Not that I was ever implying that! BUT, I would like to do a test to have each person turn the volume to their normal listening volume and test the SPL reading for it. Every headphone should easily be able to reach 95-100db without risking damage. I listen around 85-90db on average, and once in a while if there is a song I really enjoy I may get to the point of possibly hitting 100db. but this is for a few minutes at most. I've found that it seems average listening levels for most people i've done this spl test with is around 90-95db, and one person I know is actually listening around 70-80dB.
Nah, it's all good, I didn't think you were implying anything like that.
I find I start listening around 80 dB or so and by the end of the night both my listening and BAC levels have crept up bit - though I've never though to see how loud things had gotten at the end of such a session. A lot depends on what I'm listening too. I can't imagine listening at an
average level of 90 dB for any length of time though. Lana Del Rey's "Video Games" is playing on my LCD-4 right now and it's average level is sitting at 83 dB - much more than that I'd find her a bit shouty.
That's me though ... and I'm one of those unfortunate souls that can hear hiss down at 24 dB or so (e.g. the residual noise level using a Chord Mojo feeding SE846s) so maybe I'm just unusually sensitive to louder sound too.
I'm actually quite excited to hear your pair as you've confirmed it's not like the demo pair we had at the TOTL HP shootout meeting.
My M11 is more than capable to drive them very well, and likely three pairs at a time if we had them
The fundamental signature is the same as what we had at the shootout - but these are definitely performing a lot better and without the bass flutter.
I surely didn't get a good experience with the abyss and I truly want to give it another go!
Fit was an issue for almost everyone and that's a major part of getting these things to sound their best. In fact they're pretty tunable and I find myself adjusting the fit (mostly using the joint in the support to twist the cups forward or back) to get the best out of different types of music. I believe
@potkettleblack has the same experience. So ... fit might be an issue again - as personally I think they sound best with either a
very light seal or no seal at all and I have them adjusted in a way that fits me very well and with a high-degree of comfort and is easy to flip forward and back.
That means people aren't going to be able to bend the frames to get the best fit possible for them.
It seems there is a higher rate of failure with the Exotic cans. I've heard even the LCD4's have had a lot of driver issues or failures. I don't know this for certain, but have heard this from two different people as to why the delays have set in for the delivery of the LCD4's. The abyss seems to commonly have some reviews that are questionable. I really am glad to hear you got a good pair. I'm curious what would have actually been the cause for the failure? It's simply a guess. I find it hard to believe someone had over driven these drivers and caused the failure. Yet maybe some amps have pop's when you shut them off or even turn them on.
I've heard of a few failures with the first-driver revision of the LCD-4, but not of any with the new, 200 ohm, driver. The LCD-3 has a poor reputation for such failures though. And the demo Abyss we had was clearly broken. And those are the only driver issues/failures I've ever heard of that weren't down to the headphones being blatantly (if accidentally) abused. The most common thing I've seen there has been people turning up the volume because they weren't getting any sound, then realizing they hadn't actually hit "play" ... and then they hit "play" without thinking to turn the volume down and ... BOOM! They get a nasty surprise, possibly damage their hearing and destroy their cans.
A colleague of mine smoked his brand new HEX on my Lyr doing exactly that about two weeks ago.
I doubt any of those failures were due to actually listening too loud in normal use though.
--
Incidentally, I decided (this morning actually) to add the LCD-4 to my collection - so we can compare those with my Abyss and HD800S and your HEX.
