[Ciggavelli]

Any suggestions for a hard shell travel case for the 1266?

I've been looking into this myself. I think the best (and possibly only) option is to get a customizable Pelican Case.

https://www.amazon.com/Pelican-1450...ocphy=9027719&hvtargid=pla-435644386450&psc=1

I need to look into exact dimensions, etc., but it should work and be better than a traditional headphone case (my LCD2s had the pelican case, and it worked pretty well, aside from being big and awkward).

 

[astrostar59]

New Abyss owner
Hi all. I took delivery of my new Abyss Phi TC today. So far I am very impressed / excited about the performance.

A few questions on the fit. I probably have a smallish to medium head. Initially The frame was fully closed, and I put the cups with the seam at 10 o'clock. The cups felt to me quite high on contact pressure, almost the same as my LCD4. So I tried many different positions, and finally seemed to settle on fully open frame, and the cup seem at 11 o'clock. The point of main contact of the cups is above my ear, and middle and lower area beyond my ear is feather light touch. In fact the bottom of the cups is floating maybe 2mm of my face.

This position seems to have the best soundstage, bass extension and 3D presentation.

Does this sound like the same setting you guys use? I wonder if the drivers need a bit of gap to flow, enable extension. I 'normal' tighter seal would make the drivers have to work against the pressure created inside the cup cavity? Or am I on the wrong track here?

How do they burn in? Does the signature change at all? I wanted to know what to expect going forward.

I don't have my LCD4s here, and am driving the Abyss of my lower DAC, a modded Audio Note 4.1. But I must say, I like the Abyss a LOT. I can understand why it has such a big following. It has a unique sound I think, a blend between the LCD4's bass and mids, and the speed and transparency of the Stax 009 driven by the BHSE. But so far, without the boldness to the treble or the forward and synthetic presentation I found with my 009.

 

[astrostar59]

New Abyss owner
Hi all. I took delivery of my new Abyss Phi TC today. So far I am very impressed / excited about the performance.

A few questions on the fit. I probably have a smallish to medium head. Initially The frame was fully closed, and I put the cups with the seam at 10 o'clock. The cups felt to me quite high on contact pressure, almost the same as my LCD4. So I tried many different positions, and finally seemed to settle on fully open frame, and the cup seem at 11 o'clock. The point of main contact of the cups is above my ear, and middle and lower area beyond my ear is feather light touch. In fact the bottom of the cups is floating maybe 2mm of my face.

This position seems to have the best soundstage, bass extension and 3D presentation.

Does this sound like the same setting you guys use? I wonder if the drivers need a bit of gap to flow, enable extension. I 'normal' tighter seal would make the drivers have to work against the pressure created inside the cup cavity? Or am I on the wrong track here?

How do they burn in? Does the signature change at all? I wanted to know what to expect going forward.

I don't have my LCD4s here, and am driving the Abyss off my lower DAC, a modded Audio Note 4.1 and the V281, not my Aries Cerat Genus.
But I must say, I like the Abyss a LOT. I can understand why it has such a big following. It has a unique sound I think, a blend between the LCD4's bass and mids, and the speed and transparency of the Stax 009 driven by the BHSE. But so far, without the coldness to the treble or the forward and synthetic presentation I found with my 009.

 

[szymonsays]

New Abyss owner
Hi all. I took delivery of my new Abyss Phi TC today. So far I am very impressed / excited about the performance.

A few questions on the fit. I probably have a smallish to medium head. Initially The frame was fully closed, and I put the cups with the seam at 10 o'clock. The cups felt to me quite high on contact pressure, almost the same as my LCD4. So I tried many different positions, and finally seemed to settle on fully open frame, and the cup seem at 11 o'clock. The point of main contact of the cups is above my ear, and middle and lower area beyond my ear is feather light touch. In fact the bottom of the cups is floating maybe 2mm of my face.

This position seems to have the best soundstage, bass extension and 3D presentation.

Does this sound like the same setting you guys use? I wonder if the drivers need a bit of gap to flow, enable extension. I 'normal' tighter seal would make the drivers have to work against the pressure created inside the cup cavity? Or am I on the wrong track here?

How do they burn in? Does the signature change at all? I wanted to know what to expect going forward.

I don't have my LCD4s here, and am driving the Abyss of my lower DAC, a modded Audio Note 4.1. But I must say, I like the Abyss a LOT. I can understand why it has such a big following. It has a unique sound I think, a blend between the LCD4's bass and mids, and the speed and transparency of the Stax 009 driven by the BHSE. But so far, without the boldness to the treble or the forward and synthetic presentation I found with my 009.

This is exactly how i feel about the Abyss house sound!

 

[astrostar59]

So back to the fit, how much contact / pressure do you have your zero'd at?

 

[tholt]

Your fit sounds similar to mine. There is a video made by Abyss posted somewhere (maybe do a youtube search) that shows the basics of adjustment. In general for me, expanding the headphone frame increases air and soundstage, contracting closes the stage a bit but gives more intimacy. I've been playing around with fit ever since I got them, I don't think there is ever a 'right' way, it almost depends on the recording or mood. I had my pads anywhere from 9 oclock to 11 or 11:30. Going down the clock increases the air gap on the bottom (space between pad and face) which acts kind of like a bass port = more bass. I'd just play around with rotating the cups and increasing/decreasing the width of the frame. It's all individual.

FYI I currently have the frame pretty much all the way out and pads are at 10 oclock. The pads are very lightly touching my head at the tops, there is a slight gap at the bottom and the whole thing can swing front to back pretty freely.

 

[Hoegaardener70]

Hi there, I am also a fairly new abyss ab-1266 tc owner and experienced first hand how hard it can be to find the right setting. To be honest, at the beginning I found these headphones REALLY uncomfortable but it is much better now, I set the pads to 11 o’clock position. Initially I had them float at my ears, but I now adjusted them to envelop my ears, in traditional headphone style. I find that keeping the pads too far away creates distortions in the mids. I also bent the metal frame quite a lot, otherwise the pads would put too much pressure on my ears. Don’t worry bending, it wont break (I guess).

 

[FLTWS]

I have to fully extend my Phi's (bought 11/17) or they wont fit over my head and I'm reluctant to do too much bending to the corners and changing the angle of the driver to my ears.
At the 3 o'clock position I get the highest pressure and it's almost all above the ear but not excessive. At the 12 o,clock position the pressure is equalized all the way around the ear and the pressure is light.
On my head / jaw every step between the 3 and 12 o'clock positions (looking into the left driver) changes pressure locations incrementally as I move between the two extremes.
But everyone's head / jaw will be different so you got to figure it out over time for yourself. It's possible that one side could be 1 position different from the other for the most comfortable fit and / or best sound.
Your lucky if you don't have to fully expand the head band like I do, you should have a lot more options to find a good fit.
There's no one right setting, you figure it out over time, and I even like to change it up every now and then for a change of pace.
The Abyss is the only phone I'm aware of that provides so much flexibility when it comes to fit, your not stuck with one fixed position. I guess it could be considered a pro and a con at the same time for someone who doesn't like fiddling.

 

[MacedonianHero]

New Abyss owner
Hi all. I took delivery of my new Abyss Phi TC today. So far I am very impressed / excited about the performance.

A few questions on the fit. I probably have a smallish to medium head. Initially The frame was fully closed, and I put the cups with the seam at 10 o'clock. The cups felt to me quite high on contact pressure, almost the same as my LCD4. So I tried many different positions, and finally seemed to settle on fully open frame, and the cup seem at 11 o'clock. The point of main contact of the cups is above my ear, and middle and lower area beyond my ear is feather light touch. In fact the bottom of the cups is floating maybe 2mm of my face.

This position seems to have the best soundstage, bass extension and 3D presentation.

Does this sound like the same setting you guys use? I wonder if the drivers need a bit of gap to flow, enable extension. I 'normal' tighter seal would make the drivers have to work against the pressure created inside the cup cavity? Or am I on the wrong track here?

How do they burn in? Does the signature change at all? I wanted to know what to expect going forward.

I don't have my LCD4s here, and am driving the Abyss off my lower DAC, a modded Audio Note 4.1 and the V281, not my Aries Cerat Genus.
But I must say, I like the Abyss a LOT. I can understand why it has such a big following. It has a unique sound I think, a blend between the LCD4's bass and mids, and the speed and transparency of the Stax 009 driven by the BHSE. But so far, without the coldness to the treble or the forward and synthetic presentation I found with my 009.

Congrats! I was actually talking to Joe from Abyss this afternoon and I mentioned that I found the TC the most "stat-like" non-stat headphones I've ever heard. Throw in wonderful ortho bass, beautiful mids and refined treble and add a dash of some of the very best sound staging I've heard, they are definitely one of my favourite headphones of all time! Don't worry about a tighter seal, I've found that these headphones sound best loose-fitting.

 

[GU1DO]

Any suggestions for a hard shell travel case for the 1266?

Same question ,, though i have the Deluxe edition with the that fancy leather bag but i want more practical option .

 

[simorag]

So I tried many different positions, and finally seemed to settle on fully open frame, and the cup seem at 11 o'clock. The point of main contact of the cups is above my ear, and middle and lower area beyond my ear is feather light touch. In fact the bottom of the cups is floating maybe 2mm of my face.

This position seems to have the best soundstage, bass extension and 3D presentation.

I also have a smallish head and it seems we went to a similar fame / pads arrangement.
My setup is shown in this post.

After almost 2 years of AB-1266 ownership, the fit is now very plug-and-play for me and I don't need to fiddle anymore. But, as @FLTWS has written, it is a nice option you still have at your disposal - once you realize what are the effects - to slightly change the sound presentation when you feel like it.

How do they burn in? Does the signature change at all? I wanted to know what to expect going forward.

I noticed some changes in the first 50h or so, where the bass tightened a bit, the mids and treble became even more transparent, loosing that small hint of 'nasality' I heard straight out of the box.
Can't exclude it was my brain / hearing burning-in, though

 

[astrostar59]

OK, these things are really rocking now.

Many more positions and tweaking. I came back to my position last night, with contact above my ear against my glasses, and really floating over my ears, minimal contact.

And the top frame swivelled inwards about 4-5°. Damb the soundstage is HUGE, cavernous, I can sit in it and be lost, like a massive cavern 100 feet deep and 500 feet wide, with musicians floating around the space. It is truly a breakthrough headphone this thing.

It reminds me a bit of the Jecklin Float, but without the hollow suckout and low bass issues.

Compared to my LCD4, I still love that HP and have a well established soft spot for it. It is more intimate, calmer and warmer, like a jazz club, a big leather sofa. It has it's place for sure. The Abyss has more insight to the event, masses of information and texture, no harshness or noticeable peaks or troughs. I have my DAC feeding the V281 amp via Roon, with no DSP. On the LCD4 I used the Audeze DSP and added +1.5 at 4-6K. The Abyss is basically straight through. This in turn removed a loss using DSD and it is not a free lunch, some SQ is lost. The bass on the LCD4 is the thing, it is centre stage. The mids flow well into it, and it's treble is lower energy and more recessed. Detail is there, but it is harder to follow. This in turn emphasis the bass and it takes over slightly. There is a place for that signature, and it is super forgiving on lower quality sources. I can't tell until I get the Abyss hooked up to my main DAC and Genus amp, but I get the impression it is scaling really well. For example some tracks really pop out from others, i.e.e there is another level of joy I haven't heard yet. This makes me think the Abyss will take off on my Genus tube amp, give it more to work with and a great match. Tube treble has always done for me. My DAC I am using now is tubed output R2R, but is well below my Kassandra DAC.

The speed of the Abyss matches my Stax 009, and am 100% sure of that. But the way it plays is very un-stat like, it doesn't have the floaty ethereal treble of the 009 which I never got to grips with totally. In other words, I am more convinced by the Abyss, the illusion is more complete, less hi-fi.

So, a happy bunny. The fit is a bit of a new aspect, even though I have owned Stax for 25 years, and planers and others for 5 years. The fit thing is well worth the effort. It may put some newbies off, and bug others. But a bit of patience pays of big time. Well done Joe and the guys at JPS Labs. I can't imagine getting beyond this level of performance with anything else, even the HE-1.

Off to Can-Jam tomorrow, too much fun being had.....

 

[Hoegaardener70]

Hi there, I plan to buy some aftermarket cable for the Abyss AB-1266 TC. I am very excited to get rid of the stock cable, I think it actually sounds great but I do not like its feel, which is an important part of the listening enjoyment. I do not like to have too much stuff lying around, and I know i won’t use it once the aftermarket cable arrives. So, do you think the cable is sellable and how much one could sell it for?

 

[jlbrach]

the stock cable is surprisingly good...you have to spend a lot of money to improve on it although I do agree that it isnt the most comfortable to use

 

[Hoegaardener70]

the stock cable is surprisingly good...you have to spend a lot of money to improve on it although I do agree that it isnt the most comfortable to use

Agreed - no issue at all with sound. The only problem is also with my setup location, and the way the two separate wires tangle. I could of course just tape them together