Initial Impressions
Received my FA-004's about two weeks ago directly from
www.bugdenaudio.com and I had a 10% discount code, so with shipping to U.S. from Canada they were under $70 USD. They were shipped in their own box not double boxed-they did survive but one side was crushed slightly but luckily the HP was not damaged. I ordered the Black/Silver color and I must say they're pretty ugly but this may save someone from stealing them; so if looks are important to you you may want the Brown/Gold color. The coiled cord is very nice measuring about 30" coiled to from 9' to 10' uncoiled and I believe it is about the thickness for this size headphone. I find the headphone to be quite comfortable with about the same cup size the Denon D1001, the memory type foam in the earpads is nice but I think could be a little thicker. The build quality is up to the standards of best Japanese companies in the $40-$50 USD range, it could be a little sturdier, but none of the plastic pieces are flimsy to the touch and the headband is reinforced with steel. So all-in-all the build quality is not great but with a little care I could see it lasting for years.
The Good
Some initial listening was done right out of the box, the midrange through the highest high-end were very promising but the bass response of any kind was MIA. For my system set-up and music please refer to my thread on "Official JVC RX 700 thread". I have burned-in the HP's for abou 36 hrs. with music-hope to do about at least 100 hrs. soon. From the midrange through the high-end there a very few complaints. The midrange is prominent and very detailed-some of the best I've heard; all female and male singers are rendered faithfully with no chestiness and stringency detected. The upper midrange through the highest high-end sounds wonderful with all instruments in these ranges rendered faithfully. The highest high- end can not float in space like my vintage DT990 does, but it is close and the best I've heard in an enclosed HP. The soudstage is fairly deep from front to back with good localization of instruments and the width of soundstage was good but not great-didn't defy the laws of physics.
The Bad
The problems I have with the right now are mainly in the bass areas. The sub-bass is present but not very prominent, The midbass is better than the sub-bass but there is not much of a bass slam that I like to hear in my rock songs. For this type of of bass my Philip HP910's are great. The midbass may be more monitor-like and more accurate though. The largest problem I have right now is the upper bass through the lower midrange which seemed to be a little threadbare and not very fleshed out. this frequency range effects quite a few musical instuments such as violin (acoustic stringed instruments) and some percussion instruments such as piano-these frequency ranges are rendered very well in a HP like my JVC RX700. So with these problems the sound is disjointed between the upper bass and lower midrange areas. Hopefully these areas will be cleared up to my satisfaction with more burn-in.
Wrap Up
So to wrap things up I'll place values from 1 to 10 scale.
Build Quality: 6/10
Value for the Money: 7/10
Sound Quality: 7/10
The SQ value is subject to change and hopefully it will. I also listened a small amount of music on a portable device which would be a Creative Labs Zen player. With lossless files the FA-004 sounded great. with 320kps files with no EQing and bass boost off the SQ was o.k., anything less than this sampling rate sounded awful. Would I buy these FA-004's at the price I paid for them again-"yes I would". As "LFF" expessed in his initial musings, asking if the FA-004 was a monitor grade HP-he said "no"; is it close to monitor-grade "yes". I will have to agree with this. Happy Listening.
