'm struggling to see your point. I've owned many, many full sized headphones, and the A900X is definitely one of the cheapest I've ever had. But like you said, even if it is cheap, it's not going to effect the performance, unless they break.
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No problems "getting a seal" either. The headphones go on, stay on, and don't slide.
I'm glad they fit "your" head.
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All of the so-called "issues" with comfort, fit, etc. disappear with a few hours of use. All of those complains definitely indicate an in-store demo review or fresh out of box review.
Used mine for weeks. Did everything I could do improve it. Nothing.
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Theres other technical issues with this review as well. I think everyone who has read Head-Fi for more than an hour knows that different equipment drives different headphones with varying results. I mean, I have the current iPod nano. That iPod nano and my original Grado SR60s with the "quarter mod" and vinyl/cloth driver covers removed make a pretty good combination. But if I use it with my A500 or A900X its just.. no. Same thing with my original iPad. The Grados just don't sound good at all out of the headphone jack on it. But the ATs sound great.
So the lack of any technical information in this review other than a basic "I heard both and liked the K550 better!" is a big problem. What equipment was used to drive the headphones? What music? What kind of music quality in terms of compression/source? The A900X and AKG K550 are quite different in terms of resistance, sensitivity, and power handling. So the equipment used to drive the headphones is very important.
Thanks for telling me the sky is blue. I think being here for over 3 years and writing a good handful of reviews, I'd know how to formulate decent testing procedures.
But if you really want the details, I used 96kbps MP3 ran out of my toaster. I only tested white noise and frequency sweeps, with some nature sounds.
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The other most important issue is how much burn in time did the A900X have? My A900X came first thing Monday morning a week ago. I put them on within 5 minutes of UPS delivering the package. The way they sounded out of the box I almost thought something was wrong with them. I came back a few hours later and the sound had changed significantly. By the 40 hour mark the difference was night and day. Now, a week later with over 100 hours of burn in (yes, literally left on nearly 24/7 burning in), "night and day" isn't even an appropriate term to describe how different these sound compared to when they were first taken out of the box or even the first day of burn in.
NOT even going to comment on this one...
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My overall point with this post is that there are too many details left out of the "review" for people to take it as an accurate comparison of the A900X versus AKG K550. It's more of a "drive by impression" of the A900X either in a store or fresh out of of a box written by someone who is clearly a dedicated fan of the AKG K550 before hearing the A900X.
Dedicated fan of the K550 eh? I actually got them both the same day. And now, I own neither. Have a great day!
) So I'm going to be testing them stock, and cringe while doing it (since it seems it's really nasty without any mods!) but then I'll eventually send them when I get more funds and have them modded. Should be fun... 
