[Reputator]

Now a thought crossed my mind.
Perhaps we are being unfair to Sennheiser.

Perhaps Sennheiser is aware that their old dynamic products from the HD6...HD8... series have already reached the TOTL peak.
Maybe in these affordable price ranges (unless the unlimited amount is HE-1) it is not possible to obtain physically from the current raw materials, a technically faithful transmission of music, a more comfortable product, maybe a slightly more modern design - but nothing more.
While waiting for new headphone premieres, what else can really surprise us, what can our brains and ears still hear that we can't hear right now?
Let's be honest, in the case of other manufacturers of full headphones (dynamic, planar), for several years the changes have also been small, cosmetic and certainly not revolutionary.
Are current headphones better than the Sony MDR-R10 (1989)?
Are you just trying to imitate them or equal their quality?

This is just my opinion, do you also feel this way sometimes?

Sennheiser didn't announce a new flagship because it's impossible to get better than what we already have (that's ludicrous). They didn't announce one because it's not possible for them to do any better than they've already done.

They're a shell of their former selves.

 

[fidgeraldo]

The big announcement is that Sony bought Sennheiser

Cheers!

 

[LobalWarming]

Sennheiser didn't announce a new flagship because it's impossible to get better than what we already have (that's ludicrous). They didn't announce one because it's not possible for them to do any better than they've already done.

They're a shell of their former selves.

Nope. They're half a shell of their form selves. Senn sold their consumer department to hearing aid giant, Sonova. Hence the Sennheiser OTC hearing aids released last year.



Sennheiser kept their pro audio division, including Neumann. And purchased pro audio interface company, Merging Technologies.

 

[Andrew Seeley]

The HD 800 is a fantastic headphone. What are you talking about? It has the cleanest waterfall noise floor and spectral decay of any Headphone Since as well as before it. The design is still very, very, good for a dynamic driver.

I don't believe Sony will ever lay a hand on Sennheiser's HD 800, or hopefully anything resembling the company.

To answer musicaldoc, you're referring to 4 and 5000$ headphone devices. The HD 800 = appr. $900$

Of course the electrostatic and some few planers, or maybe the utopia come CLOSE to asking for the better price tag. But the spectral decay (which is a measure of qualitation and music-availability) is still very clean in the HD 800' favor, and is better even beyond ALL the newer developments. If you look around you'll find it, And the spectral decays of the other new headphones post big-bang of the HD 800 and Stax C-32 [009] moment.

No Company had 1kiloBuck$ (In-)production headphones until HD 800 and Stax has always had a multithousand dollar flagship - time immemorial. Remember Sennheiser had redefined what a 1k headphone represents to the whole Planet -- that is how Good HD 800 was\still commends an origination to.

The driver was good at 56mm, and Presents a correct spatial phenomena in an admirabl quantitative way of doing so to the ear / brain.

It would be cool if there were a successor. But alas, If for any reason there cannot be, there Cannot be. Particularly for the time-being.

 

[MusicalDoc8]

The HD 800 is a fantastic headphone. What are you talking about? It has the cleanest spectral decay of any Headphone Since as well as before it. The design is still very, very, good for a dynamic driver.

I don't believe Sony will ever lay a hand on Sennheiser's HD 800

Sony v Sennheiser is like a regional tournament for HP. Right now the big boys are others.

 

[Reputator]

Nope. They're half a shell of their form selves. Senn sold their consumer department to hearing aid giant, Sonova. Hence the Sennheiser OTC hearing aids released last year.



Sennheiser kept their pro audio division, including Neumann. And purchased pro audio interface company, Merging Technologies.

Heck, just last summer, What Hi-Fi did an interview with someone at Sennheiser who ironically holds a position at the company called "Audiophile Product Manager", in which he literally said, "well, we'd love to make a HD800S successor, but it's impractical".

https://www.whathifi.com/features/s...moment-for-headphones-and-beyond-its-hd-800-s

And as for a more progressive, lock-stock-and-barrel wired over-ear, the ambition certainly appears to be there. “It’s very easy to make plans but harder to follow through with them!” admits Koehnke.

“The manufacturing facilities are with Sennheiser Pro [not the consumer audio division now owned by Sonova]," explains Koehnke. "So do we build a new manufacturing facility and line of transducers for just one pair of headphones? We do not want to say ’no’, but there needs to be an idea for scaling it. Sennheiser has different operations from all other audiophile manufacturers – we are mass production, with the high-performance transducers in our wireless headphones.”

[...]Koehnke spends the next minute of our conversation stating very reasonably that he believes the HD 800 S to still be a “very respectable flagship”...

I mean, there you go. They spelled it out eight months ago. They're not in the business of making flagships anymore, and an "HD900" probably won't ever happen to any meaningful degree.

 

[Somafunk]

Has the video been pulled?, YouTube says It’s private?

 

[emailists]

What a disappointment for Sennheiser sound bar owners. They have been hinting at rear channels for their Ambeo sound bars (plus and mini) since they have 4 channels of wireless currently for up to 4 subwoofers, and have been described by employees as future proof.

 

[MusicalDoc8]

Heck, just last summer, What Hi-Fi did an interview with someone at Sennheiser who ironically holds a position at the company called "Audiophile Product Manager", in which he literally said, "well, we'd love to make a HD800S successor, but it's impractical".

https://www.whathifi.com/features/s...moment-for-headphones-and-beyond-its-hd-800-s


I mean, there you go. They spelled it out eight months ago. They're not in the business of making flagships anymore, and an "HD900" probably won't ever happen to any meaningful degree.

"we like to crap out consoomer slop that gets us fat profit margins instead of doing lots of legwork with planars and such so we just keep milking the HD800 so much it's become a meme"

 

[XERO1]

where is HD900?

Apparently only in our dreams

 

[Not so fat head]

Looks like the MTW3 are around 33% smaller than the MTW2’s, so I’m ok with Sennheiser trying to get another 1-2 years out of the current profile…. I have the 2’s and 3’s and the 3’s fit me better. However, I never had a problem with the 2’s.

 

[123peter]

I was also waiting for the premiere - who doesn't like the announcement of something new.

But in fact, from the full dynamic open headphones we have competitors for the HD800s, from those currently produced and on sale on the market, from those considered successful and good-sounding:
1.AUSTRIAN AUDIO THE COMPOSER (2022)
2.Focal Utopia 2022 (2022)
3.ZMF VÉRITÉ (2019)
4.Focal Clear (2017)
5.Sennheiser 800s (2016)
6.Audio Technica ATH-Adx5000 (2017)

Does this mean that the dynamic transducer has reached the limit of its capabilities?
The list is quite short (maybe I missed something) and planars will take over the entire market because there are so many of them?
Companies don't want to go in this direction anymore?

 

[javertim]

This is REALLY disappointing.

 

[ThanatosVI]

Sennheiser didn't announce a new flagship because it's impossible to get better than what we already have (that's ludicrous). They didn't announce one because it's not possible for them to do any better than they've already done.

They're a shell of their former selves.

The thing is, nobody expects them to beat their He1, but between the HD800S and He1 is a grand canyon of a gap...

 

[nioh]

Watching the Sony stream - this is how a quality stream looks and sounds like