[kingpage]

I know it's tempting, but please restrain from looking at the result/comments before voting.

 

This headphone has an easily detachable mechanism, making it open-backed or closed as you wish. Instead of one open and one closed, you now have a chance to buy this hybrid headphone for less than the price you would pay for two separate headphones.

 

Would you buy this hypothetical headphone? I'm assuming you're already interested in a headphone purphase, and all you know is the above information and the fact that the headphone is produced by a reputable company. Let's leave other aspects out of the consideration at first, such as driver compatibility, sound quality and comfort, etc; only focus on the unique feature of earcups in the poll, then you may voice those concerns after the vote.

 

Also leave a short comment as to why you voted that way. And, what potential elements of the headphone, if there are any, would worry you?

 

[Gwarmi]

 
Yes, but it depends.
 
Mechanism would most likely be a rotary slider with mesh type gills that allow's the user to close the gills making
it closed back or opening the gills that vents the back of the cup. 
 
Just clever acoustic engineering really, a design that means it would function in both states of operation
really. Open, clear and extended with soundstage when vented and reasonably competent when closed.

 

[PleasantNoise]

open/closed gives a very different sound, so cans have to have drivers to match, to do this you would have to have an 'inbetween' driver, that wouldn't really work ideally as open, or as closed.
besides, you shouldn't really listen to music in loud environments, so the only time (I feel) closed cans are needed, is for monitoring is studios for tracking purposes.

 

[Nagasaki_Kid]

Bad idea as I have tinker with many drivers and you would  have to make a very versatile driver. Some drivers just do better closed and some do better open. The mechanism would be a nightmare since tuning an enclosure for a driver is tough enough already but when you add a open closed mechanism, there will be compromises to such that it won't sound as good as if the headphone was fully opened or fully closed by design.
 
 
The only example of an headphone similar to what you describe in which I can recall at the moment is the sony mdr xd300 and mdr xd400 I think they go from closed to semi open which they dub movie mode and music mode.
 

 

[kingpage]

I'm aware that finding a driver that can perform under both conditions will be difficult, but in the eyes of the consumers, we shouldn't worry about how the company did it. It's just a thought experiment. At least, I don't worry about how civil engineers made my house such that it won't collapse for several decades.

 

[Aaron1006]

I said no. I would rather have a really good closed headphone that can do everything that an open one does so well . However if there were covers I could buy for headphones I already own to make them closed for portable use, etc. I might consider buying some. 

 

[kn19h7]

I'd worry if such mechanism introduce build quality / durability issue or so.. but anyway such feature doesn't really interest me, other factors are much much more important

 

[Uncle Erik]

Unfortunately, no.

I'm particular about open headphones because they sound better.

When I need isolation, it's usually because of external noise. When that's the case, I use IEMs. IEMs isolate better than any circumaural headphone and sound great without active noise cancelling.

 

[TheGomdoRi]

No - only because of personal preference.

I really like simplicity and I wouldn't want "more parts" and because it's detachable I'd be in constant fear of losing it lol (and also seems kind of gimmicky to me as well).
Another thought is that I just don't see people wanting two headphones - one closed one open. Maybe it's just me but why would you specifically get one of each and for application? (unless it's just for a personal collection). Thus, there is no point of the hybrid. Last point - it's cheaper than two headphones but I'd assume it's still on the pricier end of the scale relatively to a pair of headphones.
 
 
Just some feedback

 

[Danz03]

Turning a pair of open headphones into closed would most certainly change the sound character as well inevitabily. So if I like the sound character of the open headphones I'd most probably not like it when it's closed. Therefore I'd have to vote no, unless I got convinced otherwise when I hear the real thing, I could be wrong.

 

[nickchen]

It wouldn't work properly anyway. With dynamical systems, the pads would have to be swapped as well every time you change its working state. If it were ortho systems, you maybe could keep the pads, but would have to adjust the inner damping.

 

[kingpage]

To the ones who said yes: What would be some big no-nos or turn-offs for you?
 
To the ones who said no: Is there anything that would make you change your mind? What if the headphone is optimised for the open state, but still retains much that performance in the closed state comparable to other good closed-backs, would that help? What if the cost of the headphone is competitively priced among other headphones in the same league?
 
Quote:

I said no. I would rather have a really good closed headphone that can do everything that an open one does so well . However if there were covers I could buy for headphones I already own to make them closed for portable use, etc. I might consider buying some. 

Well, if headphones were designed so that they could share a universal cup cover, don't you think someone else would have made it? Besides, no existing open headphone was engineered to have it closed.
 
 
 
Anyway, just because something doesn't exist now, it does mean it won't. I'm sure the first headphones faced the same resistence with the speaker community, or the first earbud with the full-size headphone community; same with any other products with unique features introduced for the first time. If I were to make this product, I'd have to know there is some demand for it; otherwise, I'd be wasting my time and everyone else's.

 

[Clockmaker]

I said yes because I move around a lot, having a dynamic can that can easily switch would be wonderful. The biggest nono's for me would be a nondetachable cord, overpowering bass, flimsy or unsmooth build quality, and sensitivity to eq. I like equing my cans from time to time, but don't like having to crank the eq wayyyyy up to get a noticable change.

 

[JBAndradeIV]

I said no.  I think a good pair of open headphones are designed only to be a good pair of open headphones, and if you closed them off they'd be much worse.  And vice-versa for closed headphones.  I think to create such a hybrid, you'd need to meet somewhere in the middle, meaning only an okay open headphone and an okay closed headphone, even if you have all the money in the world to spend on such a pair of headphones.  That isn't to say I wouldn't be curious.  In reality, I'd probably wait for others to review it and then see if I can find it for a price I'd be willing to pay if the reviews were above average.  I just doubt they'd be very good for the price they would cost to make.