Yet another headphone thread

Hey guys

Just wondering ... if I wanted to upgrade FROM Sennheiser 558's and hear a noticeable improvement, what headsets would give me that?

I'm listening to Daft Punk's Random Access Memories right now on my 558s and I thought to myself that that sounds pretty damn awesome and I wonder if past THAT there would be a headset that could blow me away ... and maybe that'd be my next purchase

interstate78 wrote:

Hey guys

Just wondering ... if I wanted to upgrade FROM Sennheiser 558s and hear a noticeable improvement, what headsets would give me that?

I'm listening to Daft Punk's Random Access Memories right now on my 558s and I thought to myself that that sounds pretty damn awesome and I wonder if past THAT there would be a headset that could blow me away ... and maybe that'd be my next purchase

AKG K702. One of the best purchases I've ever made. If you were gonna stick with Sennheiser, the HD 600s and 650s are in the same category.

All would likely require a headphone amp. You could keep that fairly inexpensive, though, by getting the Total Bithead (looks like it may have been discontinued, however).

Seriously, though, the AKG K702s are pretty mind blowing. The soundstage and accuracy are both excellent. Because they are very accurate headphones, they really shine when playing jazz and classical music. If you want something that's bass-heavy, the HD 650s are supposed to be pretty good.

Here are some pictures of mine.

I wish you lived close and could just bring your headphones over to compare.

I have the Sennheiser HD 439s as my work/travel headphones. Love them for that purpose.

Edit: removed some broken links

I'm surprised that a model in a ~similar~ price range could blow my hd 558s out of the water but I'll definitely try to test those somewhere.

One thing for sure is they look damn good but again, it could be due to your superhuman picture taking skills

EDIT: forget what I said, the Msrp on your headset is much higher than mine. It is Amazon's pricing compared to what I paid for mine that gave me this impression

The fairly high MSRP headphones tend to get deep discounts once in awhile on Amazon. I did get the AKG K702s for around $250 IIRC. Prices will fluctuate on Amazon.

Edit: Yeah, it might not blow your ears out of the water, though. You do have things figured out using the 558s.

The HD600 should be on the short list.

heavyfeul wrote:

The HD600 should be on the short list.

I think those, the Beyerdynamic DT-880's, and Audiotechnica A900X's should all be on the list.

interstate78 wrote:

One thing for sure is they look damn good but again, it could be due to your superhuman picture taking skills ;)

I forgot to do this.

I try.

All the other great suggestions are the big ones in the $300 or so category.

In all honesty, I'd just stick with the 558s until they die. Then just splurge and get the AKG K702s.

Use the money saved to buy some records.

Yeah, by all accounts the 558's are good enough that any improvement will be a lot of money for a potentially middling improvement, depending on your personal tastes.

The HD598 are as about as good as headphones get and they are only around $250.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

In all honesty, I'd just stick with the 558s until they die. Then just splurge and get the AKG K702s.

Use the money saved to buy some records.

I have a condition and it requires that I get new shiny and I gets a lot of relief when it's a new set of headphones

BUT SERIOUSLY

That's probably what I'll do, wait til my 558s die...

The earpads/cups on my DT-990's had gotten a little worse for wear over time through lots of use and also lots of travel, so I ordered the replacements from Beyerdynamic.

So they get here, and I take the old ones off and open up the new ones. I immediately noticed that the actual padding that goes over the driver was like three times as thick and different colors on each side. The stock pads were much thinner even when new. I stared at them for a minute and figured eh, Beyerydynamic knows better than I do.

So I put the pads in.

Headphones sound terrible. Midrange is completely muffled and highs are recessed where before they were very forward and super clear. Back apart they come. I guess I'm just going to flip the old earpads over.

The actual velour cups are the same and fit fine of course.

Still... super weird.

Thin_J wrote:

The earpads/cups on my DT-990's had gotten a little worse for wear over time through lots of use and also lots of travel, so I ordered the replacements from Beyerdynamic.

So they get here, and I take the old ones off and open up the new ones. I immediately noticed that the actual padding that goes over the driver was like three times as thick and different colors on each side. The stock pads were much thinner even when new. I stared at them for a minute and figured eh, Beyerydynamic knows better than I do.

So I put the pads in.

Headphones sound terrible. Midrange is completely muffled and highs are recessed where before they were very forward and super clear. Back apart they come. I guess I'm just going to flip the old earpads over.

The actual velour cups are the same and fit fine of course.

Still... super weird.

Oh yeah, you have to break in the pads for at least 200 hours before they start sounding right

They werent even remotely the same pads. They were thicker and even an entirely different material on one side.

Just for the sake of testing I also swapped them into my old DT-770's and the new pads crushed the midrange and highs on those too.

Just really bizarre.

Weird.

Thin_J wrote:

They werent even remotely the same pads. They were thicker and even an entirely different material on one side.

Just for the sake of testing I also swapped them into my old DT-770's and the new pads crushed the midrange and highs on those too.

Just really bizarre.

I understand, it was my try at a headphone break-in period joke

So. I sold my DT-770's. Got $100 for them. Since I paid $150 for them years ago, that seems pretty solid.

Then I lined up a buyer for my pair of Audio-Technica A900's. $100 for those too.

Then I got a bunch of money for my birthday because my entire family gave up shopping for me years ago.

So what did I do?

I bought a pair of HiFiMan HE-400's. They use Planar Magnetic drivers. The detail they put out (on quality recordings anyway) is better than any dynamic driver headphones I have ever heard in that kind of price range. They're big and comfortable, but if I were to levy a complaint against them it would be weight. They're a good bit heavier than any other pair of headphones I've owned, and heavier I think than any I've tried to date. That said, I haven't had any discomfort from it yet and I've already used them for a few hours.

So far I'm still just driving them off my Little Dot MKIII, which seems to work out pretty great.

I still haven't figured out what I'm going to do DAC wise. Right now I'm using the USB DAC in my Maverick Audio D1, which is solid but not nearly as nice as my soundcard was. I'm leaning toward a much nicer dedicated USB DAC.

I might cheap out and get a Schiit Modi. Or I might get ridiculous and use some extra money (that I had set aside for the PS4 preorder I canceled) to just go all out and pick up a Schiit Bifrost USB.

*whistles*

I envy your audiophileness. I'm going to stick to my Koss KSC-75's for the moment... maybe pick up DT-770's or something in the future.

The best DAC I've ever heard, I think, is the Burr-Brown that came in the Squeezebox 2. It wasn't a terribly advanced part, in that it didn't do high sampling rates, and it wasn't very expensive, even when they were making them (something like $5/chip), but it sounds absolutely phenomenal. And the missing 'advanced' features don't matter at all; for standard music playback, there is absolutely no improvement past 44.1KHz/16 bit.

Listening to the SB2, through the analog amp of a Total Bithead on the Senn HD600s, is some of the nicest music I ever remember hearing. The adjectives I was using at the time were 'liquid and floaty', just kind of drifting away in the music; it took a couple of minutes to really register just how nice it was, how there was no harshness to that combo at all, just lovely, lovely music.

The Bithead's DAC was okay, but I really thought that old cheapie Burr-Brown was something special.

I need some coaching on DACs, pre-amps, headphone amps and stuff like that

I got a nice Rega turntable and I'd like a setup that'll give the most bang for the buck to use with my HD-558s but I don't know where to start

interstate78 wrote:

I need some coaching on DACs, pre-amps, headphone amps and stuff like that

I got a nice Rega turntable and I'd like a setup that'll give the most bang for the buck to use with my HD-558s but I don't know where to start

Personally, I don't really like listening to vinyl through headphones all that much. I'll try and post some thoughts tomorrow. What speakers/amp are you using with the Rega currently?

Just a heads up: there's a deal for the Bottlehead Crack headphone amp including the Speedball upgrade. This is a build-it yourself kit. I'm on the fence, but looks like a good deal.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

What speakers/amp are you using with the Rega currently?

That's the thing I don't really have a setup yet. Moving into a new house soon, with more rooms!

interstate78 wrote:
tuffalobuffalo wrote:

What speakers/amp are you using with the Rega currently?

That's the thing I don't really have a setup yet. Moving into a new house soon, with more rooms!

Ah. I'm assuming since you asked about a DAC that this will be hooked up to your computer as well. Is there anything else you are going to want to hook up to it? Also, what's an approximate budget?

The best bang for the buck will usually be used, but that can be tricky and hit or miss. If you do want to listen to vinyl with headphones a fair amount, I might suggest going with a little tube headphone amplifier. It would hopefully warm up the sound a bit. Listening to vinyl with headphones through my solid state receiver and AKG K702s isn't very pleasant because they are really critical headphones. They just pick up every little pop and hiss. So, anything that might make the sound a bit warmer would probably help.

Low frequency instruments are where you can really notice how much better the Rega is than a cheap turntable. So, it would be advantageous to have some pretty big floorstanding speakers. Still, you would be able to notice it with some bookshelf speakers. It sort of depends on the budget and if you want them to also function as PC speakers.

As an experiment, I ran the Tape Out on my receiver (with a Rega RP1 hooked up) to a Maverick Audio A1 tube headphone amplifier. I think it cut down on the crackle a bit, but who knows? It's hard to be objective. Unfortunately, some buzz was being generated by something, so that wasn't perfect.

This is the Maverick Audio A1 that had the LED light go out, and a replacement unit was sent to me. Other than that it still works fine, so I generally just use it as a tube pre-amp for an iPad.

I need to order a replacement LED. It should be a fun soldering project. I can't really recommend the Maverick Audio stuff wholeheartedly. I've just had a few too many issues with the A1 and D2.

My D1 has functioned pretty flawlessly the way I use it, which is as a tube pre-out for my speaker setup. Optical out from the PC into the D1 sounds great.

That said... the built in headphone amp isnt very good and there's some issues with the sound quality over USB. I cant recommend it for either of those.

I still havent figured out my DAC situation though. Right now I have my sound card in anyway and a plastic spacer installed to brace up my videocards to keep the fan from hitting my soundcard again. It's functional but ugly and not any good as a permanant solution.

A USB DAC of some form is definitely in my future, I just havent found one that offers the right combo of input/output switching options yet.

The table I got is the Rega Rp1.

I'm thinking that I will need a pre-amp or something, right? are there any amps out there that can do that?

As you probably can tell by now I'm a noob.

In that room I'll also have a computer yeah so I think a DAC or a good soundcard will be necesary.

I'm looking at the Geek on kickstarter and the Bottleneck on Massdrop and they look interesting but I don't know if they hum, "fit the bill"

I may have figured out my planned setup in the last hours of my work shift. The Audioengine D1 gets great reviews everywhere, is small so it won't take up a ton of desk space, and works great over USB, or if I want to go cheaper the Schiit Modi will accomplish the same thing in a similar way.

The second part of my plan is to either find a very high quality RCA switchbox or just build one myself. USB out from the PC to the Audioengine, pre-outs on that out to the switchbox, and from the switchbox to both my Speakers and Little Dot MKIII.

Then I can abandon ship on my soundcard, get the ridiculous plastic braces I fashioned out of my case, and also free up some desk space currently occupied by the Maverick D1.

At the same time, I still maintain the ability I have right now to switch back and forth between headphones and my speakers without juggling cables. I just turn the knob on the switchbox and go.

interstate78 wrote:

The table I got is the Rega Rp1.

I'm thinking that I will need a pre-amp or something, right? are there any amps out there that can do that?

As you probably can tell by now I'm a noob.

In that room I'll also have a computer yeah so I think a DAC or a good soundcard will be necesary.

I'm looking at the Geek on kickstarter and the Bottleneck on Massdrop and they look interesting but I don't know if they hum, "fit the bill"

Well, that Audioengine D1 Thin_J is talking about looks like a fantastic, relatively cheap option for a DAC. The built in headphone amp would work just fine, too I'm sure, and you could always upgrade to a little tube amp.

Still, that doesn't do anything for your turntable. If you want to go fairly cheap but new, you could get something like the Onkyo TX-8255. These JBL bookshelf speakers popped up on Amazon when I viewed that item. They seem like a pretty good deal. Between the two of those, that would put you at $310 USD which is less than the turntable cost. Do poke around on Craig's List to see what's floating around in your area. You might be able to snag some really nice stuff.

When you get down to nailing down a budget, I'll tell you what I'd do with the money. It's sort of hard to provide suggestions because you are always limited by the cost, ultimately.

At one time I was thinking about doing an outboard DAC, but the last time I was using USB soundcards, they were buggy as heck. I was thinking about a Firewire DAC for awhile, but then when I upgraded to the Realtek 889, and then the 898 when that first motherboard croaked, I realized that I wouldn't particularly benefit anymore. Both those chips have excellent analog outs, and they'll easily do bitperfect to my Denon receiver, which has an *awesome* DAC, plus Audyssey when it's in digital mode. (not in multichannel, sadly.)

Computer sound, at least on premium motherboards, is finally getting genuinely good. The cheaper Realtek chips don't sound as good, but I think basically anything recent will easily do bitperfect out over the S/PDIF, so you can pipe it into a receiver, and get truly outstanding quality.

The big downside to that approach: size. Receivers are not small. You can sometimes mount them underneath a desk using wire brackets, and then mount the speakers on the wall, but for folks short on space, that's a lot less convenient than a little box like that Audioengine and a pair of headphones.

Malor wrote:

The big downside to that approach: size. Receivers are not small. You can sometimes mount them underneath a desk using wire brackets, and then mount the speakers on the wall, but for folks short on space, that's a lot less convenient than a little box like that Audioengine and a pair of headphones.

A lot of, or the majority of even, USB DACs also offer optical input. Even some of the little portable ones are offering it now. I think the E17 Alpen from FiiO even comes in a bundle with an optical cable.

What's making my setup complicated is that none of the damn things, and I mean none of them have multiple outputs you can switch between. Multiple inputs? Sure. There's one for any variety of inputs you want. Outputs? You want multiple pre-amp outputs? F*ck off.

*There are amps that will switch off their pre-out when headphones are plugged in. So if I were to replace my Little Dot ( ) that last bit wouldn't be an issue anymore, but I'd really just rather have a DAC with switchable outs and keep the amp I have that I like.