[jazzwave]

Back to basic question as noob.
What is inside cup of headphone (I never open), driver only or driver + small electronic schematic (x-over)?

CMIMW, what I understand driver/speaker it self not produce soundstage...I suspect headphone producer add "something" to make their headphone produce soundstage (narrow or wide/big).
From my experience with my stereo set, I can set up bigger soundstage by rolling the tube on amplifier. Tungsol 6SU7GTY has bigger soundstage than 6SN7.

~ronni~

 

[Strangelove424]

Just a driver. No crossover. Crossovers are only for speakers with multiple woofers or woofer and tweeter. It's there to send frequencies to the right driver. Some headphones can have all sorts of things in the housing... noise cancelling chips, resistors to increase ohms, acoustic padding. By and large, it just a driver though.
 
What the tube source probably changes is the frequency response. If the source is colored, like a tube amp, it can change frequency response and effect the perception of depth. You can also effect soundstage the same way via DSP or EQ.

 

[jazzwave]

Just a driver. No crossover. Crossovers are only for speakers with multiple woofers or woofer and tweeter. It's there to send frequencies to the right driver. Some headphones can have all sorts of things in the housing... noise cancelling chips, resistors to increase ohms, acoustic padding. By and large, it just a driver though.


 


What the tube source probably changes is the frequency response. If the source is colored, like a tube amp, it can change frequency response and effect the perception of depth. You can also effect soundstage the same way via DSP or EQ.

 


Thanks for the brief...

Sometimes change cable (interconect or speaker cable) also has effect the perception of depth.
I enjoyed read this thread, really open my mind...keep rolling

 

[Strangelove424]

Once the levels are matched, there's no chance the cable can effect soundstage... unless it's too thin of gauge for the speaker resistance or distance of run, or otherwise defective. Money spent on expensive cables is money lost. Monoprice makes great cables, I'd stick with that. Put the money toward something better like headphones or music.    

 

[bigshot]

Well I had long held that opinion from experience with many headphones myself until hearing the AKG phones.  And for all I know they might not work for others with differently shaped ears.

Do you have a speaker system that you use as a serious listening rig?

 

[money4me247]

  Just a driver. No crossover. Crossovers are only for speakers with multiple woofers or woofer and tweeter. It's there to send frequencies to the right driver. Some headphones can have all sorts of things in the housing... noise cancelling chips, resistors to increase ohms, acoustic padding. By and large, it just a driver though.
 
What the tube source probably changes is the frequency response. If the source is colored, like a tube amp, it can change frequency response and effect the perception of depth. You can also effect soundstage the same way via DSP or EQ.

 
Quote:

  Once the levels are matched, there's no chance the cable can effect soundstage... unless it's too thin of gauge for the speaker resistance or distance of run, or otherwise defective. Money spent on expensive cables is money lost. Monoprice makes great cables, I'd stick with that. Put the money toward something better like headphones or music.    

 
+1. This is all very solid information. There is no magic 'sound stage' improvement switch in headphones. The drivers are responsible for producing the signal from the source. Depending on the sound stage mastered into the original file and the headphone's capability to reproduce accurate, you experience sound stage. Alterations in the frequency response can affect our perception of sound stage. Often times, you see that brighter (treble-focused) headphones are characterized as having a larger sound stage. Also, I think that the physical design of the ear cups and damping materials used have an impact on perceived sound stage. This is apparent from the sound stage/imaging differences through a comparison between a closed pair of headphones vs open pair of headphones. 
 
Cables should have no effect on any sonic attributes. I do not believe that there is any cable claims that have been proven through objectively testing such as blind ABx comparisons or actual measurements.

 

[blades]

There is no soundstage in headphone listening.  Binaural sound reproduction places everything in the middle of your head.

 

[SilverEars]

  Just a driver. No crossover. Crossovers are only for speakers with multiple woofers or woofer and tweeter. It's there to send frequencies to the right driver. Some headphones can have all sorts of things in the housing... noise cancelling chips, resistors to increase ohms, acoustic padding. By and large, it just a driver though.
 
What the tube source probably changes is the frequency response. If the source is colored, like a tube amp, it can change frequency response and effect the perception of depth. You can also effect soundstage the same way via DSP or EQ.

CIEMs are commonly said to have a sort of "sound stage"  or dimensional sound compared to a UIEM. Multiple driver IEMs have crossovers.  HD800 and AKG701 are commonly stated to have wider sound signature.  Both have similar speaker and cup designs.  I have heard from members that boost in certain frequencies produce perceptions of "sound stage."  Sound delay or phase is what gives the perception of spacial location of the sound source. This could be in the recording or DSP can be used to adjust the phase to cause perception of spacial sound.  Also the room can cause perception of enclosure from the reflection of the sound.

 

[esldude]

 
Do you have a speaker system that you use as a serious listening rig?

Yes, most of my listening is over speakers.  I have Soundlab electrostats.  I also have some Reference 3A de Capo's in another system. 
 
And I am not saying AKG's had full out there soundstaging.  They did have some soundstaging with some space beyond sounding inside your head.  The subjective experience of space also was generally correct in comparison to listening over speakers though smaller and less expansive.  I had long thought any such perception of space was something phones couldn't do without DSP. 

 

[money4me247]

@bigshot, i am curious what your position is on soundstage. i have definitely heard differences in sound stage, imaging, and instrument separation between different headphones. this is most notable between open vs closed designs. lookin forward to hearing your thoughts on the matter

 

[bigshot]

Yes, most of my listening is over speakers.  I have Soundlab electrostats.  I also have some Reference 3A de Capo's in another system. 

And I am not saying AKG's had full out there soundstaging.  They did have some soundstaging with some space beyond sounding inside your head.

Which direction? Forward? Backward? Or was it just more open sounding?

I was told about the amazing three dimensionality of binaural recordings. So I decided to check some out. After listening to a bunch of mediocre jazz bands playing in muddled public restrooms full of reflections off the walls, I was ready to give up. Then I found the test recording of the buzzing razor going around your head. I listened to it and thought the razor was behind me. But then in the middle of it being behind me, I could change the way I thought about the sound and it would be in front, then change my thinking again and it would be in the middle of the head. It was never more than a couple of inches away from my head. I finally discovered that the effect flickered back and forth and I couldn't control it at all. I stopped trying and the recording popped back to smack down the middle. It just had peculiar recorded phase clues that made *ME* create the dimensionality. If I sat with that recording and practiced, I could probably train myself where to hear depth. But it wasn't really in the recording itself. It was in my perception of it. I discovered that the further away the sound was from the dummy head, the less likely I was to project dimension into it. There had to be a big difference between the two ears, and that difference had to keep changing. I came to the conclusion that it was just a perceptual trick that depended more on the listener than the recording itself, and it isn't very useful for music recordings.

I suspect that soundstage in headphones is similar. People listen to a recording with lots of phase tricks and different miking distances... like Pink Floyd... and train themselves to hear dimension in it. I bet if you listened to a natural recording that you weren't familiar with recorded from a single microphone position, the AKGs would be straight down the center of the skull just like any other headphones. Without the perfect set of circumstances of phase and training from previous listening to the track, the soundstage wouldn't exist. It's all in the recording and perception, not the headphones.

 

[esldude]

Which direction? Forward? Backward? Or was it just more open sounding?

I was told about the amazing three dimensionality of binaural recordings. So I decided to check some out. After listening to a bunch of mediocre jazz bands playing in muddled public restrooms full of reflections off the walls, I was ready to give up. Then I found the test recording of the buzzing razor going around your head. I listened to it and thought the razor was behind me. But then in the middle of it being behind me, I could change the way I thought about the sound and it would be in front, then change my thinking again and it would be in the middle of the head. It was never more than a couple of inches away from my head. I finally discovered that the effect flickered back and forth and I couldn't control it at all. I stopped trying and the recording popped back to smack down the middle. It just had peculiar recorded phase clues that made *ME* create the dimensionality. If I sat with that recording and practiced, I could probably train myself where to hear depth. But it wasn't really in the recording itself. It was in my perception of it. I discovered that the further away the sound was from the dummy head, the less likely I was to project dimension into it. There had to be a big difference between the two ears, and that difference had to keep changing. I came to the conclusion that it was just a perceptual trick that depended more on the listener than the recording itself, and it isn't very useful for music recordings.

I suspect that soundstage in headphones is similar. People listen to a recording with lots of phase tricks and different miking distances... like Pink Floyd... and train themselves to hear dimension in it. I bet if you listened to a natural recording that you weren't familiar with recorded from a single microphone position, the AKGs would be straight down the center of the skull just like any other headphones. Without the perfect set of circumstances of phase and training from previous listening to the track, the soundstage wouldn't exist. It's all in the recording and perception, not the headphones.

It was like a miniature soundstage cloud around my head.  I didn't at the time try to put more into it than that.  But it was an out of head, more open sound. Even if it was perhaps a sense of a 2 foot diameter sound cloud I much prefer that to a an all in my skull presentation.  As for orientation it was something like I would hear listening to speakers were I also reading a book in my listening chair.  Somewhat above horizontal and outside my head with some cues for distance and your rather normal cues for left to right that you get with stereo recordings.  The recording I first heard them with was done using a pair of crossed figure 8s or a Bluemlein configuraton.  So it was single point minimalist recording of a group of 5 musicians playing acoustic instruments in a church.  No processing of any kind done at that point.  I briefly listened to some recordings done in the same location with a pair of omni's and a Jecklin disk.  It worked with that as well (perhaps slightly better as I recall).  I don't own any AKG's at this point, but might get some in the future.  So my experience with them is limited to a few minutes a few times.  I certainly would like to know what optimizes that effect as it is easier for long term listening.   Maybe some do this better than AKG does.
 
As for binaural I too have found it regularly disappointing.  The buzzing razor recording you mention mostly doesn't work for me.  A slight effect at each side and all in my head otherwise.  From what others have said, if you record with tiny mics using your own hears then binaural lives up to the hype.  Also some have said if you do your own recordings with a pair of dummy ears always using the same dummy ears, your brain learns to process the cues from those ears pretty well over time.  Of course listening to your general recorded music neither approach is feasible. (Well I suppose you could record all your music with mics in your ears listening to your speaker system, then save it for headphone use.  HA!)
 
Obviously there is no magic there.  If you get the rightly conditioned signal to your eardrums it will hear it as something other than in your head.  Crossfeed never seems to help all that much to me.  I guess my outer ear shape is too different than the dummy heads to work very well for me.  Still in principle one could work out what is needed to get the right signal to your eardrums.  Maybe DSP to correct for your personal outer ear shape would do the trick.  And working out the effect of wearing the phone itself.  I suppose IEM's would bypass inconsistency, but I find them rather uncomfortable to wear.  They will still need DSP to simulate your personal pinnae shape. Convolving that in software doesn't seem beyond doing just not a commercial reality at this point.

 

[bigshot]

Ah. OK. A two foot diameter around your head is about the limit of what binaural can do too. I think that is phase built into the recording itself. Some headphones might present phase differently because they are open or closed or have different angles on the ear, but that really can't be called soundstage. Soundstage is the placement of instruments in three dimensional space. That requires speakers, and to do really correctly, it requires multichannel.

 

[money4me247]

Which direction? Forward? Backward? Or was it just more open sounding?

I was told about the amazing three dimensionality of binaural recordings. So I decided to check some out. After listening to a bunch of mediocre jazz bands playing in muddled public restrooms full of reflections off the walls, I was ready to give up. Then I found the test recording of the buzzing razor going around your head. I listened to it and thought the razor was behind me. But then in the middle of it being behind me, I could change the way I thought about the sound and it would be in front, then change my thinking again and it would be in the middle of the head. It was never more than a couple of inches away from my head. I finally discovered that the effect flickered back and forth and I couldn't control it at all. I stopped trying and the recording popped back to smack down the middle. It just had peculiar recorded phase clues that made *ME* create the dimensionality. If I sat with that recording and practiced, I could probably train myself where to hear depth. But it wasn't really in the recording itself. It was in my perception of it. I discovered that the further away the sound was from the dummy head, the less likely I was to project dimension into it. There had to be a big difference between the two ears, and that difference had to keep changing. I came to the conclusion that it was just a perceptual trick that depended more on the listener than the recording itself, and it isn't very useful for music recordings.

I suspect that soundstage in headphones is similar. People listen to a recording with lots of phase tricks and different miking distances... like Pink Floyd... and train themselves to hear dimension in it. I bet if you listened to a natural recording that you weren't familiar with recorded from a single microphone position, the AKGs would be straight down the center of the skull just like any other headphones. Without the perfect set of circumstances of phase and training from previous listening to the track, the soundstage wouldn't exist. It's all in the recording and perception, not the headphones.

I am assuming that you are talking about this track? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IUDTlvagjJA
 
I dunno. For the test track above, I can distinctly hear the exact spot where the sound is coming from with both my open HE-560s and closed M50x, so sound stage definitely exists if present in the recording. I never personally experienced the sound moving or flickering in locations in a weird way. The sound moves closer & farther away & around my head very precisely and linearly for me. I do not think the idea that there are different cues in sound intensity & arrival time contained within the source that creates the perception of sound stage is a "trick." It really is just how our brains process and interprets distance cues. When you listen to movies or game with headphones, you can often get the positional cues from the sound. I have also noted a perception of distance and sound stage in non-binaural recordings where you can hear exactly where an instrument is in space not located in the 'center of your head'. With live orchestral pieces or vocal performances, I feel like I can accurately place where the instruments are in space.
 
I am unable to accurately tell whether there is a large differences in sound stage are between these two headphones because I am unable to do an exact volume matching or blind test as they feel very different on your headphone. However, both headphones present the illusion of space very effectively.
 
I am curious if you hear the center vs twisted the same or opposite with your headphones and if you can hear the distance of the knock in the binaural test track located here: http://www.audiocheck.net/soundtests_headphones.php

 

[castleofargh]

what I tend to call soundstage or imaging is usually a mix of signature and crosstalk/crossfeed. and if like me you're into portable rigs, you can very much find combos where the crosstalk is so bad you can actually hear the sound going more forward in front of you (mono style).
I always though that one reason for people to love vinyls was that the panning was also closer to mono. after all the closest to mono, the lower the chances your brain will detect weird timings between left and right ear.
 
anyway I also think that some really purposefully stupid cables increase crosstalk(don't know if the cables have wrong enough specs so that the signal can get induced in the other one a little, or if it's simply a messed up soldering?), I could never find measurements or a paper for this, saying if it could be enough to be audible or not. but simply having a low impedance headphone on most DAPs is enough to cripple stereo, and with it the full left/right "imaging" you get from headphones.  and if you happen to get an amp section with a crosstalk that rises with frequencies(with really really poor values), then you can get some amazing  low-fi "3D" imaging.
I guess it's one of those "the better the spec, the less people will be impressed by the sound" thing. as real good stereo on headphones is really not a lot of fun on many albums.
on speakers, it's a completely different experience. the left and right mixing, the fact that the sound doesn't move with our head, the very real distance from the speakers, all that makes for a much more realistic experience. but it's very much possible to have fun with headphones and experience various "soundstages"(small ones but still).
 
last time I tried to understand why we heard things how we hear them, I ended up in a mess about left/right DB differences, timing differences. the overall signature with bass being perceived as large  and occupying space, while trebles are easy to pinpoint, so more trebles sounds like more precise positioning(hd800 anyone?). and frequency also affecting how high(altitude) we think the sound is(as the shape of our ear will bounce back different frequencies to the eardrum depending on where the sound hits). then there is how one sound evolves, if it slides in frequency while decaying, we might hear it as some kind of Doppler effect. and last but not least, how used we are to listening to something and how long we spend listening :'(. 
how the driver is positioned in headphones does in fact very little for soundstage.