[tgx78]

I have both AEON and L300 (with L700 pads). They are equally enjoyable and I switch between the two depending on room temperature and ambience noise level. Aeon's bass does dig deeper than L300 and overall feels more dynamic, but L300's upper mids and treble feels smoother and overall slightly more resolving to me. Comfort is equally excellent on both.

 

[Bloos]

However, both of those headphones more closely follow the diffuse field curve than the Harman curve. (The latter is warmer and darker.)

https://m.imgur.com/ZFHCAX7
The AEONs at least follow the Harman curve (green overlay) more closely than the DF curve (already compensated red blue lines). Especially in the highs were it's up to ~10db off the DF but less than ~5db off of Harman.

Also another one I found
http://bilder.hifi-forum.de/max/792735/aeon-mit-target-response_750934.jpg
Edit: Sorry for taking about aeons in a STAX thread

 

[Music Alchemist]

https://m.imgur.com/ZFHCAX7
The AEONs at least follow the Harman curve (green overlay) more closely than the DF curve (already compensated red blue lines). Especially in the highs were it's up to ~10db off the DF but less than ~5db off of Harman.

Also another one I found
http://bilder.hifi-forum.de/max/792735/aeon-mit-target-response_750934.jpg
Edit: Sorry for taking about aeons in a STAX thread

You may be misunderstanding a few things. (For one, the red/blue lines are not the DF curve, but Tyll's compensated measurements for each headphone, which seem to be proprietary.)

I'll upload some old images @miceblue made of InnerFidelity STAX measurements with both curves superimposed.

The green line is the diffuse field curve while the black line is the Harman curve. (Ignore the red/blue lines.)

SR-207

https://www.innerfidelity.com/images/StaxSR207SB2217.pdf

SR-207 with EP-507 pads

https://www.innerfidelity.com/images/StaxSR207EP507LeatherPadsSerNumSB22217.pdf

Now you can compare those measurements alongside the ÆON to see how similar they are.

https://www.innerfidelity.com/images/MrSpeakersAEONPreProduction.pdf

If @miceblue wants to work some magic with a corresponding overlay image of both curves using that link, that would give everyone a better idea.

To be fair, there's not a large difference between either curve. However, nearly all planar magnetic headphones follow the green line (DF curve) in the bass, and most high-end headphones follow the DF curve more closely than the Harman curve.

 

[Bloos]

Doesn't Tyll use DF as his compensation curve? If miceblue's green line is the same DF curve you can just look at the red and blue. But yes there seems to be a difference.

Yes the differences aren't major between DF/FF/Harman but you do hear the slight differences. the research Harman is doing on this new-ish Target curve is just very convincing and modern. but of course preference plays a role for what you want in headphones.
What an I misunderstanding?
Edit: just saw you said Tyll't compensation curve is proprietary, man I could've sworn I saw him say he was using DF

 

[Music Alchemist]

Doesn't Tyll use DF as his compensation curve? If miceblue's green line is the same DF curve you can just look at the red and blue. But yes there seems to be a difference.

Yes the differences aren't major between DF/FF/Harman but you do hear the slight differences. the research Harman is doing on this new-ish Target curve is just very convincing and modern. but of course preference plays a role for what you want in headphones.
What an I misunderstanding?
Edit: just saw you said Tyll't compensation curve is proprietary, man I could've sworn I saw him say he was using DF

Here's an example of the more typical type of compensated measurements: http://en.goldenears.net/15856

Those show you how closely the measurements follow a target curve, with the target as a straight line and only deviations shown. (In the first "Perceived Frequency Response" section.) The way Tyll does his compensated measurements is different and is more akin to the raw measurements.

To really see how Tyll's raw measurements follow each curve, you have to superimpose the curves over them (similar to that second "Measured Frequency Response" section on the Golden Ears link), which requires a bit of image editing skill.

I would show you lots of planar magnetic measurements and how they follow the DF curve more or less perfectly in the bass instead of the Harman curve, but the files don't seem to be on the site anymore thanks to the switch from Huddler.

 

[Bloos]

Not sure, but you seem to assume that I know very little about compensation curves and planar magnetics, from all your posts addressing them, just bc i falsely assumed that Tyll used the DF compensation in his graphs, or by something else.

Edit: I just felt it was slightly condescending being the one addressed in second person (you) and through quotes, explaining details you could probably tell I already knew from my previous posts, when I only continued talking about the AEONs because you said that the AEONs follow the DF curve more closely than Harman's. Which just isn't the case.
From the measurements we have and the ones with the Harman overlay, posted above, you can see that the AEON's FR is already slightly under the harman curve after 3kHz. and since I knew the DF curve was brighter, it'd just be more off from that. Also the AEONs have the increased bass of the Harman curve after 200Hz.
But heck it might just be my lack of sleep that I'm feeling more irritable than usual. I apologize if I'm reading too much into this.

 

[Music Alchemist]

Not sure, but you seem to assume that I know very little about compensation curves and planar magnetics just bc i falsely assumed that Tyll used the DF compensation in his graphs

I didn't mean to imply anything about you; I just like to explain things clearly for anyone who is reading it. But it's obvious that he's not doing typical compensated measurements.

 

[Bloos]

Don't get me wrong, I love to learn and I appreciate the effort you put into explaining.

 

[Pokemonn]

if you guys care FR curve so much, please try Sonorworks systemwide calibration software. this software still doent have Stax HPs profiles yet. but hopefully near future...
and Ask @RudeWolf of sonorworks to add some Stax HPs profiles. That will fix Stax HPs FR curve issue.

https://www.sonarworks.com/
https://www.head-fi.org/f/threads/sonarworks-headphone-calibration-software.762969/

you can request Stax HPs profiles here(bottom of page form)
https://www.sonarworks.com/headphones/supported

 

[miceblue]

@Music Alchemist
I like the layering and spacial rendering of sounds with the SR-009, but I still don't like its tonal balance/overall sound signature. That's how I felt about the L700 too. I'd still keep the SR-207 since it nails the tonal balance/sound signature with a 2 kHz EQ reduction.


@Bloos
Tyll uses a modified DF compensation curve that has more bass as the 'neutral' line, kind of like the Harman target.


I wasn't a fan of the Æon when I heard it at CanJam SoCal. Maybe it was the rig though.

 

[Bloos]

@miceblue Thanks, that's good to know. If anyone else is wondering I just looked it up and Tyll says it's "compensated by the Independent of Direction compensating curve that came with my measurement head."

Might not be the rig, I remember you saying you prefer DF over Harman (H). Which I guess is why you didn't like the Sonoma or the new mr.speakers electrostat (assuming this is tuned that way)? Because they lack the bit excitement DF has over H?

 

[Music Alchemist]

if you guys care FR curve so much, please try Sonorworks systemwide calibration software. this software still doent have Stax HPs profiles yet. but hopefully near future...
and Ask @RudeWolf of sonorworks to add some Stax HPs profiles. That will fix Stax HPs FR curve issue.

https://www.sonarworks.com/
https://www.head-fi.org/f/threads/sonarworks-headphone-calibration-software.762969/

I've used Sonarworks Reference 3 Headphone with various headphones. (Sennheiser HD 800, Sony MDR-7506, Audio-Technica ATH-M50x.) You can do the exact same thing (and better) with your own EQ settings if you know what you're doing. Or if you're lucky you can find others' EQ settings that copy Sonarworks. Personally I don't like the idea of charging money for things that can be done for free. What I do value more, though, is their individual calibration service, which entails sending your headphones in to them so they can give them a more accurate calibration. However, the main downside for me is that (last time I checked) they use their own proprietary curve that doesn't sound the most neutral to me. For example, I think the stock FR of the SR-207 is already more neutral overall than the Sonarworks curve. That's another reason I think it's a better idea to equalize things yourself by ear, using frequency sweeps and lots of music. (And a measuring rig if you're hardcore.)

I like the layering and spacial rendering of sounds with the SR-009, but I still don't like its tonal balance/overall sound signature. That's how I felt about the L700 too. I'd still keep the SR-207 since it nails the tonal balance/sound signature with a 2 kHz EQ reduction.

Ah, so it is just tonal balance after all, eh? This means that you don't actually think it's a better headphone in terms of performance; you just like the tuning more. I'd like to see more headphone reviews comparing them after they've all been equalized to have roughly the same FR.

 

[Pokemonn]

I've used Sonarworks Reference 3 Headphone with various headphones. (Sennheiser HD 800, Sony MDR-7506, Audio-Technica ATH-M50x.) You can do the exact same thing (and better) with your own EQ settings if you know what you're doing. Or if you're lucky you can find others' EQ settings that copy Sonarworks. Personally I don't like the idea of charging money for things that can be done for free. What I do value more, though, is their individual calibration service, which entails sending your headphones in to them so they can give them a more accurate calibration. However, the main downside for me is that (last time I checked) they use their own proprietary curve that doesn't sound the most neutral to me. For example, I think the stock FR of the SR-207 is already more neutral overall than the Sonarworks curve. That's another reason I think it's a better idea to equalize things yourself by ear, using frequency sweeps and lots of music. (And a measuring rig if you're hardcore.)

i agree with you. i just tried EQ my SR-207 to B&K 1974 optimal hifi curve which i prefer. wow its sounded better than Sonorworks EQed HD650...LOL

 

[Music Alchemist]

Gotta love that improper English in STAX promo material. For your entertainment, here's a quote from the SR-L300 manual I just got:

Thank you very much for purchasing STAX earspeaker SR-L300.

• STAX's headphone, known as "Earspeaker", is an electrostatic product. Earspeaker makes sound using the power of static electricity, and which is different from the dynamic headphone driven by a pair of magnet and coil.
• Earspeaker has a sensitive rich sound performance, due to its ultra-thin film diaphragm, which is fully driven by the homogenously-distributed static electricity over it.
• As a product of advanced Lambda series, it is developed with the newest technology taking advantage of STAX long-years abundant experiences.
• Please enjoy the advanced Lambda sound.

 

[LaCuffia]

I have the L300 too and there's certainly no fancy instructions, manual or advertising material. Stax is like: "We don't bother with the fancy stuff. We are boss." No frills, just quality.

The L300 is very peculiar in that it has that smoothness of an e-stat but at the same time it's not polite or boring. It can produce some kick. Bass is surprisingly strong. It might be the driver unit I am using (the SRM-1 Mk 2), not sure, but the L300 doesn't make you miss dynamic headphones.