Sony MDR-A20 - opinions, other MDR-A series?

[nofarewell]

I have the A50, it's quite amazing. It's the V model (MDR A50LV) with the volume control dial.

In terms of sound it obviously is one of the top notch SONY phones from the time. Great natural sound and clarity, and because of the form factor which holds the buds next to/in your ear a bit, you get quite a bit of lows compared to other buds.

From what else I have/have had, it basically is better than the E888 (both gold and silver versions), and it hangs with my all time favorite E464 (which I desperately need to get replacements for since my first one had the left side die and I stupidly destroyed the second one by having it hang outside my car and drove over them). While I still preferred the E464 because of the midrange/upper midrange emphasis, I can see why others would prefer the A50 due to it's more balanced sound and better bass. I have a E575 on the way so let's see how that does against the A50 soon enough.

The only thing with this W•EAR type is that, well, it doesn't "wear" as nicely as earbuds do. There is a little protrusion on the hinge that gets annoying digging into your head after a short while. Sometimes your hair gets caught in the hinge itself which sucks. Also, if you have these on for a few hours, the pressing of the buds into the ear wall outside your ear canal can also start to bother you (perhaps I need some foams and that will help?). Minor comfort nitpicks compared to many on ear/in ear/full sized headphones, but compared to how actual buds wear so comfortably, it's just not as good.

Obviously these were designed for when you may have earbuds fall out cause of jogging or skateboarding or whatever. I find a good use case for these when flying, since you can recline back/lie down, and still have them stay by your ears.

Obviously the Colani design A60 is on my wish list, I'd assume it can only sound as good if not better as the A50, and it has a beautiful design and looks like it doesn't have the hinge protrusion thing either.

Hey, good to see you here as well
I wonder what might be the difference between the A50 and the W70.

So the A50 is better than the E888? Those are really different guys for sure. I don't own the E464, and never heard it, but I heard the E575 and own the E565, which I love very much. So it will be interesting to hear about the 575.

That "protrusion on the hinge" phenomenon is familiar to me, or I'd rather say (as I think it's due to different reasons) the form factor of certain Sony verticals didn't do well with my ears. Namely the A21 and the A22. I believe the Colani design is very similar to the A22 (only by shape of course). These two made me almost nauseous after longer periods of listening, never had any issues with the 20/40. A foam might help, but my experience prompts me to say that foams make the verticals a bit boomier than they ought to be. That's a subjective opinion though.

WOW, can't wait for your review on the A60 as well! My A40 is quite good imho. Certainly better than the A/W20s, a bit more refined, less bassy.

 

[tabness]

I've never heard the W series phones. Perhaps they are like the A series but simply do not fold up, not sure?

So I didn't really directly compare the A50 to the my E888s, because both my E888s had a side die earlier this spring/summer (As an aside, so did my first E464. I think the culprit was the Apple iPhone dongle, when it strains and breaks it just seems to wreak havoc on these buds sadly. I've learned my lesson in casually using these buds at work especially with the backup E464 getting destroyed a little more than a month ago which was completely my fault and picked up a E525 for a little under $40 new old stock for work usage. It isn't at the sound quality of the top notch SONY buds but solid enough for the use case of going in and out my car and walking around with).

I jumped on a new old stock A50 in June partly because of all that.

So just by audio memory, yeah I think the A50 plays a level higher than the E888s. Probably the E888 silver which was the bassier one (not my preference), though maybe it's actually closer with the E888 gold which had less bass and sweeter mids, and I'd have to do a direct comparison to really understand my preference. The issue with the E888 gold though is that the bass distorted at moderately high volumes, especially on one side. I got a new old stock pair of the E888 golds and it was somewhat problematic from the start unfortunately with one side playing softer and distorted, I actually blew into the buds (I know, I know, but it kinda worked lol) to sort them out from time to time.

The A50 is just natural sounding and balanced across the spectrum. So were the E888s in general, but the A50 does bass better, while not giving up much/anything in the mids and has the same smooth highs. I did do direct comparisons with my second E464 and the A50, and there, I still prefer the more in your face sound of the E464.

 

[tabness]

So the A60 arrived in the mail today, picked it up after work and have gotten a little bit of listening time as well as direct comparison to the A50 this evening (listening to both right now).

• The A60s have more bass (somewhat impressive how much bass these bring given the form factor) and maybe have a slightly larger sense of space.
• The A50s have more pronounced mids and maybe highs (maybe simply due to having less emphasis lows) and thus sound slightly more clear.

Soundwise, I gotta say first impression has me favoring the A50. I'm just not a bass kind of guy I guess. I already was impressed and happy with how much bass the A50 put out. In terms of naturalness, especially on some already bass light tracks, I lean towards the fuller A60 rather than the thinner A50, but on other tracks with a good amount of bass, it's definitely the A50 over the A60 which can actually sound a little muffled in comparison! The A60 sounds better at higher volumes and then the comparison becomes closer/maybe in the favor of the A60 because then the mids come up a bit and the whole sound becomes clearer, but then again, I try not to listen at louder volumes.

I'm not exactly sure what is serving as the drivers for either of these phones. Looking at the frequency response specs of both, it seems that the A60 matches the E282 and the A50 matches the E262?

In terms of how these phones wear, the A60 still actually has a slight protrusion on the hinge, but it's less pronounced and plastic instead of metal, and seems like it will be less bothersome which is definitely a plus. On the other hand, the A60 ear buds themselves aren't adjustable like the A50 (which can bend a bit and fit better) and so I expect the pushing on the ear wall will be an issue when these are worn longer.

In terms of looks, I definitely prefer the Colani design cobra thing, so cool.

Somewhat surprised about the sound, though I guess I understand what SONY was going for, getting more bass out of their top of the line stuff, but I gotta keep it real to my preferences, at least the initial impressions favor the A50, slightly buy surely.