first a big thanks to sennheiser for the first class service getting a private listening session with the orpheus. i could listen to my own music wihtout time limit (was at the end two hours). about your question, i had the impression that the music flow was better after some minutes.
my expectations where high, so many of you have their wow moments. i have different deskop settings at home and listen to them every day at least for a hour. most of the time its either a auralic-yggdrasil-blue hawai-sr009 or a auralic-yggdrasil-ksa5-focal utopia setting. for the sr009 the tricky part for my was to have "some meet on the bone" sound, the sr009 is a airy sounding headphone with a extraordinary resolution, sound to light with a stax srm727. with my settings it's great but a bit on the lighter "airy" side. the focal has less resolution but plenty enough to get deep in to the music (with the sr009 sometimes you hear to much details, out of 100 recodings 3 are perfect/very good recorded/produced (try susan wong)). the utopias have this dynamic punch that i love and for the sr009 it's not always easy to deliver that especially when you listen with a low or moderate volume.
now the orpheus, i used the internal dac, a 8 times sabre es9018 chips. the resolution of this dac was good but not as good as the yggdrasil (or hugo) with the sr009 but a tad more details then with the utopia. so i think anyone who owns a orpheus should get also a great dac.
the overall character of the orpheus system leans more to my utopia setting then the stax setting. for me that was the best part, it's a electrostatic system that plays very organic, natural with great dynamics, superb vibrato, it's made first to enjoy the music and then to analyse it. soundstage was good and deep, a bit wider then the sr009 but not as deep/holographic; similar to the utopia. the utopias are great because they goes very linear down to the deepest bass regions, the orpheus delivers the same authority over the fq spectrum, the sr009 goes as deep but lighter on deepbass (but with a extra resolution). i have the impression that the tubes add a tiny bit of character to the sound, more then the blue hawaii, would rate my stax setting more neutral (i see the measured fq chart for this orpheus system (no13) and it shows down in the bass +1.5/2 db mids 0 db hights -1.5db). so overall it's for me the bigger brother of the focal or even the better trained twin, they have a lot in common. i would rate the stax system technical higher vs orpheus with the sabre dac (only linearity in the deepbass not as good), similar musicality, orpheus has that extra vibrato that i really like, first time i hear this so good with a electrostatic system. with a better dac i think the orpheus could win some more quality (resolution and better holographic stage), i think with a bette dac the orpheus and the sr009/blue hawai are quite equal, orpheus in front with his musicallity/linearity, the stax with his ultra resolution.
i must say that the amp is beautiful crafted, could not get better. the plastic parts on the headphone don't feel like 54k eur, would be nice if they used some premium material for it (carbon like the utopias). headphone fits nice, not to heavy, fine pressure, they get mild warm at the side because the electronics inside. you can chose how the buttoms and cover of the tubes are made off (gold is an option) and free choice of the stone (you can bring a sample) adds 5k to the price, standard is only white.
the orpheus is more a piece of art then a audio component, it needs a lot of time (try and error) to have a headphone system that sound as well as the sennheiser, so you pay the price for a complete system that was masterly fine tuned, absolutely fine for high-net-worth individuals looking for a "to go" system. i would like to see a more versitail system from sennheiser, a baby orpheus with stax plug. i let big speaker system go because i want to have multiple headphones / amplifers at hand to get the right sound for my mood at this hour, the perfect headphones does not exist in my world.
so we'll see if the orpheus catch my dreams the comming nights
, at the end it's a better investment then a car (from a depreciation view).
