[Achmedisdead]

My last JVC products before the S500's were the HAS-150 "Flats" which are a great value and sound pretty decent....and the HA-S600's, which again, good value and sound decent (I do use a bit of EQ with them). So I was surprised at first that there was an S500 that might be better than the S600, but Dsnuts was right before about the S600 and the AT WS55, so I trusted him to be right about the S500's. Little did I know that once I got the S500, I'd barely use anything else! 

 

[dimako83]

I am a little bit confused after reading all the posts in this thread. Saw a lot of discussions about the the ATH leathers/pleathers and Sennheiser HD25 pads. Can someone please give some more information about the difference between them and recommend which one of them would be a better choice?
 
 
Thank You

 

[Dsnuts]

Quote:

I am a little bit confused after reading all the posts in this thread. Saw a lot of discussions about the the ATH leathers/pleathers and Sennheiser HD25 pads. Can someone please give some more information about the difference between them and recommend which one of them would be a better choice?
 
 
Thank You

What type of sound you prefer.  Bassy, balanced, mid forward?

 

[bobeau]

Quote:

JVC, or Victor as it's still known in Japan, is a well known company in Japan. I've got a Victor MP3 player, Alneo XA-HD500, which was sold around 2005-2006. It has got a simple and very user friendly UI and excellent SQ. Too bad it's only 6GB, otherwise it might have become my favorite. Victor released some updated versions of the Alneo line of MP3 players, but after they merged with Kenwood, the Victor line of MP3 players was discontinued.
 
I've heard older portable JVC headphones while in Japan and frankly I wasn't too impressed. But I'm looking forward to trying the HA-S400 and S500 out the next time I go there.

 
Wow, I had no idea how big and innovative JVC is.  $660 BILLION in revenue in 2008.  Developed the VHS (so they kicked Sony's butt in that war).
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JVC

 

[rickdohc]

What type of sound you prefer.  Bassy, balanced, mid forward?

The Menu.
Just choose what you want and this S500 will just deliver.

 

[kevo108]

To those who did driver transplants, did these drivers sound good in anything?  My roommates pair was turned into parts by the residing dog. Headband is screwed, and they need a rewiring. but the drivers and cups are intact for the most part.
 
Edit: front of cups are not ok, rear of cups are bitten, but are mostly intact.

 

[7S Cameron]

To those who did driver transplants, did these drivers sound good in anything?  My roommates pair was turned into parts by the residing dog. Headband is screwed, and they need a rewiring. but the drivers and cups are intact for the most part.

Edit: front of cups are not ok, rear of cups are bitten, but are mostly intact.

I know Norm did a transplant into the S600s. I'm thinking about doing that myself.

 

[gmcmage]

Thanks for the huge thread, time to pick up a new toy!

 

[Achmedisdead]

Quote:

I know Norm did a transplant into the S600s. I'm thinking about doing that myself.

 I like the theory there, having these drivers in a circumaural headphone, but I think some of the joy would be lessened by the S600's kinda creaky build. Move your head around much while wearing them and you'll hear what I mean. It's a shame because they're fairly comfortable, assuming your ears fit into the cups.

 

[dimako83]

Quote:

What type of sound you prefer.  Bassy, balanced, mid forward?

Well that's a tough question That depends on the music genre I listen to and I listen to a lot of genres from acoustic and folk to electronic and rock. I can tell you that between the PortaPro and the PX-100 I prefer the sound of PX-100 
 
Thank You

 

[analogsurviver]

Quote:

 
Well, the FX-700s were what, about $300?  And then there were the $1000 or so DX1000. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe those started off the interest in JVC coming to head-fi and were well received, and then subsequently they came out with more value priced models.  To much of the world they might be Just Very Crappy (ha)... but inside Japan they could be considered to be a brand that produces quality stuff... is there anyone from Japan who can comment?  The rest of us have to import the good stuff.  That's a similar situation with Audio-Technica, before coming to head-fi I was only aware of them producing budget mics and recording equipment.  I guess now they sell their higher end headphones worldwide, but that certainly wasn't the case 7-8 years ago, where you had only AudioCubes/PriceJapan/Bluetin to get them from.  I remember what a revelation is was at a time that they had this rich history of fairly exotic wooden headphones that extended back into the 90s.  I picked up some used L3000s in late '05 for $1500 and I remember thinking to myself... holy crap, I just spent well over a grand for something from Audio-Technica.  Head-fi had totally warped my mind.
 
It's also not too far-fetched considering that VSonic's GR08 will be priced about the same and quite a few people are eagerly awaiting their release, including myself.  This adds another entry to the list of new IEMs in the $400-500 range, also including the 4.ai and UE900.  Hopefully a few head-fiers will pick up one and we can have some shootouts between the bunch   JVC and UE probably have the advantage as far as engineering resources and R&D budgets are concerned.
 
Have to say that the idea of a multi-driver dynamic is pretty insane.  Not sure how well that will fly, but I'm curious to find out...

Regarding what Japanese in general, not only JVC, export and keep to their shores, needs clear clarification. I was shocked in mid 70s to find it the hard way - Italian Stereoplay did issue then annually a special issue called Stereobest. The brutal truth - catalogues for Japan and for rest of the world
do overlap - for a couple of models in the entire line. What is top of the line for the rest of the world, is bottom for Japan. It was quite sobering to find top Mark Levinsons and Audio Researches of the day to be only mid priced components in Japan - check Uesugi etc etc - the price simply had at least one zero in yen too much, rendering the  first digit being 1 or 9 irrelevant. To further add to the insult, service manuals for Sansui from said period have labeled components like capacitor C123* - that * means models for Japan only. No closer toleranced components or bypass capacitors and other goodies for export ! Verified by myself by opening a few boxes - empty places on circuit boards.
 
JVC repeated this scenario by bringing only HA-S400 to US and keeping HA-S500 to Japan only - times have obviously not changed.

 

[Doc-holliday]

JVC repeated this scenario by bringing only HA-S400 to US and keeping HA-S500 to Japan only - times have obviously not changed.

Wow Analogsurvivor, that is VERY informative and makes total sense why they haven't (and prolly wont) release the has500 in the states. Thanks for that background info.

 

[kevo108]

So I'm  looking at cheap options to transplant these drivers in and I was wondering, does anyone have any idea/impressions on which cup/chamber these drivers would sound better in, between the HARX500 and the HARX300? These cups seen to have similar depth to the S500's and are designed around 40mm drivers.

 

[rhfactor1]

To do a transplant with another JVC headphone the first one you may want to check out is the HA-RX500 which can be purchased for about $20 USD or possibly the HA-S700 which can be purchased for abut $30 USD. The build quality I did not care for on the HA-S600, I thought it was a little bit flimsy. Happy Listening.

 

[bobeau]

Quote:

...I was shocked in mid 70s to find it the hard way What is top of the line for the rest of the world, is bottom for Japan. 
 
JVC repeated this scenario by bringing only HA-S400 to US and keeping HA-S500 to Japan only - times have obviously not changed.

 
My earliest memory of JVC was a 24" television we had when I was very young (like 4 years old, which would be about 1980) that probably weighed about 300 lbs.  I remember it being pretty craptastic, I think the only other JVC component I owned in my life was a VCR in college because it was one of the cheapest at Best Buy or Frys or wherever the heck I bought it.
 
I'm pretty much figuring at this point that any JVC goodness that head-fiers would be most interested in will remain imports for the foreseeable future.  The irony is we'll be paying more for the privilege.  But I bet the activity generated from this site is barely more than a blip in domestic sales.
 
Personally, I think alot of this is due to Sony's dominance over here on the upper end and the desire not to compete.  I imagine it is quite expensive to export and esp. market vertically, and *esp* back the 70s and even 80s there was a very anti-Asian made bias here.  Made in Japan no longer carries that bias, but made in China, Tawian, Singapore, etc, is still synonomous with being junk.  The funny thing about China though is they are essentially the kings of manufacturing and despite producing everything Apple, the average American hears 'made in China' and they immediate think junk.
 
EDIT: The big elephant in the room I must mention... I kinda have the feeling there are more audiophiles in Japan.  I don't mean per capita, I mean overall compared to the US.  My impression is Audiophiles generally a negative connotation in the US.  There's definitely a geek/loser bias.  That's a bit why "Beats are cool".