[manveru]

Explanation: I realize that this will be of very little interest to most Head-fiers. Most probably have no reason to ever consider the M over the regular DT770 models, and in fact a good number probably haven't even heard of them. But that is not my reason for writing this review. Quite simply, there is not very much information about these headphones out there on this, our world wide web, a situation which I hope to alleviate in whatever small way I can. I bought these more or less blindly, and so I would like to share my experiences in case anybody else ever finds themselves in the same situation.
 
Background: Not very long ago, I learned that I am prone to earwax buildup, a problem which is exacerbated by frequent use of earplugs or IEMs. Being a drummer I require the use of both quite often, and so I began to search for an alternative. I needed something that could isolate as well as, or at the very least close to as well as a pair of earplugs, and it had to be something that didn't require me to stick it inside my ears. Of the limited options I was able to discover, the Beyerdynamic DT770M seemed like the best I was likely to find, so I placed an order.
 
Description: The Beyerdynamic DT770M is an alternate version of the popular DT770, with supposedly strong isolation for use by drummers or monitoring in noisy environments. Physically, it is the same as the other DT770s, only with pleather earpads, and an in-line volume control. Concerning the pads, they are much shallower than the normal velour ones. My ears pressed up right against the drivers, and I noticed that it got hot and sweaty in there pretty quickly. Build quality is good, exactly the same as you'd expect from any other DT770, only the in-line volume control seemed unnecessarily bulky, and was made of cheap and flimsily put together plastic. The DT770M has an 80 ohm impedance and 105 dB sensitivity, so it's not too hard to drive. It worked ok with my portable player.
 
Functionality: Beyerdynamic claims that the DT770M have a noise attenuation of 35 dB. That's higher than the quoted attenuation of many earplugs, and matches the lower range of what Etymotic claims for their IEMs. Well, it is an outright lie. Either that or it's an intentionally misleading spec based on a meaninglessly high frequency. While playing drums, I compared them to Ety mc5s and some regular foam earplugs. I wouldn't even say the DT770M isolated half as well as either. In fact, they didn't really isolate better than any other typical set of closed headphones, which is to say they are completely useless for the drumming or monitoring purposes they were intended for. Is it possible I just didn't get a good seal? Perhaps, but quite frankly I don't see how. They fit very snugly on my head, and I have pretty small ears which had no problems getting a circumaural fit inside the cups. There are some reviews on retail sites where people claim they have excellent isolation as advertised, but I'm not sure I believe in those peoples' credibility. I've known many drummers and musicians over the years, and I'm one of the only ones I know who takes even the slightest precautions to protect their hearing. (Yet I'm the one with ear troubles. Thanks irony!) The DT770M might seem like they isolate some if you've never worn earplugs before and you are blasting music through them. Of course, I could just be crazy.
 
Sound: But what about the sound? They are DT770s after all. How does it compare to the regular versions? It doesn't. Unfortunately, whatever it is that they did inside the cups to try and make them more isolating killed the drivers. There is absolutely no extension in either the bass or treble, and I don't mean just deep sub-bass or really high treble. I mean even the bass or treble you would expect from an already rolled off headphone is missing. Grados would be bass monsters in comparison. All that's left are some mids, and what's there is extremely muddy, smeared, and compressed. If I had to describe them in two words, those words would be "Immanently Unlistenable." A $20 pair of earbuds from Walmart would probably be a big improvement over these, and they cost $200! I know that they were meant for more utilitarian purposes and high fidelity sound isn't their main selling point, but for crying out loud!
 
Conclusion: So all in all, the DT770M fail miserably in every way. They don't even partially fulfill their main purpose which is isolation, and on top of that they are probably the worst sounding headphones I've ever heard. They don't even deserve to be used as a paperweight. Thankfully I was able to return them right away.

 

[TOWSC]

Quote:

 

Conclusion: So all in all, the DT770M fail miserably in every way. They don't even partially fulfill their main purpose which is isolation, and on top of that they are probably the worst sounding headphones I've ever heard. They don't even deserve to be used as a paperweight.
 

This hasn't been my experience with these headphones at all. I find the isolation to be extremely good. We use these headphones for rehearsal with a rock band. Live drums in a small room with microphones on the drum kit fed with vocals, guitars and bass into a mixer into headphone amps and then into these headphones. They do a superb job of isolation so you can hear the drums clearly from the microphones but are not deafened with the sound from the drumkit in the room. As for the sound quality, they are very good. They have been voiced for sound in the diffuse field in other words to sound more like speakers in the room. This means that Front of House sound engineers can swap between listening to the PA and then headphones and get a similar tonal balance. For this they work very well. If I don't need isolation I do prefer to listen on my open backed sennheiser hd650s but the beyers do the job they are designed for. There is plenty of detail, a good balance and isolation or they would be completely unsuitable for monitoring purposes. I can only think the reviewer above didn't manage to get a good fit for some reason.
 

 

[MattTCG]

Thanks for the info and glad that you could return them. I think that most of us have had a similar experience where we bought some headphone that we thought was a safe bet but instead it bombed. 

 

[manveru]

 
Quote:

This hasn't been my experience with these headphones at all. I find the isolation to be extremely good. We use these headphones for rehearsal with a rock band. Live drums in a small room with microphones on the drum kit fed with vocals, guitars and bass into a mixer into headphone amps and then into these headphones. They do a superb job of isolation so you can hear the drums clearly from the microphones but are not deafened with the sound from the drumkit in the room. As for the sound quality, they are very good. They have been voiced for sound in the diffuse field in other words to sound more like speakers in the room. This means that Front of House sound engineers can swap between listening to the PA and then headphones and get a similar tonal balance. For this they work very well. If I don't need isolation I do prefer to listen on my open backed sennheiser hd650s but the beyers do the job they are designed for. There is plenty of detail, a good balance and isolation or they would be completely unsuitable for monitoring purposes. I can only think the reviewer above didn't manage to get a good fit for some reason.

This is what I mean by other reviews that were the opposite of my experience. I wish I could get to the bottom of this. It's doubtful I got a defective pair, as there are also some other reviews which line up with mine. Like you said, it is possible I didn't get a good fit. I'm just having trouble imagining how. They fit very well, so there doesn't seem to be any reason why I should have gotten such a horrible seal. I don't doubt the possibility though. If it is true that they are for some strange reason very finicky with fit and only work for certain people, at least that issue should be known. I also have to wonder how loud you had to turn them up to achieve the effect you did (not trying to insult you in any way, I realize I may have been a little ranty in my review). For example, if one was playing along to music on an iPod and had to turn the volume up any higher than about 40% (50% max considering their slightly higher impedance) to hear everything loudly, I would consider that sub-par isolation.

 

[stv014]

The low frequency isolation of even the most isolating full size headphones cannot really be compared to that of IEMs. Full suze headphones isolate best above 1 kHz, and usually have virtually no isolation (or even slightly amplify outside noise) below 250 Hz. And for drumming, low frequency isolation is obviously important.
 

 
As you can see on the above graph, the IEM is better at any frequency, but the full size headphones are useless to isolate bass.
 

 

[manveru]

^^Exactly, but the DT770M is not a normal closed headphone. It's advertised as having much higher than average isolation specifically for drumming or FOH monitoring. I find eaplugs and IEMS to isolate more or less identically, and the isolation on the DT770M is rated at or higher than ones I've seen/used. That leads me to believe the spec is misleading, or they just don't work. Because of the conflicting reports, the alternative explanation is that I didn't get a good seal. What would really be helpful in that regard is if somebody successfully AB tested them against eaplugs/IEMS without music playing, as music can give you the illusion of isolation if you turn it up loud enough. Even then, I should still think they only deserve 2.5 stars, as it means the design is flawed and anyone who buys them only has a 50/50 chance of them working at all.

 

[TomMe]

Quote:

What would really be helpful in that regard is if somebody successfully AB tested them against eaplugs/IEMS without music playing, as music can give you the illusion of isolation if you turn it up loud enough.

One year later..
 
Compared to the Howard Leight MAX Lite earplugs I use every day, with a SNR of 34, they isolate only half as well. It doesn't even come close to my Howard Leight Leightning L0F with a SNR of 25.
 
Hope that helps..

 

[dinodrums]

Dude,
 
from a felllow drummer and writer in UK, thanks for your honest review of these cans.  I for one was considering purchasing these as like many others am swayed by current reviews/ manufacturer recommendations/ google searches..
 
Your review has saved us all a lot of time and money, another crafty excuse headphone retailers use is the old "you can't try these" due to: 'virus transfer from ear cups' bull, which means once again, people interested in 'really' testing out performance shell out bucks for this junk and can only road test post purchase.  
 
Sorry you lost those bucks but thank you for warning discerning musicians away from these. As a catharsis, p'raps create a funny video on youtube of you crushing them under a car wheel or hammer?
 
Goodness will come back to you i'm sure

 

[BrotherKathos]

Since I own these headphones and there is not much info about them I thought I’d post my impression as well. Like many have stated I would mostly agree with the stock sound sig impressions. The bass is slightly recessed below 50 hz and falls off steeply after 42hz, but you can still hear a faint rumbling until about 35hz. That is where some audible woofer noise starts so not the most refined down low.

The treble is definitely rolled of up top, and due to the overall tuning, the headphones sound very flat. They can be almost unbearable flat at low volumes, but become much more fun at higher volumes due to the lack of fatigue and how at least my ears handle treble at loud volumes. Sounds more like I’m listening to a pair of floor speakers than headphones at loud volumes. But they are only really fun when played loud. I suspect this has something to do with drummers needing to play at loud volumes to cover up the sound of their kit?


I’ve actually modded mine since owning them for a couple of years. I changed pads to dekoni lambskin, removed the white sound cloth around the plastic focus ring, and added some higher density foam around almost the entire inside ear up. its very dense foam that is almost similar to cork even in how it responds to squeezes. I’ve also cut holes in the center of the stock black cloth driver cover, while leaving the cover untouched on the dekoni pads. This gives me more treble definition while keeping a unnoticeable aesthetic.

The sound is much better for my overall preference. The bass quality is much better in definition, possibly due to the dekoni pads having more isolation from the headphone vibration. Sometimes on bass heavy songs with stock pads I could actually feel the headphone shaking that would muffle or distract from the music. Now The background is a bit blacker. The treble is definitely brighter than stock in this form, but not as bright as the 770 pro 250 ohm I had before and returned.

If I had to make a comparison to another headphone I own, I would say this modded 770 m sounds like a Sennheiser hd6xx with slightly less sub bass, possibly exactly like a hd600, but i’ve never heard a hd600 to be sure. Just going off other people’s impressions of them. The treble is very very slightly brighter than the hd6xx, but only ony certain cymbals frequency. S sounds are also very very slightly sharper, but still very warm compared to other 770 series. The sound stage is almost identical to the hd6xx, and position might be a bit better due to the isolation benefit helping in spacial perception. I’ve also replaced the stock headband with a ZMF pilot pad for added comfort. So at the $250 total price including mods I have to say I’m very pleased with this headphone. Its got great details and musicality now with a slightly warm sound sig which I always prefer as I’m more of a bass head than a treble head. This is still no bass monster though. Remember hd600 reference. Is a very relaxing sound that can be enjoyed at low volumes as well as high now, instead of the full volume only stock setup.

I hope this helps anyone if they own this headphone already and are looking to tinker, or are able to get one cheap. It’s definitely a good modding headphone. Signing off!