[Mr Rick]

Indeed nice spin.....kudos. You are missing one key piece however I never said one couldn't relay their impressions here. This thread is for all impressions both good and bad.

He could portray his sentiment towards the beyers in the beyer thread, it would be more tactful and better received than doing so here.

 
I will accept the fact that we can both be correct. 

 

[HPiper]

We could all just jump over to the Beyer thread and post about how much better our HD650's are than those old nasty Beyers. Turn about is fair play as they say.

 

[pp312]

Say, you've given me a great idea! All these years of just posting in the appropriate threads, and what has it ever gotten me? Now I'm going to tell everyone in every thread how great the Beyer DT880 is.

 

[ButtUglyJeff]

..."Love is a Battlefield"
 
-Pat Benatar

 

[DiscoProJoe]

now tell about your experiences =).

 
I certainly can do that,...although I'll have to ruffle a few feathers in the process. (ha)
 
Within the text of this new thread from yesterday, I wrote the following:
 
----------------------------------------------------
Humorously, with this extra power, there's something else the [Cayin] C5 can do, which the [FiiO] E12A can't: exposing the Sennheiser HD 650 headphones as a flimsy paper tiger that goes, "Snap, crackle, pop," like Rice Krispies -- and without the slightest bit of amp clipping! 

 
At the Hi-Fi shop, I sampled the HD 650s they had on display. I set my Rockbox EQ preset to "0 Flat 3 Bass," which boosts 32 Hz and 64 Hz by 9 dB each, coupled with the bass boost switch on the E12A or C5, which boosts the sub-bass by an additional 6 dB or so on top of that. I then tried cranking up the Japanese pop song "Alright" by Kana Nishino.
 
These HD 650 "bad boys" were a whopping 300 ohms (as opposed to the mere 32 ohms of my M-100 headphones) and had a 5 dB lower sensitivity in addition to that, so surely the HD 650s could handle some power, right? 

 
With the E12A, they had no problem with the thumping beat, even though it couldn't play very loud nor hit very hard. If I turned up the volume enough, I started getting amp clipping.
 
But while cranking up this song with the C5 running these HD 650 headphones, something entirely different happened. Not only was I able to play it significantly louder, but the headphone drivers started bottoming out with the beat! Snap, crackle, pop,...and no amp clipping!  Hahahahahahahaha
 
(Don't worry; I quickly turned down the volume within one second after hearing that sound, so it wouldn't damage the drivers. And by contrast, I've never been able to make my M-100s bottom out with the beat -- not even with the C5 maxed out, and in spite of the M-100s being driven with 15 times the equivalent power than the HD 650s: 5 times the amp power from the lower impedance, multiplied by 3 times the power from the higher sensitivity.)
---------------------------------------------------
 
Of course, this doesn't tell my entire story about my experience with the HD 650s, as I was primarily writing about those two portable amps and comparing them.
 
(I sample and get my equipment from a local shop here in Chongqing called Chongqing Feixiang HiFi Shop, which is an authorized retailer for many big name brands.)
 
The best feature of the HD 650s, in my opinion, was how well they played classical music without an EQ. They certainly did this splendidly.
 
However, with my 2 sets of 193 EQ presets in Rockbox, I can use the "Optimized" category to make my M-100s play classical music almost as well as the HD 650s. Not perfectly, but almost as well.
 
But then again, I only listen to classical-style music about 2% of the time, anyway, so this is no big deal to me. I'm especially a huge fan of happy, sappy, bubbly dance-pop music, and also enjoy hard and soft rock, country-pop, lounge music, and a little bit of stuff from other genres.
 
That's my story with the HD 650s, though. Snap,...crackle,...pop! 

 

 

[Solrighal]

I'm not sure what point you're trying to make here but I own both the headphones you mentioned. Both have their areas of expertise but there poles apart signature-wise. My M's are up for sale though because I'd never dream of using them in the house where I also have the Senn's.

 

[DiscoProJoe]

  ..."Love is a Battlefield"
 
-Pat Benatar

 
Have had Pat Benatar's Greatest Hits album in my collection for many, many years. "Love is a Battlefield" sounds awesome with my custom EQ preset named "Electronic 5 Bass" in Rockbox. This one boosts 32 Hz by 19 dB and 64 Hz by 18.5 dB, and is coupled with the bass boost switch on my Cayin C5 portable amp, which delivers an additional 5-to-6 dB of sub-bass on top of that. (This EQ preset also boosts the treble by 4 dB or so as well.)
 
"Love is a Battlefield"........pounds hard and sounds great!  

 

 

[DavidA]

I can't imagine using 192 rips, I tried blind testing WAV, FLAC, 320/CBR, 256/CBR & VBR, and 192/CBR & VBR (had some friends over to help with this).
 
With my speaker system: Computer optical out to UD-301, SAE X10A, KEF 103.2 Ref and Magnepan 1.6 speakers, anything less than 320/CBR was noticeable to all of those listening as being lacking in sound stage, distorted, lacking in dynamics, and muddy bass.
 
With my headphone system: Computer optical out to UD-301, Lyr2 (Telefunken tubes), HD-650, HD-700, HE-560, LCD-2f, RS2e, and SRH-1840; almost all noticed distortion, lack of dynamics, muddy lows and harsh highs with anything below 256 CBR, 256/VBR was even worse, 192 was really not listenable.
 
Now add EQing to those 192 rips its no wonder the HD-650 started to "Snap Crackel & Pop" the music was distorted.  I've never use a C5 but it being a portable and looking at the specs 800mW at 32ohms (couldn't find any info on output at 300ohms) it is not look like an amp that would pair with a HD-650 or any other high impedance headphone.
 
Just my 2 cents and experiences so far.
 
Saw Pat Benetar in concert back in the 80's (yea, I older), still love her music.

 

[mikoss]

Yeah, I've also found mp3's in general to hit 0db and clip without even applying any eq'ing. (Mine are 320kbps encoded rips, downloaded)... This frustrates me quite a bit, considering that some artists don't offer lossless downloads... not sure if it's bad in general to hit 0db, but I do notice that their FLAC counterparts don't.

 

[Tuneslover]

I own both the HE-500 and HD650 and I keep both of them for a reason. Both of them convey a natural and lush midrange that is to die for on the right system and with the right recordings. They just present their mids differently. HD-6xx have a tonally unique signature that cannot be replicated, but the HE-500s warmth is nothing to scoff at either. But I totally understand people who would prefer one over the other. Something about the Senns is both incredibly natural and yet almost magically otherworldly to my ears. I think it is related to its longer decay. The HE-500s seem to be aiming for verisimilitude and speed, though they are definitely not as fast or as shockingly immediate as the HE-560, which is to say that HE-500s still have that musicality factor like the Senns whereas the HE-560 wants to be as realistic, referenced-grade, and as neutral as possible. The latter comes just slightly short of this with its slight 6khz peak, but I have jumped more than once when I thought that violinist or drummer was right behind me or suddenly beside me.

The Senns are not going anywhere anytime soon from my small collection, nor are the HE-500. I really want my dad to send me his HE-560s though, lol.

Edit: I forgot to add that the HE-500s mids are more resolving due to higher technical capabilities that the older Senn drivers, but I think their treble resolves equally well. In terms of bass, I am waiting on my otl for my Senns finally, but the HE-500s planar bass goes much deeper on my system thus far. To be honest, HE-400s bass is even more impactfull than HE-500s. The former has the most engaging bass of all sub-1 k phones I have heard and easily rivals that of the LCD-2.2 to be frank. It's the mids and treble, along with its very solid bass, that draw me to the 500 over the 400.

With that said, I actually really like the bass on both the HD 650 and 600 as I am not really a bass head in the first place.

I too have the HE500 and HD650 and couldn't agree more with your comparison and assessment of these terrific cans.

 

[onebigunion]

   
I certainly can do that,...although I'll have to ruffle a few feathers in the process. (ha)
 
Within the text of this new thread from yesterday, I wrote the following:
 
----------------------------------------------------
Humorously, with this extra power, there's something else the [Cayin] C5 can do, which the [FiiO] E12A can't: exposing the Sennheiser HD 650 headphones as a flimsy paper tiger that goes, "Snap, crackle, pop," like Rice Krispies -- and without the slightest bit of amp clipping! 

 
At the Hi-Fi shop, I sampled the HD 650s they had on display. I set my Rockbox EQ preset to "0 Flat 3 Bass," which boosts 32 Hz and 64 Hz by 9 dB each, coupled with the bass boost switch on the E12A or C5, which boosts the sub-bass by an additional 6 dB or so on top of that. I then tried cranking up the Japanese pop song "Alright" by Kana Nishino.
 
These HD 650 "bad boys" were a whopping 300 ohms (as opposed to the mere 32 ohms of my M-100 headphones) and had a 5 dB lower sensitivity in addition to that, so surely the HD 650s could handle some power, right? 

 
With the E12A, they had no problem with the thumping beat, even though it couldn't play very loud nor hit very hard. If I turned up the volume enough, I started getting amp clipping.
 
But while cranking up this song with the C5 running these HD 650 headphones, something entirely different happened. Not only was I able to play it significantly louder, but the headphone drivers started bottoming out with the beat! Snap, crackle, pop,...and no amp clipping!  Hahahahahahahaha
 
(Don't worry; I quickly turned down the volume within one second after hearing that sound, so it wouldn't damage the drivers. And by contrast, I've never been able to make my M-100s bottom out with the beat -- not even with the C5 maxed out, and in spite of the M-100s being driven with 15 times the equivalent power than the HD 650s: 5 times the amp power from the lower impedance, multiplied by 3 times the power from the higher sensitivity.)
---------------------------------------------------
 
Of course, this doesn't tell my entire story about my experience with the HD 650s, as I was primarily writing about those two portable amps and comparing them.
 
(I sample and get my equipment from a local shop here in Chongqing called Chongqing Feixiang HiFi Shop, which is an authorized retailer for many big name brands.)
 
The best feature of the HD 650s, in my opinion, was how well they played classical music without an EQ. They certainly did this splendidly.
 
However, with my 2 sets of 193 EQ presets in Rockbox, I can use the "Optimized" category to make my M-100s play classical music almost as well as the HD 650s. Not perfectly, but almost as well.
 
But then again, I only listen to classical-style music about 2% of the time, anyway, so this is no big deal to me. I'm especially a huge fan of happy, sappy, bubbly dance-pop music, and also enjoy hard and soft rock, country-pop, lounge music, and a little bit of stuff from other genres.
 
That's my story with the HD 650s, though. Snap,...crackle,...pop! 

 

How do you know that the amp isn't clipping?  With that much boost (9db), you're demanding a LOT more power output from your amp.  If you're going to boost frequencies in rockbox, particularly the bass, you really need to use the precut feature to lower the pre-amplified signal or you definitely run the risk of putting out a distorted or clipped signal, which may be more likely to happen with a 300 ohm load (read the rockbox instruction guide, it does a better job of explaining this than I'm doing).  I'm not sure I agree with your assessment of why you heard what you heard, in fact I'm pretty sure I disagree with it.   I boost sub-bass a few decibels on my Sansa Clip with rockbox but I also pre-cut the same number of decibels in order to prevent clipping.

 

[Pirakaphile]

Well, here's a hard decision to make. Got a pretty good refund on my taxes, so I'm looking at either the HD-650's or the Cavalli Audio Liquid Carbon. Either way I'm getting a fantastic piece of gear, but I can't decide which one to get. The Carbon may be a one time deal, since finding them used is probably going to end up being a wild goose chase. But the 650's would be put into use right away.

 

[YtseJamer]

Well, here's a hard decision to make. Got a pretty good refund on my taxes, so I'm looking at either the HD-650's or the Cavalli Audio Liquid Carbon. Either way I'm getting a fantastic piece of gear, but I can't decide which one to get. The Carbon may be a one time deal, since finding them used is probably going to end up being a wild goose chase. But the 650's would be put into use right away.

 
The HD650 are still available for $279 @ Buysonic.  (A steal for the price!)
 
https://www.buysonic.com/products/sennheiser-hd-650/

 

[Pirakaphile]

The HD650 are still available for $279 @ Buysonic.  (A steal for the price!)

https://www.buysonic.com/products/sennheiser-hd-650/

Dang, that is a pretty good price there, especially since all I ever see are $300+ prices used on Amazon. I'll have to do some more research 'fore I make a decision though.

 

[Tuco1965]

Dang, that is a pretty good price there, especially since all I ever see are $300+ prices used on Amazon. I'll have to do some more research 'fore I make a decision though.

 
Ah just buy it!  Cans don't like being lonely.  The more the merrier.