[r9800pro]

This is my first post on Head-Fi after being a lurker for many months. It is really great to be here
 
Ok straight to the point; I've bought Sound Blaster Z sound card a few months ago after 5+ years with my X-Fi Titanium PCI-E card and found no difference at all when using my 14 years old Creative DTT3500 Digital 5.1 speakers. It was actually a downgrade feature wise.
One thing that made me not selling the SBZ was how awesome the SBX Pro virtual surround sound is. Music, movies and games were amazing in virtual 5.1 surround using a cheap KOSS KTXPRO1 headphones and the way I can tell the difference between front and rear channels was really great.
Before that, I've only used ROCCAT Kave True 5.1 gaming headphones and I could NEVER know front channels from rear channels.
 
I thought that if I am gonna watch movies or play games after midnight, I should not use my speakers and settle for headphones with good virtual surround but since KOSS headphones are cheap (although they are still pretty amazing for the price) I wanted to get something better without paying $200+
 
So after months of reading I decided to get the Samson SR850 and because we didn't have them here in Egypt, I got them from ebay for $40 (from 2 box set and they were just shrink wrapped) shipped from a Chinese seller. The international free shipping was so slow that when 30 days passed without getting them, I thought they were lost and ordered another ones from a UK seller for $43 + $21 shipping but this time I contacted the seller to make sure they are the new version with velour pads as the ones from the Chinese seller had pleather pads and indeed the UK seller confirmed they had velor pads and come in original box.
 
To keep the story short, both headphones arrived today
 
I tried the ones with pleather earpads first and they were very light and comfortable while sound quality was just amazing!
After about 30 minutes, my ears started to get hot and sweaty so I tried the ones with velour pads.
They were much more better in comfort and I used them for hours without an issue.
The real problem is, the ones with pleather earpads sounded better to me!... They have better bass and not so bright highs compared to velour-pads ones.
 
I am not even and audiophile but can still hear the difference clearly.
I was about to exchange the earpads just to get best of both worlds then it occured to me to sign in here and ask: Do velour pads give toobrighter highs and lower bass compared to pleather ones or Samson just made the newer version worse ?
 
I would appreciate any help from you guys.
 
Thanks. 

 

[PurpleAngel]

  This is my first post on Head-Fi after being a lurker for many months. It is really great to be here
 
Ok straight to the point; I've bought Sound Blaster Z sound card a few months ago after 5+ years with my X-Fi Titanium PCI-E card and found no difference at all when using my 14 years old Creative DTT3500 Digital 5.1 speakers. It was actually a downgrade feature wise.
One thing that made me not selling the SBZ was how awesome the SBX Pro virtual surround sound is. Music, movies and games were amazing in virtual 5.1 surround using a cheap KOSS KTXPRO1 headphones and the way I can tell the difference between front and rear channels was really great.
Before that, I've only used ROCCAT Kave True 5.1 gaming headphones and I could NEVER know front channels from rear channels.
 
I would appreciate any help from you guys. Thanks. 

 
Did you totally delete the older Titanium drivers and all other sound card drivers and just have the SB-Z/SBX software installed?
Did you disable the motherboard's on-board audio? in the BIOS

 

[r9800pro]

   
Did you totally delete the older Titanium drivers and all other sound card drivers and just have the SB-Z/SBX software installed?
Did you disable the motherboard's on-board audio? in the BIOS

 
Actually I am running both cards as I still use X-Fi to record multi-channel 24bit/96KHz sound from "What U Hear" source which SBZ can't do.
 
For headphones and speakers I use SBZ as default and both of the 2 cards' software run fine.
 
My thread is about something totally different: I want to know whether velour vs pleather pads on the Samson SR850 can make such subtle difference I hear.

 

[PurpleAngel]

  Actually I am running both cards as I still use X-Fi to record multi-channel 24bit/96KHz sound from "What U Hear" source which SBZ can't do.
For headphones and speakers I use SBZ as default and both of the 2 cards' software run fine.
My thread is about something totally different: I want to know whether Velour vs pleather pads on the Samson SR850 can make such subtle difference I hear.

 
I was surprised you found the Titanium (non-HD) to sound better then the SB-Z.
Though maybe the Titanium's software drivers might have been having a negative effect on the SB-Z's sound quality.
 
I would say it's more then just Velour vs pleather when it comes to effecting the audio.
Your own ears are the best judge on what your going to like better, or the differences, with what you currently have.
I've heard the Sound Blaster World of Warcraft headset ear pads improve the SR850 headphones.

 

[r9800pro]

   
I was surprised you found the Titanium (non-HD) to sound better then the SB-Z.
Though maybe the Titanium's software drivers might have been having a negative effect on the SB-Z's sound quality.
 
I would say it's more then just Velour vs pleather when it comes to effecting the audio.
Your own ears are the best judge on what your going to like better, or the differences, with what you currently have.
I've heard the Sound Blaster World of Warcraft headset ear pads improve the SR850 headphones.

 
I didn't say X-Fi "sound" was better than SBZ, I said it was better only "feature wise". As for Audio quality, SBZ has the edge as the sound is more richer and fuller 
 
I currently have 2x Samson SR850 headphones, one pair have velour pads and the other have pleather. Velour ones are way more comfortable for me but the better bass and highs for the pleather ones sound better.
 
I was going to sell the pleather ones but after hearing the sound quality I got confused.
 
Maybe I should exchange the pads and check again because it might be the headphones themselves not velour vs pleather thing.
 
Thanks

 

[r9800pro]

I've decided to exchange the pads. I've found that velour pads are actually pleather from the bottom side and for my amazement, the headphones that had pleather now have the same "better" bass and not so bright highs. So it seems Samson has changed something in headphones with velour pads which is weird.

 

[Theo Sudarja]

  I've decided to exchange the pads. I've found that velour pads are actually pleather from the bottom side and for my amazement, the headphones that had pleather now have the same "better" bass and not so bright highs. So it seems Samson has changed something in headphones with velour pads which is weird.

I've got the velour one. Lucky you, you've got the better sounded ones.