kixxit
New Head-Fier
- Joined
- May 16, 2012
- Posts
- 45
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- 11
says you... do you walk down the street with a megaphone trying to convince the thousands of people wearing them that they're "doing it wrong"? educate us sonic heathens!
What I generally don't understand about many responses to such reasonable questions is that "why" the responder believes this or that is never given. "It sucks because it sucks because I say so"??? Having said that, I find actually answering the "why" is easier said than done. Big words and esoteric sonic terms are thrown around like confetti. So, Mr. Noob, I will say that I agree with DJHoro on this. For the most part, it's really difficult to understand why the Beats would "suck" until you've heard them back to back with a pair of headphones that don't "suck". Neutrality is a difficult thing to come by. I've recently purchased two pair of $500+ headphones (and some highly praised amps) that are lacking in one way or another. Neither of them will do dubstep the same justice that the Beats Pro will because they both seem to try to do well across the spectrum instead of excelling in one area (bass). However, if you're listening to classical stuff (I generally don't) "neutral" headphones work well because they don't have to achieve sonic greatness at either end of the spectrum. Generally speaking, the midrange is where it's at.
Why: I like the Beats Pro better than the Bose QC15's because the Beats have better and cleaner bass impact while the QC's tend to smear the bass across the midrange, creating a bit of a muddled sound. The Beats midrange is fairly recessed, but if you're listening to a lot of electronic music, this might not matter to you. Also, the QC's have a slightly annoying "hum" that seems to be caused by their noise cancellation. See how easy that is to understand? Just kidding. I think finding the perfect analogy to explain something is what these blogs tend to be about at best - especially when no one is bashing anyone or anything.
What I generally don't understand about many responses to such reasonable questions is that "why" the responder believes this or that is never given. "It sucks because it sucks because I say so"??? Having said that, I find actually answering the "why" is easier said than done. Big words and esoteric sonic terms are thrown around like confetti. So, Mr. Noob, I will say that I agree with DJHoro on this. For the most part, it's really difficult to understand why the Beats would "suck" until you've heard them back to back with a pair of headphones that don't "suck". Neutrality is a difficult thing to come by. I've recently purchased two pair of $500+ headphones (and some highly praised amps) that are lacking in one way or another. Neither of them will do dubstep the same justice that the Beats Pro will because they both seem to try to do well across the spectrum instead of excelling in one area (bass). However, if you're listening to classical stuff (I generally don't) "neutral" headphones work well because they don't have to achieve sonic greatness at either end of the spectrum. Generally speaking, the midrange is where it's at.
Why: I like the Beats Pro better than the Bose QC15's because the Beats have better and cleaner bass impact while the QC's tend to smear the bass across the midrange, creating a bit of a muddled sound. The Beats midrange is fairly recessed, but if you're listening to a lot of electronic music, this might not matter to you. Also, the QC's have a slightly annoying "hum" that seems to be caused by their noise cancellation. See how easy that is to understand? Just kidding. I think finding the perfect analogy to explain something is what these blogs tend to be about at best - especially when no one is bashing anyone or anything.
The Beats are a good headphone with a somewhat strange sound that I suppose is trying to cater to a specific music consumer market. My only issue with them is the price. They are aimed at bass heads but for about one third of the price you can get a headphone that beats the Beats (pun intended) into the ground and those are the Audio Technica ATH M50s.
The Beats are indicative of the most important law of today's consumer society and I'll deliberately misquote here.
It's not a matter of whether you win or lose - it's how you LOOK while playing the game.
If people don't understand this then Beats are definitely for them.
speaking of the ATH M50's, do you know how they fare against the AKG 550's? assuming the beats are a distant 3rd place.
What annoys me is that they market the Beats as the kind of 'reference' quality used by professionals. So when the drones buy them they think "oh this is what reference sounds like". And then they will just automatically assume reference headphones should be bassier than a 1000W RMS car sub going full blast.
That probably makes me more upset than anything else... I have come across more than a few people that think Dre actually uses Beats Studios in his studio. Comments like that indicate such an extreme level of ignorance that I don't even feel like taking the time to address them.
There's ignorance, then there's WILLFUL ignorance. Who's going to buy Beats if they know about better sound? The kids who think (insert high end audio mfgr here) are not cool or are ugly as sin. You were a teenager once - don't even try to deny! You can blame Dre for better marketing, or you can blame Denon, Beyerdynamics, etc for poorer marketing. Great sound = great advertising. Just ask the masses!
AKG K550's are technically very superior to the M50, but their sound signatures are very different. I don't know to much other than that about the K550 so you will need to search around.
Willful or otherwise, ignorance results in damage to the fabric of a society.