[niic]

Dear Head-Fiers,
 
In advance: sorry for the long story. I know what I'm looking for, but because it is difficult to audition headphones in my area I will try to describe in detail what floats my boat.

 
I've owned the Sennheiser HD598s for about a year now, combined with a Fiio E10. For listening sessions I usually play FLACs with Audirvana Plus. I listen mostly to rock, and a bit of jazz/blues/pop-jazz. Artists in my playlist: Bob Dylan, Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, Queen, Jeff Buckley, Dave Brubeck, Marvin Gaye, The Asteroids Galaxy Tour, and foremost: The Who.
What I love:
- Airy sound and soundstage: music plays around my head and not in my head.
- Detail: compared to my cheaper headphones like the Koss PortaPros I can hear much more in my music collection, and I love being able to clearly recognize different instruments.
- Neutrality: I love that the bass does not overpower the midrange and the treble. I enjoy similar features in my cheap Astrotec AM-90 balanced armatures.
- In your face voices: I especially love that vocals come out strong. As if the singer is clearly in front of the band, rather than behind it or in the middle of it. I especially love the intimacy this creates: as if the singer sings his/her song for and to you.
 
At times though, I feel the HD598 lacks a bit of oomph. They lack passion; they sound distant, thin. If I have The Who's Baba O'Riley on after 2:20, I sometimes feel underwhelmed; unconvinced. Similarly with Who Are You (album version). From 3:40 (quite possibly my favourite piece of music when the piano comes rolling in) I feel unconvinced. The Fiio E10 has a switch to increase the bass, and although this does bring in a bit of passion, it is often too much and drowns out the vocals and the piano (the midrange?) which I love, and makes the whole messy and muddy.
 
Thanks for bearing with me up to this point. I hope that the collective experience here at Head-Fi can help me find a pair of cans that are able to provide me with pretty much above, but with a bit more oomph, to complement my Sennheisers. I'm looking for open headphones that will give me great detail, forward vocals in rock, good instrument seperation in jazz, and overall the oomph I'm looking for in rock music, for < $300.

 
Thanks so much in advance!
 
Best,
 
Nic

 

[Dillont3]

I had a similar experience when I owned the HD595's and then HD598's. I loved them for jazz, classical, acoustic, vocals, etc.,but found them lacking with rock, hip-hop and other genres where bass was emphasized more. I think the 598's are great headphones, and they have tight accurate bass, but the bass just isn't present enough or have enough impact to make it ideal for some genres. I also am not a basshead and don't like my bass to overpower the mids and highs, but I eventually sold my HD598's in search of something else. 
 
I ended up buying a pair of used Beyerdynamic Dt880 250ohm premiums. To my ears the Dt880's take a lot of what I loved about the 598's- really comfortable, good soundstage, fairly neutral,detailed, great highs and mids, but also have more bass presence that give them the oomph that allow me to enjoy them with more genres. Now I wouldn't say they have a real strong bass impact that would satisfy bassheads, but definitely more bass presence than the 598's. The only thing that took me a little while to get used to coming from the 598's and my shure 940's is that I think the mids are slightly less forward on the DT880's. But I still think they have great mids and sound great with vocalists, it just took me a little while to get used to a slightly different sound signature. Other than that i would say that the DT880's sound more refined, more realistic and overall more enjoyable to me than the HD598's. 
 
So I would suggest looking into the DT880's. I'm sure you will get other options to look into that would satisfy you as well, but the DT880's solved this problem for me. If you get the Pro model you would stay under $250. The Pro's are supposed to sound pretty much the same, but just clamp a little more and have a bit more bass. Otherwise you can find the 600ohm premiums on amazon for $286 right now.
 
edit: just realized you are in Netherlands, so I don't know how much the Beyers are going for there, the prices I listed are Amazon US.

 

[niic]

Thanks for the quick reply! The DT880s seem to be much more in the direction I'm looking for! The Beyers are fortunately widely available here in Holland, at good prices.

 
Of course I'm still open to other suggestions as well!

 

[Dillont3]

Also I forgot to mention my FiiO e10 drives my 250ohm DT880's just fine and they sound good to me. While the DT880's benefit from better amplification, they are not that hard to drive despite their higher Ohm's rating. http://www.head-fi.org/t/637048/dt-880s-250ohm.Malveaux says in this post that the E10 even drove the 600ohm DT880 pretty well, although I have not heard the 600 ohm version myself and would probably suggest going with the 250ohm premium or pro version myself if you are not planning on upgrading from your e10 anytime soon. I have been enjoying my DT880's with my e10, although I have been itching lately to hear how much more I can get out of them with more powerful amplification, especially tube amps, which are supposed to help bring the mids forward a bit more with the DT880's. 
 
Also as far as the sound differences between the different Ohm versions, a lot of people on here claim that 600ohms sound significantly better and are the only DT880's worth buying. A lot of others have said that the differences between 250 and 600ohms are minimal and over exaggerated. Some people have also said they like the sound of the 250ohms better. I have only heard the 250ohm versions and can't comment on that myself. So take that how you will, but don't feel like you have to get the 600ohms version. It seems to be agreed on though that the 250 and 600ohm version are better than the 32ohm version as long as you have an amp to drive them. 

 

[niic]

Thanks again! I've read quite a bit today about the DT880 and they seem to be great headphones, with my only concern being their weaker mids.
Do you still have to use the bass switch on the E10 with the DT880s, or is that a thing of the past?
 
I found out that a store not too far from me sells the DT880s and I will try to audition them. In the meantime I'm of course still open for awesome midcentric headphones that are great for rock and jazz!

 

[Dillont3]

I find myself still using the bass switch on the E10 with my Beyers some, but I find myself doing it a lot less than with the HD598's when I am listening to rock. It kind of depends on the artist and the how much bass is present in the recording that I am listening to. I don't listen to a lot of rock, but I find when I want to these are more enjoyable than the HD598's.  Again these are still pretty neutral headphones so while i think the bass is more present and realistic than the HD598's, if you are looking for loud hard hitting bass you might not be satisfied. Also although some people describe them as warm, I would say they are still pretty transparent. So if you are listening to an older album that wasn't recorded that well or a low bitrate file it will be apparent and not sound great. 
 
I do think that the mids are not as forward as the HD598's or my Shure 940's, but I would not call them recessed. My ears have gotten used to the difference and now it doesn't bother me. I still enjoy them more than my 598's with just about all genres and think the trade off for a little less forward mids to get more bass presence and overall more refinement is worth it for me. I do still listen to my Shure 940's some when I really want to hear the mids up front, but the Beyers are so much more comfortabIe and have that open airy sound so they get most of my headtime. I still find the DT880's great with jazz and vocalists though. If you can listen to them somewhere that would be the best to see if they are right for you. Everyone's ears and sound preferences are different so that is the best way to see if they are for you, but it can be hard to find a place to audition headphones.