So after I helped this guy with his HD700 questions in this thread:
https://www.head-fi.org/threads/hd700-worth-buying-in-2022.961660/
I realized how misunderstood the HD700 is. This is not just for casual listeners, but also critical listeners and the manufacturer themselves. Casual listeners think of the HD700 as a mini-HD800, while critical listeners think of the HD700 as a mini-HD600. Sennheiser thought of the HD700 as a cut-down HD800 that would also be a stepping stone for their advancement into the HD6XX (which is why they also approved of this name for Drop products) series, which became the HD660S. Couple this manufacturer's marketing plan with the 21st century's first global pandemic, and we can see where this was really leading.
No, I am not trying to be facetious towards Sennheiser and how they have been planning things. After all, other conglomerates, like Intel, are also selling off certain divisions to other companies to get back some earnings. I just had to face the fact that I could not live without the HD700 in a global-pandemic-affected-world and now I can see why. Yeah, many casual listeners really wanted the HD700 to sound more like an HD800 in terms of soundstage, but the HD8XX (hey, there goes another manufacturer-approved name for future Drop products) series is still one of the toughest in finding its synergy. This entails critical listeners to feel like the HD700 is really a mini-HD600, where the soundstage is intimate, but you have to cut down on the treble to really make it a daily listener and there goes all of the lush mids and sub-bass, so really it is a mini-HD600.
For me, it took owning a Light Harmonic Geek Pulse X-Fi with LPS and have to baby that setup in storage and buy an HD800 to see how much I really just wanted a HD700 all along, all while many backers continued to groan about where their promised product was (many backers have given up now, while Light Harmonic makes new speaker systems for Teslas). Yeah, it took a global pandemic for me to finally set up the LH Geek Pulse X-Fi with its LPS with the HD800 and hear what synergy that David Ho (I think that was him) was looking for in making an amp that could power his HD800. Then, and only then, could I see why Sennheiser created the HD700 as a cut-down HD800 and eventually a stepping stone for their HD660S. After all, I did tell one of their CanJam@RMAF representatives in 2014 that I still thought that the HD250-series was still the best closed-backs that Sennheiser ever offered and that I wondered if there was a closed HD800 coming soon.
Yeah, the HD820 came out in 2018, but it was to the dismay of many critical listeners and it eventually led Axel Grell to resign from Sennheiser in 2019 and make his own company after Sennheiser sold their consumer products division in 2021. There was my tipping point in jumping off the fence and finally getting a HD700, which was the sale of Sennheiser's consumer products division to Sonova, who also bought out Phonak in 2012 and basically dissolved the company from consumer existence. Even then, I was wondering why I bought this thing; after all, I only like listening to the HD700 with a FiiO e12, which was discontinued and I sold my amp a long time ago. I had to listen to the X-Fi stack with the HD800 balanced for a while to get how to HD700, and the fit-and-finish was horrible with the aftermarket real lambskin earpads that I bought for it, as the inner earcup covers could not fit together.
Alas, I finally get to my point of helping the guy in the thread above and I realize that the darn small HD700 earcups and earpads really are not orthogonally-shaped like HD800 earcups and earpads, even when inverted, and that I had to adjust the notches by two-or-three steps for the perfect fit. Well, I did have to get a special 2.5mm-to-4.4mm cable with the "special" HD700 earcup connector notches to ship from China and listen to the X-Fi stack balanced, but I finally hear the taut-and-airy-impactful bass, lush mids, and focused treble that I wanted the whole time. I can now remember all of the unique times I had connecting with people throughout my life before this global pandemic began through the tracks that I hear. Of course, a bunch of the stuff above seems confusing, but that is really how things have been as I have been trying to figure out all that I was hearing with the HD700. Now back to listening.
cDetailBottomMoreOtherSeller,scm-url:1007.40050.266918.0,pvid:12ed774a-e42b-4150-a14b-7cf4d2a3152c,tpp_buckets:668#2846#8114#1999&&pdp_ext_f={"sceneId":"30050","sku_id":"12000021265885839"}&compareFields=formatted_price:US $26.95;itemId:1005002584148918;freight_formatted_price:null;source:recommend-ump;is_freeshipping:null;trade_order:5
) for my HD800 to make the sound signature more tonal with a much more coherent soundstage, before making the HD700 the same and figuring out how the HD700 was supposed to fit consistently.
