nordkapp
Headphoneus Supremus
I have a pair to exchange for your sr009. Lol
I have a pair to exchange for your sr009. Lol
"The Aeon is going to knock its big brothers Ether C and Ether C Flow of to take the top spot on the Wall of Fame as outstanding over-ear, sealed headphone."[/I]
Something worth noting is that when a bunch of people say that their measurements correlate, you have to take into account that amateur measurements rigs are calibrated against Tyll's, or someone else's system.
More midrange depression compared to the other two headphones sure, but it could also be argued that the other two headphones have much greater top end emphasis and boosting. The Utopia in particular also has an upper mid bump. I think the point I'm trying to make is, there isn't really an ideal here. The way you're comparing the MDR-Z1R to the other headphones, is as if you are implying the other headphones have the balance right, and that it is the MDR-Z1R that is imbalanced or improper, and I disagree with that implication or notion.
My personal subjective belief is that for too long, audiophiles and journalists have been presenting an inaccurate account of what "neutral" or "balanced" actually is. I believe manufacturers were making their headphones more articulate and detail orientated with headphones like the AKG K701, T1, HD800, Grados etc, to promote the idea that the revealing nature of such sound signatures were the pinnacle of accuracy, and justified the high price tags. Personally I think these headphones weren't actually neutral, accurate or necessarily ideally balanced, but instead, detail orientated and verging on the colder side, lacking tonal accuracy, and the emotive and atmospheric properties present in, for example, high end speaker set ups. In that respect, I actually feel like headphones such as the MDR-Z1R, do a better job of replicating the authenticity of live performances or recordings, and are ironically in many ways better balanced, despite having somewhat of a bass emphasis.
We need to get rid of the notion that headphones with treble or detail emphasis are automatically more accurate or balanced, as well as the belief that a perfectly flat response curve is also somehow indicative of an ideal sonic balance. It isn't.
Ironically, the estimated Harmon Kardon target response curve does also have a recessed midrange, along with a bump in bass, and a tremendous bump in the upper mids and highs. I believe they're working on a specific headphone variant.
Here's Tyll's headphone estimated version.
Guess which measurements you go with . Sonically the TH-900s and PS1000 are significantly more "U" shaped.
The LCD-XC 2016 and Ether Flow C and a more flat. But I definitely put the Z1Rs here as three of my top choices for closed headphones.
It's good to see that an old guy in a Hawaiian shirt can cause such a stir.
What a world we live in. (Context: late night w/ alcohol).
G
I'll just refer back to my rough mega comparison which uses N00b's MDR-Z1R measurements (which are extremely similar to Jude's) to highlight some of the above.
well you could also argue that the z1r has the flattest fr of the four but that would be implausible. i know that headphone measurements are subject to interpretation but that doesn’t give us a licence to only see what we want to see. and i’m not implying anything but what i’m saying is that the measurements you have posted indicate that the z1r has the most uneven fr of the four headphones. all four headphones deviate from the “ideal” fr, but the z1r departs from it the most as i see it.
the olive and welti target curve doesn’t have a recessed midrange. the midrange doesn’t dip below flat actually but it does continue to rise all the way through to the treble peak at 3khz. the bass is also accentuated. tyll’s version is incorrect according to dr olive but again, the midrange never dips below flat. and remember that the Harman headphone target response curve is still a work in progress.
you can prefer the z1r’s frequency response to the others, but you can’t logically argue from your “personal subjective belief” that “audiophiles and journalists have been presenting an inaccurate account of what "neutral" or "balanced" actually is”.
I think another thing worth noting regarding these amateur rigs is that they are amateur. Sony is the world's largest vendor of headphones with 17% of the entire market. They have the resources to provide the capital expense and R&D costs to maintain the highest quality measurement infrastructure, on top of operating a factory full of artisans to hand build these things. By comparison, Tyll is a guy in a garage with a dummy head on a shoe string budget doing his best.
Which isn't necessary to slight Tyll in any way, but I think these discussions tend to very quickly lose their context and the frame of reference in which decisions can be made regarding headphones. Tyll's commitment to consistent probably means that if one headphone relatively measures higher in treble regions compared to another, you may be able to reasonably conclude that comparison will be valid. But to echo Dan Wiggin's excellent insightful contribution here, comparing measurements across rigs is prone to problems - and trying to shoe horn and project things like the Harman curve onto results from Tyll (or anyone else) is probably an exercise in futility.
As an objective frame of reference, measurements from a consistent source let you reasonably compare headphone sound signatures, but do not take things a step further and assume you can reasonably deduce what is "right" from "wrong" by such a frame of reference.
Tyll is simply a reviewer. Tyll himself has his own sonic preferences and things he looks for in headphones. You might not share those views. Other people might not share those views. It's all gravy.
One rule of thumb I would have for individuals contributing to this thread - try not to have strong opinions before you have even listened to a headphone. And unless you try different things, you can't possibly know definitively what you actually enjoy, which to remind everyone, is the ultimate point of this hobby (yes, even those who enjoy accuracy above all ).
I will go out on a limb here and predict the test very close to the original set Tyll tested, which is the result we should expect if the headphones are not sonically different.
Well, headphones like the AKG K240, HD 600, HD 650 and the HD 800 are used by studio's so you could say that they are balanced / neutral.
Not saying that the HD 800 doesn't have an annoying peak though.