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Originally Posted by Bojamijams /img/forum/go_quote.gif
It would also depend on your music tastes.. classical music is not known to be bass heavy.. well except for maybe wagner's pieces.. so if that is what you mainly listen to, you probably don't notice it
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Bojamijams /img/forum/go_quote.gif
Acoustic and classical music does not go deep enough in the lower frequency range for you to know that there is a bass deficiency.
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Now this is a fun one, you really made my day with this one
Well, forget about Wagner (??) we are not talking about loud tones, we are talking about bass tones.
I have got a lot of tracks and samples in acoustical and classical music to assess the realism and fidelity of hifi devices. Think Bach+cello for a beginning, and then think harder, think "
pipe organ" : do you know that pipe organs can go as low as
16 Hz... And that some 64 feet organs can produce a
8 Hz sound.
Think also double bass (Ray Brown, as low as
41 Hz) and five-strings double bass (Renaud Garcia-Fons, as low as
31 Hz). You see what I mean ?
Think japanese and Gamelan gongs (
65 Hz), think percussion in general (first track of Rabih Abou Khalil's CD "Tarab").
And if you want both loud and bass music, try Mahler and Bruckner symphonies instead of Wagner...
You see, there ares plenty of acoustic instruments that can produce bass tones at a high level, especially in solo, and I use them for my tests. Classical music is not only Vivaldi's violins
The advantage of recorded acoustic samples (more or less, it also depends on the recording engineer, but I've got years of experience now) is that I know how they sound in reality (concerts), so I can tell if the (for instance) HM-801 + EM3 PRO is bass shy or not.
After checking this, I can listen to any kind of music, including (for instance) techno, transcore, electro, d&b, dubstep, or, talking about rich bass pop bands, Kraftwerk, Depeche Mode, Front242, Massive Attack.
Well now, to my taste, I might want from time to time more bass (when listening to dubstep for instance). But then I know that this is
a matter of taste and fun, not a lack of Hifiman+EM3 PRO fidelity (already checked with acoustical samples and with all my test CDs).
And there, praise Fang : there is an equalizer in the Hifiman, so just use it if you feel the mix/mastering or your headphone or the hifiman amp lacks bass.
By the way, some people around here complained about the lower quality of the Hifiman equalizer. I'm afraid this is not true again.
The output level of the equalizer is lower, not the quality
. And this is a very good thing to lower the ouput level of a few dB when an equalizer is to be used : because you might use +1dB here, +2dB there, and would the output level not have been reduced, then you would have a risk of saturation. So praise Fang for the Equalizer, and praise the wisdom to lower the output level of the equalizer.
I did not notice any lack of quality with the equalizer in the neutral position after I raised the volume back.
As a matter of fact I did not need to use the equalizer except for some Massive Attack tunes and dubsteps mixes when I want to have fun and bass excitement (I simply used the "Bass" setting in the equalizer). But it is all here : I am talking about
fun and excitement, not about high fidelity.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bojamijams /img/forum/go_quote.gif
And what are you getting all bent out of shape for? I know what bass deficiency is. I'm using them with JH-13 which is as top of the line as headphones get. How do you know its perfect regarding frequency response? Have you used a microphone and recorded and frequency response out of headphone out and line out? No? then you have no idea what you're talking about.
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Well, you can not imagine the tones of test CDs I have or made, based on acoustic samples mostly, but not only, to check and test each and every frequency response and other benchmarks of an hifi device. The Hifiman + EM3 PRO passed all the tests.
JH-13 are vey good headphones, and I guess perfectly balanced in terms of frequency range.
If you feel there is not enough bass, here are my hypothesis :
1) maybe your JH-13 is not compressive enough with respect to you ears (maybe air leaks if they are not well sealed to your ears)
2) or your JH-13 are perfectly sealed but the problem is either in the CD mix/mastering/recording and/or in your taste. The solution, as stated above is quite simple : try to use the built-in Hifiman equalizer.
3) or try your way : find an external amp increasing the bass response (but basically this is the same as point 2). Well, personally I would prefer a neutral amp used together with a digital equalizer rather than a coloured amp, but here only taste matters.)
4) or maybe the JH-13 PRO has a very different interaction with the Hifiman amp than the EM3 PRO does. But this would be weird : both are IEM with similar characteristics (well, almost : 119 dB and 29 ohms for JH13, 124 dB and 23 ohms for EM3 PRO). I do not know if the sensitivity difference can explain a different behaviour with the Hifiman amp. It actually might.
5) or, last hypothesis : the EM3 PRO is bass heavy and the Hifiman amp is bass light... This would explain why the association is perfect in frequency response for me. This is possible but improbable. Since the JH13 itself is not low in bass at all (JH put a punch in the 45-50 Hz region to reinforce the bass feeling and excitement without bluring the low medium), and the JH 13 can go down as low as 10 Hz, so.... So I do not understand...
==> To conclude, as far as high-fidelity and realism are concerned, based on all the varied acoustic samples and acoustic/classical music I have listen to (including rich bass samples), the Hifiman+EM3 PRO is a high fidelity device. I do not see why you dismiss this opinion.
Now, to your taste, or on some of your CDs, you would like to have more bass. My advice, but it's only an advice, would be : use the built-in equalizer (and raise the volume
)
But please, consider that people are reading all these comments and trying to make themselves an opinion. So please, do not use bold statements such as
"the amp is horrible" or
"Acoustic and classical music does not go deep enough in the lower frequency range for you to know that there is a bass deficiency", because you are making a fool of yourself.
It seems more reasonable to say (for instance) :
"To my taste, when listening to -insert here the music you are listening-, I would like more bass coming out from the Hifiman+JH13 PRO combo". This would make sense and be clear to everybody.
And well, as a matter of fact you almost did in the second part of your statement :
"the amp is lacking in bass so much that its just not overall a pleasing experience for 98% of my music". Therefore I do not understand why you reacted so strong to my post when I just pointed out that
in a high-fidelity point of view there was no problem with Hifiman+EM3 PRO.
Of course my conclusions are limited to Hifiman+EM3-PRO and would be VERY different for, for instance, Hifiman+Beyer DT990 !!
And I guess we all agree that the Line-out of the Hifiman is perfect in terms of frequency response (it is so easy for an hifi source to achieve a flat frequency response. For sources the challenge is elsewhere : transparency, details, soudstage, etc...). The beauty of the Hifiman is to be (as far as I know) the first device to achieve such a high degree of high fidelity is such a small volume.
Well, all in all, this is a very interesting discussion, but may be more appropriate in the "Appreciation Thread"
