[codythelucario]

Lately, I found that the sub bass has been lacking.

I relatively enjoy the low end on these cans, but lately I can't help but notice how bass is lacking compared to even my Momentum 4 wireless headphones. It makes modern trap/rap tracks from Future sound a bit flat.

I hope I can solve this through my Fosi Audio Q4 because I just got these headphones last year since I enjoyed the overall vocals on these headphones - it makes them pop

I usually listen to rap music from modern artists like Future, Cardi B, and GloRilla, as a baseline. However I find myself enjoying bright headphones the most. They give a good oomph of bass while being very detailed in the highs.

But I guess the biggest key here is that before I heard my friend's Hifiman headphones, I wasn't that concerned for the bass or overall quality of my headphones. I really enjoyed them for the time I used them up to that point. Ever since then it's been constant chaos of me comparing headphones over and over again (might have to do something with my mental health as well being a factor to this lack of enjoyment in my headphones now). i also felt like i missed out on what the bass frequencies could be like, as my Momentum 4's did have so much more bass but sounded like a bass-boosted car speaker. I love that on my car, but for headphones, I think that's simply too much though.

If I really bought the wrong headphones for my taste, please recommend headphones that are less than $350 that go well with this genre. But I am hoping to fix these without having to buy another headphone again; I went through a buy-sell phase last year that was vicious on my mental health as I went overly analytical on the sound and compared the **** outta the ones I had to those I didnt.

 

[dunring]

Before spending a penny use your player and open the equalizer and slide the lowest frequency band on the left up 4db and try some songs. You can fine tune it with a preamp reduction to keep distortion down, but hearing if that gets them just where you like them is easy to try.

 

[drummerman1]

I've never heard of anyone praising the HD600 specifically for their bass.

Sometimes we just buy the wrong product. It's easy to get carried away with reviews that praise this and that, I'm certainly guilty of this.

Having said that, I have a 58X which is not a hundred miles away from your 600 (more bass but inferior in other respects) and I apply EQ in Roon, including added bass. It takes it well as long as you keep within its volume range so I would assume the 600 is not too different. I would take Dunrings advise to EQ but beware of those saying you have to spend $100's on tube amplification to make it 'sing'. Whilst that may be true in ultimate terms it shouldn't be necessary and probly won't transform a 600 into a headphone with superb bass. There are better alternatives if that is important to you

Others may suggest differently.

As an aside, I feel for you and know exactly what you went through. During the mid nineties, I befriended the owner of a local Hifi Retailer. With this came a constant turnaround of products to the extent that at one stage during a weekend my whole living room was full of amplifiers and speakers. I must have had a fifth of the shop at home. It created only anxiety and stress. This 'period' lasted probably a good year. It stopped eventually because a/I got into debth over Hifi (!) and b/ I changed jobs whereas I worked more and weekends. I am glad that this is long behind me. I think it's an issue that's far more common than is discussed and hope you won't fall in the same trapp.

 

[wantan]

EQ is the key to great headphone sound, the Fosi seems to have bass and treble adjustment so first use these and hear where that will lead.
I the US the Hifiman HE4xx from drop is a great great option is you like that sound, again use EQ for details.
Headphones with great V shaped sound are Beyerdynamic, the dt880 with some added bass by EQ can have great slam, dt990 is great as is dt770. If treble is to much use EQ to reduce it.

It's best to use tonal control EQ to adjust bass and treble to your taste or to the music.

 

[whyamiinthiswarudo]

Have you tried Shire SRH1540? I think you’d like the bass on them.

 

[IXOYE]

HD 600 with a good Amp + EQ have enough base for my liking.

 

[Alchemistt]

I can say for a long time that I like the headphones and the bass is sufficient))
But there are companies that don't like bass. Sennheiser and AKG are among them.

Try listening to Shure somewhere, Beyerdynamic is a different sound philosophy.

Before purchasing, it is advisable to listen to and try on several models. Buy the pair you listened to and tried on, or have the option of an easy return.

 

[bagwell359]

Lately, I found that the sub bass has been lacking.

I relatively enjoy the low end on these cans, but lately I can't help but notice how bass is lacking compared to even my Momentum 4 wireless headphones. It makes modern trap/rap tracks from Future sound a bit flat.

I hope I can solve this through my Fosi Audio Q4 because I just got these headphones last year since I enjoyed the overall vocals on these headphones - it makes them pop

I usually listen to rap music from modern artists like Future, Cardi B, and GloRilla, as a baseline. However I find myself enjoying bright headphones the most. They give a good oomph of bass while being very detailed in the highs.

But I guess the biggest key here is that before I heard my friend's Hifiman headphones, I wasn't that concerned for the bass or overall quality of my headphones. I really enjoyed them for the time I used them up to that point. Ever since then it's been constant chaos of me comparing headphones over and over again (might have to do something with my mental health as well being a factor to this lack of enjoyment in my headphones now). i also felt like i missed out on what the bass frequencies could be like, as my Momentum 4's did have so much more bass but sounded like a bass-boosted car speaker. I love that on my car, but for headphones, I think that's simply too much though.

If I really bought the wrong headphones for my taste, please recommend headphones that are less than $350 that go well with this genre. But I am hoping to fix these without having to buy another headphone again; I went through a buy-sell phase last year that was vicious on my mental health as I went overly analytical on the sound and compared the **** outta the ones I had to those I didnt.

You seem to think one headphone is the answer to all your music, look at what most folks have here. I have 3 headphones and that's less than most. For your tastes I'd say either planar magnetics like HFM Sundara, or closed back "bass cannons". If you listen to well recorded acoustic music or classical - the HE-600 is excellent. If not much or at all, they are not the right tool for you it would seem.

If you do keep them because they do work for some of your music, you can slightly increase the amount of bass they produce, but I doubt its enough.

They do have very good bass - in some aspects. Quick and with good timbre. - but the CC ring mod, excess EQ, etc. will not make them bass cannons. If you try EQ, I advise PEQ, with two settings:

45 Hz +3.0 db bass shelf

65 Hz +1.5 db bass shelf

That's about it, much more will give you muddy bass with poor impact, and increase IM (intermodulation distortion) at higher frequencies.

They do scale up with lots of current delivery at 300 ohms, but at best it still may not be enough in the bass dept.

 

[bagwell359]

I've never heard of anyone praising the HD600 specifically for their bass.

I frequently mention how good aspects of the HD-600 bass is. It's got excellent timbre, and what it does have is quick and not sloppy. Now it does not have a lot of body, or deep sustain, or play below 35 Hz (and that only with an amp with lots of current at 300 ohms and judicious use of PEQ - and still the impact/rise time is not there. Like many here, I use the HD-600 for some types of music, and other headphones for other types. I have yet to hear a single headphone that is stellar in everything.

 

[codythelucario]

EQ is the key to great headphone sound, the Fosi seems to have bass and treble adjustment so first use these and hear where that will lead.
I the US the Hifiman HE4xx from drop is a great great option is you like that sound, again use EQ for details.
Headphones with great V shaped sound are Beyerdynamic, the dt880 with some added bass by EQ can have great slam, dt990 is great as is dt770. If treble is to much use EQ to reduce it.

It's best to use tonal control EQ to adjust bass and treble to your taste or to the music.

right now i am messing with my q4 dac, and they did add some more bass! i also am thinking that i probably got used to muddy bass from my loudspeaker since i havent really touched my hd600 a lot lately, so that might be affecting how i enjoy my music. last year, I remember i was fine with the low bass and i thought tahts what good headphones sound like, just lately i havent been using my hifi equipment and using consumer grade audio grade equipment lately.

 

[ADUHF]

Based on the graphs, the Shure SRH840A has good extension in both the sub-bass and treble. So it might be a little closer to type the sound you're after. And you could always use some EQ to tweak the bass, mids and treble a bit more to your particular preference.

The 840A is closed though, so it won't give you as open a sound as an open dynamic would. And there are some newer open dynamic headphones with better bass extension than the HD600 that might also be worth a look.

 

[codythelucario]

I think this track does a good job of highlighting the sub-bass im after:

without messing with EQ's and my bass and treble dials both on medium, im getting satisfactory sub-bass. on other tracks it isnt as much and im just curious why. it performs well with this song in modern hip hop but why not in others ig

also, i have rediscovered that I like brighter headphones actually, so I don't really like dark headphones. I like punchy bass, but I don't want the overall sound profile to sound dark.

maybe im just pretty confused or got my head too wraped around at the moment, so maybe i should take a break from this subject. its pretty confusing to be honest, im not too much of an audiophile tbh so i won't know a lot of the terms.

as I am trying to listen to the playlist i usually turn to, I also find myself fine with the bass response with the hd600. it's there, it just doesn't leak too much but sometimes it does feel boring. when i turn up the bass on my q4 dac, it turns my headphones more into a party headphone because it gives the bass more life. i think im fine either way maybe i got myself too hung up with this subject lol. also, when i try on closed back headphones i feel as if the bass is too much to be honest, but that might just be me not burning the sound into my ears long enough yet

 

[ADUHF]

Fwiw, I think you're doin just fine.

You're not gonna get much in the way of sub-bass punch from a headphone like the HD600 though, regardless of where your tone controls are set, because it's an open back dynamic driver headphone, and there just isn't enough pressure inside the cups on that particular model to really dig that deep into the low end, without producing noticable distortion. What you will hear are mostly overtones that are higher up in the mid-bass...

https://www.dropbox.com/s/pn3heg2rkwzeh34/Sennheiser HD600.pdf?e=1&dl=0

A headphone like the 840A (which also uses dynamic drivers) would have substantially more volume in the sub-bass though, because of it's closed design... Maybe even too much for your taste, if you're used to listening to open-back headphones...

https://www.dropbox.com/s/z4kfrvxw92hlz7t/Shure SRH840A.pdf?e=1&dl=0

You said you wanted sub-bass though, so that's why I put it out their for your consideration. There are other open back headphones that extend better into the low end sub-bass frequencies than the HD 600 though, that could possibly give you more of what you want, without having to resort to using a closed headphone with a less spacious sound. Most (open) planar magnetics have better bass/sub-bass extension than the HD600, for example. Even the lower cost ones. I think you might prefer the impact of a dynamic driver though for the kind of music you listen to.

(edit: fixed SRH840 graph link)

 

[codythelucario]

yeah, its a thing I noticed with open back headphones. my thinking then and recently was that open back > closed back, period, so thats why i got open back ones. I thought open back headphones were more of like an endgame hifi thing where it's superior to closed back in every way, but yeah as i listen to open back the bass is just lacking.

when I tried these out at my local audiophile shop though, I gave them a quick listen but I remembered I was pretty satisfied with these headphones, even the bass, even as it was lacking. If you were speaking to me two years ago though, I would've said that open back headphones were superior but I would've also noted the lack of bass in these, which make rap sound a bit boring.

its weird now, but i do enjoy how the bass is, its enough in open back headphones but i would also note at the same time its lacking but at the same time cleaner for analytical listening, as I noted in a new post here i talked about: https://www.head-fi.org/threads/lis...-with-the-lack-of-sub-bass-apparently.971863/

im open to buying new headphones tohugh. I got myself trapped by brand loyalty, so that might have not been a good thing. I also don't enjoy how my senny momentum 4's anc performs compared to the sony's or bose headphones. ill take note next time when i will buy new headphones not to go brand loyal as i did with senny or with my samsung ecosystem

https://www.dropbox.com/s/z4kfrvxw92hlz7t/Shure SRH840A.pdf?e=1&dl=0

You said you wanted sub-bass though, so that's why I put it out their for your consideration. There are other open back headphones that extend better into the low end sub-bass frequencies than the HD 600 though, that could possibly give you more of what you want, without having to resort to using a closed headphone with a less spacious sound. Most (open) planar magnetics have better bass/sub-bass extension than the HD600, for example. Even the lower cost ones. I think you might prefer the impact of a dynamic driver though for the kind of music you listen to.

I did set my autoeq on peace apo to Oratory's graph (for the hd600s though). I also added a bit of bass in the sub 100 hz frequency as I saw recommended from a reddit page, I forgot where it is, but it did help extend the sub bass

 

[Cheesebuggah]

Are you limited to the Fosi Audio physical EQ knobs? Maybe you could download an EQ app like Peace APO so you could apply specifics to PEQ. I mainly listen to a 2.0 near-field system where the stock speakers can be "neutral bright" and I have a +25 dB spike at 50Hz which goes flat or normalizes at around 150Hz. Those are speakers, though, so you probably don't need a drastic bump like +25 dB to hear a major difference. Sony has this thing for Bluetooth headphones called "Clear Bass," which supposedly increases the fun bass without muddying up everything else. I could reach +7 dB out of +10 dB before I noticed some parts of the music were quieter. According to some guy on the internet, it increases frequencies below 180 Hz—mainly around 60 Hz—while lowering the frequencies above it slightly.

I feel like I enjoy brighter headphones too, or at least headphones with less mid and upper bass. You could look at a graph of the HD600 and another graph of that specific HIFIMAN and compare the two. Maybe try to mimic the bass (<~500 dB) from the HIFIMANs? Of course, software like Peace APO is ideal since you can adjust the filters, quality, and all that jazz. I'm not a big EQ person, so I don't know much about it. I would try bagwell359's adjustments.