[manveru]

Interesting. Nice work kingpage!

 

[Lorspeaker]

wow u guys are can-surgeons
i am no DIYer...
 
so i spent my whole evening swapping these around...
 

 
left to right...adaptors from DacportLX...Beyer....HM5
drumrorrrrrooooll......
 
and the winner is  DACPORTLXadaptor!
swear I could hear Trijntje Oosterhuis's throat, tongue, saliva swirling around in my ears...
soundstage less compressed...LIVE-ly significantly.
 
Beyer is a close 2nd...
 
HM5 adaptor sounded sharper, less depthful...not bad if u had not listen to the other adaptors.

 

[Typhoon859]

wow u guys are can-surgeons
i am no DIYer...

so i spent my whole evening swapping these around...



left to right...adaptors from DacportLX...Beyer....HM5
drumrorrrrrooooll......

and the winner is  DACPORTLXadaptor!
swear I could hear Trijntje Oosterhuis's throat, tongue, saliva swirling around in my ears...
soundstage less compressed...LIVE-ly significantly.

Beyer is a close 2nd...

HM5 adaptor sounded sharper, less depthful...not bad if u had not listen to the other adaptors.

You're suggesting the connector makes a difference? If a connection is faulty in some way, you might get a bit of distortion apart from obvious other things where a channel could simply drop out. Things like what you're describing couldn't be the effect of the adaptors. The results and relative associations may have been compelling to form such a conclusion but I'd like to sincerely inform you - it's placebo. Have somebody else do the task for you, keep your headphones on in the same position the whole time, and obviously have your eyes closed.

There can be a case where because of the dimensions of a connector, it can work better with a particular female counterpart, but even then you wouldn't get the kind of differences you described. It's simply not what effects those kinds of things.


Actually, I'll bring this to everyone here. Could crosstalk be an issue in this case and be the reason for potential differences? Although, if the dimensions and materials are the same, I wouldn't see how that could be a possibility either.

 

[Lorspeaker]

i know i am gonna get busted by some techqies sooner or later..

but thats as much experimentation i can muster from my sparepartsbox n emptyskull.

 
hmm the difference in sound...
its got to do with recycled materials from china..russia..and possibly germany...!? 

if any reader has a few adaptors lying around...dun mess with them. 

 

[peter123]

Thank you for the inspiration!
 
I really enjoy my HM5 and think that they're extremly comfortable.
 
I did the tape mod on the front vents and put in polyfill the same way you did.
 
Now I enjoy them even more

 

[punks15]

Some members on my local forum made some woody mod to FA003/HM5, i've tried it briefly and the woody cup make the sound warmer and slightly more bass
 
Some pic ;

 

[chipstjuven]

I covered all four vents with electrical tape, and wow. The sound is noticeably more balanced. Cleaner and less "dark". Some of the bass was lost, obviously, but if I ever feel like I miss a bit of rumble, I can always put on the bass boost on my E11!

 

[chipstjuven]

Will cotton work instead of polyfill?

 

[kingpage]

I don't see why not. But cotton can be prone to mold or other infestation.

 

[parnold]

Quote:

Some members on my local forum made some woody mod to FA003/HM5, i've tried it briefly and the woody cup make the sound warmer and slightly more bass
 
Some pic ;

this looks so awesome 

 

[punks15]

Quote:

this looks so awesome 

Beautiful isn't it?

 

[Noone025]

I received my pair on Tuesday, have been auditioning and playing with them since. I have been lightly interested in headphones and IEM's for a while, but now taking it more seriously, not just buying lots of heavily disc
 
Not really happy with them out of the box, they have some great attributes, but the overall sound is not one of them.
 
Comfortable, well built, good isolation, smooth overall sound. 
 
Lacking low end extension, recessed midbass, missing some sibilance.
 
I opened these up before they'd seen 5 hours of break-in, removed the internal padding and made a 2" wide disc on the back from felt tape. They sounded quite nice for a bit, but of course, they were still breaking in and became harsh in the areas that had been lacking.
 
I let them break in some more over the next few days, tried a few different combinations of filling.
 
Currently they have the stock dampening material in with a 1.5" cutout in the middle with the 2" felt tape behind. The bass is more pronounced, tigher, probably making the bass response peaky and lumpy, but sounding better to my ears.
 
Clocked up around 30 hours of breakin, tempted to keep playing, but not sure its a good idea until they've seen another 50 hours of play time.
 
Definitely lots of capability from the stock drivers and cups, just a matter of dialing in the materials to match what my ears want.
 
Pushing them with the iPhone 4 they sound pretty good, Fiio E10 is nice, bass boost is off, using the high gain switch to me makes the bass kicks tighter and top end a little shinier. Reading my own words I seem to be making monitors into casual listening cans. I'm happy with that...

 

[Typhoon859]

Quote:

I received my pair on Tuesday, have been auditioning and playing with them since. I have been lightly interested in headphones and IEM's for a while, but now taking it more seriously, not just buying lots of heavily disc
 
Not really happy with them out of the box, they have some great attributes, but the overall sound is not one of them.
 
Comfortable, well built, good isolation, smooth overall sound. 
 
Lacking low end extension, recessed midbass, missing some sibilance.
 
I opened these up before they'd seen 5 hours of break-in, removed the internal padding and made a 2" wide disc on the back from felt tape. They sounded quite nice for a bit, but of course, they were still breaking in and became harsh in the areas that had been lacking.
 
I let them break in some more over the next few days, tried a few different combinations of filling.
 
Currently they have the stock dampening material in with a 1.5" cutout in the middle with the 2" felt tape behind. The bass is more pronounced, tigher, probably making the bass response peaky and lumpy, but sounding better to my ears.
 
Clocked up around 30 hours of breakin, tempted to keep playing, but not sure its a good idea until they've seen another 50 hours of play time.
 
Definitely lots of capability from the stock drivers and cups, just a matter of dialing in the materials to match what my ears want.
 
Pushing them with the iPhone 4 they sound pretty good, Fiio E10 is nice, bass boost is off, using the high gain switch to me makes the bass kicks tighter and top end a little shinier. Reading my own words I seem to be making monitors into casual listening cans. I'm happy with that...

Well said sir.  When you initially said you weren't happy with them, a statement like that about these headphones in this price range really just demonstrates that a person doesn't know what they're talking about in an instance where a lot is said. I decided to keep reading and what you said is actually fairly accurate and your remark in the end about making them into casual listening cans is indicative that YOU DO know what you're talking about
 
What I'm planning on doing for that goal is just get a high quality tube amp.  I'm happy with their neutrality (do lack a little mid bass though) and I feel that they can be used for anything, with the proper pairing.  Modding them for casual listening directly I don't think is a good idea considering how revealing they are of whatever source you plug them into.  Modding them to something but neutral only biases them towards one source.  Changing the source to what you want to get from them I think is the better idea.  That's not to say that no modding should be done, but one that betters them for what they already are I feel is the way to go - something like the one in this thread .  Why make them into something they aren't?  If you were looking for the sound you seem to be describing, why get the HM5's at all?  You're essentially describing the Sony MDR-V6's..

 

[Electro-Static]

Has anyone tried using an Etymotic ER4p to ER4s resistor adapter with the HM5/Fa-003? I've tried it with my jaycar clones, that I can tell the frequency response is a bit more flat and the sound sounds colder, I prefer the sound without it. I was wondering if anyone with a better set up and more experience has tried this combo, and what their thoughts on it are. 

 

[White Lotus]

 

 

 


The wood is the only mod I've done to mine.