[philodox]

Quote:

Originally Posted by morphie Yep, my words exactly. Balanced is the fitting word, and most impressive the best impression.

Now you just need to recable them balanced and run them out of your DAC1's XLR outputs.

 

[aeroes]

Quote:

Originally Posted by morphie The bass is not deficient, it is different. This bass is BALANCED, it has the sound the bass really should have. Grado's bass is much fuller, but not as deep, detailled, or fast. It doesn't have the impact of this bass, but it has more slam. Those are first thoughts mind you, but they are quite flagrant. I'm now listening to Van Halen - I'm The One, everything is fast in this song, guitar drums and bass, I'll try to say a few words about it: Bass: The bass is fast and never stops in this song. It has alot of impact from the start, and although all instrumebnts are well balanced and you can listen to everything, picking one out and listening to it is very easy. I can't really describe such a bass, I am a bass player myself, and this is exactly what my bass sounds like. I don't think you can do any better in terms of bass. It has impact, depth, and the right amount of slam so you can tell exactly which notes the musician is playing, even when they're played very quickly and almost together, you can tell them apart. Drums: Surround effect. The drums go from behind my left ear to behind my right ear passing right in front of me. This is nice I like it. The drums are comparable to the RS-1s drums in terms of detail and impact. They are however, much faster with the SA5000. Guitars: It literally cries, due to the aluminum cups, and because the sound is extremely fast and detailled, the crying is emphasized. I would say the highs are very slightly above normal level (if normal level is the same as most people on this forum), but it's perfect for me Edit: This is in my setup btw. Computer FLAC--->Transit--->DAC-1--->RA-1 clone--->SA5000. I think my need for a tube amp just grew a bit more...

Thank you very much for the bass info!

Helps me a lot which one to buy

Now, my SA1000 will be seen in the For sale/trade forum soon!

 

[number1sixerfan]

A lot of people rave about these phones in the beginning and then end up selling them. Not flaming or anything just something I observed. Hope you enjoy them. I want to try them one day.

 

[morphie]

Thanks for all the replies

I'm glad I helped those who weren't sure get a better idea of the sound of these cans.

number1sixerfan: I think lots of people who have bought a pair still have it, and those very people are the closest to thinking the same way as me about these phones in a setup remarquably similar to mine - I wouldn't say anything I didn't mean about these cans, and nothing I said was exaggerated imho. I've been doing A/B testing for the past few hours between SA5000 and my beloved sr325i using DAC-1+RA-1 or DAC-1 alone, and the difference is really there.

It is a different sound than the Grados, not as forward, but that forwardness that I love with the Grados is replaced by more detailled and faster sounds, which in a way, if not as in-your-face as Grados, is more forward in a neutral kind of way. The Grado sound is colored, the SA5000s reproduce the recording to its best, and the difference in detail is there.

I won't say one is better than the other because each has its own sound, but so far, everything I've listened to sounds better, from rock to metal to jazz to reggae to drum n bass to hiphop to piano soloists concerts - everything is simply better sounding and more enjoying with the SA5000 so far. Maybe I'll get bored of neutrality soon, but frankly speaking, I highly doubt it

 

[TwoFiveOne]

Congrats, morphie, enjoy those cans!

I, for one, love mine. When compared to my SA5ks, all my other cans are "just passin' through."

 

[Jahn]

i never had a prob with the SA5K's bass. i like its bass.

 

[myhui]

I just mail-ordered my SA5000 last night (for less than US$370 including shipping), and I'm curious whether anyone has compared the SA5000 to the Qualia 010 phones. I bought the SA5000 since I noticed there's much sharing of components between the two, and the SA5000 appears to be the mass market version compared to the ultra-exclusive Qualia version.

 

[Dr.Vencman]

I am also seriously considering getting these cans. Does anybody know if they are an "upgrade" from the Beyer 880s?

And do the Sa5000s touch your ears at all? Maybe a bit of a picky question but the Beyer's really drive me nuts because of this. The inside of my headphones push down on the top right of my ears and after a while it starts to feel really uncomfortable. (And no I don't have really big ears of anything

)

 

[xelloss12]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr.Vencman And do the Sa5000s touch your ears at all? Maybe a bit of a picky question but the Beyer's really drive me nuts because of this. The inside of my headphones push down on the top right of my ears and after a while it starts to feel really uncomfortable. (And no I don't have really big ears of anything )

I've had that problem with the DT880s before, though it was never uncomfortable. But the SA5000s don't touch my ears at all.

 

[morphie]

They dont touch my ears either

 

[acs236]

I'm glad you'r enjoying them.

Regarding aluminum. I'll reexamine mine when I get home, but I had previously concluded that only one part is metal (at best, it's hard to tell) and that the rest is some sort of plastic.

 

[morphie]

Everything silver on mine is made of metal which I believe to be aluminum. The only plastic is the drivers themselves

 

[akwok]

I think it's magnesium alloy, rather than aluminum.

The SA5K's are fantastic, but I have nothing to bench it against, so I don't know if it really is 'my sound'. They seem a bit screeching at times, i.e. with extremely high vocals your ears tend to hurt a bit.

The build quality is amazing. EXTREMELY light. Although the stand is pretty poop..

 

[donunus]

how are these compared to the cd3000?

 

[DaHoboFest]

what is speed? like when describing cans.