Hi. My first post in this thread. I'm now on my 3rd pair of DT880s due to several issues with them. My first pair was the 250 ohm version. They soon developed a fault and cut out on one channel. The next pair seemed to clunk very loudly when moving the ear cups. This was due to the metal bar rubbing the metal headband. That sound got so bad over time that sometimes when you moved your head you would head and feel this clunk as the metal rubs. I have since got the 600ohm premium version and they seem better in this area. The issue with these though is that the adjustment seems sooo slack. maybe it is because on the pro version, the metal is powder coated in black paint and it makes it fractionally thicker? I find these slip way too easily. What I have done is put some grey PVC tape around to stop them shrinking back to the minimum size and they hold themselves in the right size for me pretty well now.
Onto other things. I'm impressed with the wound of these. But they are not easy to power. I use a FiiO A3 and on high gain, I can just about get what I want out of them. Though they are not quite loud enough on quiet recordings. I tried the FiiO A5 but that barely was any louder and given the price and power difference over the A5, i was very disappointed and ended up returning it. The majority of the time, they are certainly loud enough though. But the thing is, I find them lacking in bass just a little. And the problem with the a5 bass boost is although the frequency of the bass it boosts is spot on, it distorts rather a lot with bass heavy music when it is close to it's maximum volume. What I found is the best way of changing the sound of my DT880s is changing the ear pads.
Here are some that I tried.
On the right are the original AKG K550 ear pads that I bought as spares for my K550s as i know they don't last that long. Just to see, although I know they are too big, I tested them. They are made of some sort of materiel that traps the bass. It makes the DT880s become bass heavy and rather muddy, but it was worth trying. The pair in the middle are these:
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Velour-C...h=item1ee1a1a76f:g:xZgAAOSwRdNbBm-B:rk:2:pf:0
These feel horribly cheap given the price they were. They are very firm and not very comfortable. But the design is the sort I could do with getting. Just a much better quality one. on the underside of these, they are a solid sort of material. but soft on top. This results in the sound being somewhere between the original ear pads and the K550 ear pads. Unlike the originals which seem to absorb a lot of the bass (possibly because of all the holed going through to the foam in the ear pads), these ones don't allow that. They sound tighter, add more punch to the bass and actually partially remove that spike in the treble which can be a bit much at times. What I could do with is new ear pads of this same design. solid material on the underside and soft on top. The K550 pads show that all being solid results in a really muddy sound. Similar results to what someone else posted when trying what looked like pads with similar material.
The problem with the ones that I like the sound of is that they seem so poor in quality just because they are a slightly different size and also have a slightly different feel to them. But they sound great.I did also try adding some PVC tape over all the holes on the original ones. That pretty much did exactly what i wanted, but it was messy and didn't stay on long. But I know it must be possible to get the right sound with the right pads.
I think I could do with some brainwavz pads of some sort but I'm not sure what ones to get. I want there to be a little more bass and possibly a slight reduction to the treble, but not by much. Just to make them sound more flat. I'm in the UK so a suggestion of a product from a uk page on amazon or Ebay would be great.
Also may as well add that I've recently watched one of the best reviews I've seen on headphones.
Comparing the DT880s, AKG K702s (i've had both) and the Sennheiser HD58X. In my view, the way he records the headphones is incredibly accurate compared to the original recording. Now I don't have my K702s anymore, listening to this almost does remind me of them again. Strange. It also explains the problems with these DT880s. That treble. I have the Audio Technica ATH-AD700s and that has a big bump in the treble. But it somehow doesn't sound quite as artificial or boosted as the DT880s. This odd sound is a problem that almost totally goes when i used those cheap ear pads that I mentioned earlier. While also making the bass a bit nicer. About the HD58X, i don't see it available anywhere in the UK at all. And that really really sounded good! Like people said in the video replies. It seems there is very little difference between the original recording and it being played and recorded through the HD58x. While the DT880s sounded good, they clearly have this spike that can understandably ruin the sound a bit for some. But there are solutions for it.
Like I said, if anyone could suggest earpads for me, that would be great.