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Sang Dalang Abu
Metalhead

Joined: Wed Jul 23, 2014 1:18 am
Posts: 422
Location: Switzerland
PostPosted: Sun Nov 15, 2015 3:40 am 
 

Sony MDR-1A. Very recommended headphone for you if you have time to relax.
Very rich sound. I bought it and it cost >200 $.

You will not be disappointed.

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Deathwish238
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Mar 02, 2008 4:40 am
Posts: 123
Location: United States
PostPosted: Wed Nov 25, 2015 12:23 pm 
 

Between Senn, AKG, BeyerDynamic, Sony, Pioneer, Klipsch, Audio Technica, JVC, Panasonic, Creative, some of best headphones under $500 for metal as well as rock is still the BeyerDynamic DT-990 600 ohm paired with a very clear source and neutral amp. Nothing has its clarity, while still having deep deep clear bass. I run the DT-990 w/ an E-MU 0404 USB DAC and Mini^3 amp, total cost was about $600. It compares to $15k stereo speaker setups. I love being able to hear every little detail in a recording and the way guitars sound through the DT-990s is superb.

This was the conclusion after about 50 hours of research and demoing several headphones about 2-3 years ago, not much has changed since then as nothing really tries to do what the DT-990s have done(extreme clarity and very deep bass without being overpowering such as in the DT-770s or Aurvanas). I have not yet heard the BeyerDynamic Tesla T1, there's a chance these are the ultimate metal headphones, but the cost of a T1 setup is very high too.
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Dudemanguy
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 7:19 pm
Posts: 2449
PostPosted: Wed Nov 25, 2015 12:49 pm 
 

Well be careful when making those kinds of statements. The DT 990s are very, very v-shaped and could easily drive some people up the wall. It is true that those are headphones have a very smooth curve though. In terms of fidelity, headphones seem to top out around $300. There's much more expensive ones of course, but those are always sidegrades at best.

In my opinion, headphones will never be able to compare to a good speaker setup, but that kind of judgment is of course always up to the listener.

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Expedience
Metal freak

Joined: Wed Aug 27, 2008 4:22 am
Posts: 4509
PostPosted: Thu Nov 26, 2015 9:20 am 
 

Can't say I see the point in comparing headphones with speakers - 'this or that $600 headphone sounds like a $15k stereo' and so on. They are as different as stereo is to 5.1, not necessarily better or worse just different. For one, the sound from each stereo speaker reaches both ears rather than just one in a headphone driver. Detail is easier to reproduce in headphones because your ear is closer, but you can't feel the impact of the lower frequencies as much - the body is in a way a listening device, not just the ears. Go to a live show - you'll feel it with your whole body. The latter is why phones fell out of favor with me, as well as finding them uncomfortable and preferring to move about the room.

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Dudemanguy
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 7:19 pm
Posts: 2449
PostPosted: Thu Nov 26, 2015 12:48 pm 
 

I can agree with that. Feeling the thump of the bass really adds so much more to the listening experience.

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tomcat_ha
Minister of Boiling Water

Joined: Fri Oct 27, 2006 8:05 am
Posts: 5570
Location: Netherlands
PostPosted: Fri Nov 27, 2015 9:11 pm 
 

i can actually hear the different instruments better on speakers plus i get way less listening fatigue.

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t1337Dude
Metalhead

Joined: Sat May 26, 2007 5:20 am
Posts: 956
Location: Seattle
PostPosted: Sat Nov 28, 2015 5:57 pm 
 

I'm certainly a speaker guy myself. I'm surprised we don't have a speaker discussion thread or something like that. Would make some sense, it being a music forum and all. I used to rock my Grado SR-225i's all the time but ever since getting a good pair of speakers I rarely use those anymore.

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Dudemanguy
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 7:19 pm
Posts: 2449
PostPosted: Sat Nov 28, 2015 6:13 pm 
 

If we had a speaker thread, I feel like I would end up spending most of my time making fun of those esoteric audiophile designs.

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tomcat_ha
Minister of Boiling Water

Joined: Fri Oct 27, 2006 8:05 am
Posts: 5570
Location: Netherlands
PostPosted: Sun Nov 29, 2015 11:04 am 
 

I don't think we have that many silly audiophiles here. I've seen more than a couple people praise vinyl for the entire experience/package not just because of the sound which is what those silly ones would do.

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Expedience
Metal freak

Joined: Wed Aug 27, 2008 4:22 am
Posts: 4509
PostPosted: Sun Nov 29, 2015 7:59 pm 
 

A general hi-fi thread would be cool. I've actually found metal one of the hardest genres to get sounding good (though I suspect lousy production plays a large part in this) so it'd be neat to share tips.

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The Red Tower
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Oct 26, 2014 8:06 am
Posts: 291
Location: Germany
PostPosted: Mon Nov 30, 2015 5:37 am 
 

I strongly recommend the Teufel Aureol Real (German product, http://hifipig.com/teufel-aureol-real-headphones/).

The sound is awesome for Metal and lightyears ahead of my old Philips. I bought the Teufel last year from amazon.de for about 95 euros if I remember correctly and have never regretted it since then. Different colours also available: pure black, black/red, black/White, black/gold.

Great advantage: the cable is detachable from the headphone so if the cable breaks one day you can simply replace it with a new one and don't have to throw away the phones!

Read some reviews in hifi-zines and see if you can get them somewhere in your price range. Good luck!
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The Lions Den
Metalhead

Joined: Wed Apr 04, 2012 10:12 am
Posts: 1567
Location: Italy
PostPosted: Mon Nov 30, 2015 6:22 am 
 

Ok guys, I'm trying for a good replacement of my Sennheiser HD407 and my search going to these direction...

Audio Technica ATH TAD400
http://www.amazon.it/gp/product/B00BMKF ... 1_1&sr=8-1

Samson SR850
http://www.amazon.it/Samson-SR850-SASR8 ... son+cuffie

Suggestions?

THX
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Deathwish238
Metal newbie

Joined: Sun Mar 02, 2008 4:40 am
Posts: 123
Location: United States
PostPosted: Thu Dec 10, 2015 7:12 pm 
 

Dudemanguy wrote:
Well be careful when making those kinds of statements. The DT 990s are very, very v-shaped and could easily drive some people up the wall. It is true that those are headphones have a very smooth curve though. In terms of fidelity, headphones seem to top out around $300. There's much more expensive ones of course, but those are always sidegrades at best.

In my opinion, headphones will never be able to compare to a good speaker setup, but that kind of judgment is of course always up to the listener.


Yeah, it is a dangerous statement to make, but I stand by it. If there is a better setup for metal under $600, I would love to know.

The DT990s are v-shaped, but it goes with the natural frequency sensitivity of the ear, which is why it's a v-shape...it gives you a balanced sound. Evidence:http://personal.cityu.edu.hk/~bsapplec/frequenc.htm. Having a perfectly flat speaker is not going to sound flat to human ears since the human ear is not equally sensitive to all frequencies. The higher and lower you go, the less sensitive ears are, so a V is necessary. All that said, they are a little more on the fun side than on the reference side, but I don't find the sound to be imbalanced where details are lost in the bass, mids, or treble.

There are more clear headphones, but you have to go to the world of electrostatic drivers like Stax, which bring in their own set of issues.


Expedience wrote:
Can't say I see the point in comparing headphones with speakers - 'this or that $600 headphone sounds like a $15k stereo' and so on. They are as different as stereo is to 5.1, not necessarily better or worse just different. For one, the sound from each stereo speaker reaches both ears rather than just one in a headphone driver. Detail is easier to reproduce in headphones because your ear is closer, but you can't feel the impact of the lower frequencies as much - the body is in a way a listening device, not just the ears. Go to a live show - you'll feel it with your whole body. The latter is why phones fell out of favor with me, as well as finding them uncomfortable and preferring to move about the room.


Both are used to listen to metal, and I do often have the choice between listening to music on my speaker setup vs my headphone setup, so it is quite a real comparison for me. Yes of course they are different in ways, the biggest difference is not being able to viscerally feel bass in your chest and body, as you mentioned. Aside from that, I prefer my DT990 setup over my Martin Logan Motion 12 and Dynamo and Denon AVR-3805 setup because the DT990s are clearer with better soundstage. Not that I can do much better for speakers and receiver under $2k.

The DT990s are super comfortable. I've worn them for 10+ hours a day before when working from home. lol I've even worn them without music on before, they're that comfortable...velour is great and the clamping pressure is just right and don't bother me even with glasses on.

I'm less of an audiophile today than I was a few years ago as I have less time to listen to music, but I find headphones are spectacular for getting audiophile sound without spending much money at all.
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Dudemanguy
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 7:19 pm
Posts: 2449
PostPosted: Thu Dec 10, 2015 7:40 pm 
 

Deathwish238 wrote:
Yeah, it is a dangerous statement to make, but I stand by it. If there is a better setup for metal under $600, I would love to know.

The DT990s are v-shaped, but it goes with the natural frequency sensitivity of the ear, which is why it's a v-shape...it gives you a balanced sound. Evidence:http://personal.cityu.edu.hk/~bsapplec/frequenc.htm. Having a perfectly flat speaker is not going to sound flat to human ears since the human ear is not equally sensitive to all frequencies. The higher and lower you go, the less sensitive ears are, so a V is necessary. All that said, they are a little more on the fun side than on the reference side, but I don't find the sound to be imbalanced where details are lost in the bass, mids, or treble.

There are more clear headphones, but you have to go to the world of electrostatic drivers like Stax, which bring in their own set of issues.

Measurements for headphones are almost always adjusted for target curves (typically the diffuse field) to take into account nonlinear perception of frequencies (speakers have a whole other set of rules). If you ever look at truly raw measurements, you'll notice that the "ideal" is not really a flat line, but it has sort of a bump. For example, here you can see the diffuse field correction. If you look at the golden ear measurements of the k550, you'll notice that the "ideal" line on the measured frequency response (aka raw data with no corrections) is the inverse of this.

When I say V-shape, I mean that they are still V-shaped with the corrections in mind. For whatever reason, there's not a lot of measurements available for the DT900, so the goldenears data for the 32 ohm model is the best I can find. It's not a very linear response (could easily be a result of the lower impedance though), but you can see there's a pretty definite v shape there. I think the flattest headphones on the market are Sennheisers HD 600, but I was never a fan of home headphone listening anyway.

You can get a pair of cheap studio monitors for under $500 that sound marvelous. Honestly, the biggest bang for your buck in audio right now is probably the jbl lsr 305 ($300 MSRP for two). Unless your room is just very unforgiving, these things have ridiculous measurements.

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TheMizwaOfMuzzyTah
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Feb 09, 2010 2:18 pm
Posts: 1792
Location: the emerald forest
PostPosted: Mon Dec 14, 2015 3:53 pm 
 

Just wanted to mention I picked up a pair of Sennheiser PX 360's. Great headphones; sound is amazing, bassy as hell, the phones are heavy and feel durable. Listened to John Zorn's "Templars: In Sacred Blood" and some Godspeed! on them last night. Great listening experience.

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Derigin
The Mountain Man

Joined: Sun Jan 01, 2006 6:25 am
Posts: 5998
Location: Canada
PostPosted: Tue Dec 22, 2015 4:40 pm 
 

Might not hurt to ask for some suggestions here.

I'm looking for a good pair of over-the-head headphones for listening, primarily, to black/folk metal. I'd prefer to purchase online. I live in Canada. My big thing is that I can be fairly rough with electronics, and while I'm not necessarily concerned about durability, I don't want to spend a high amount of money on something that I know I will end up breaking. Keeping that in mind, I'm ideally looking for headphones in the $30-50 range - the cheaper for the quality the better. Suggestions?
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Dudemanguy
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 7:19 pm
Posts: 2449
PostPosted: Tue Dec 22, 2015 11:30 pm 
 

$30-50? I had a pair of superlux hd 681 for a while, and they were pretty okay. I think I probably broke them by playing music too loud. Once, I turned it up really loud and used it as a speaker for a few hours. Probably not a good idea, but whatever it was nice while it lasted. Not really sure how you would break them besides being stupidly rough with them.

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iDead
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Tue Sep 23, 2014 4:03 am
Posts: 27
PostPosted: Thu Dec 24, 2015 3:14 am 
 

I used these for a long time, but they cost me around 200 AUD, had better job then lol. http://cnet3.cbsistatic.com/hub/i/r/201 ... 646_02.jpg

Now im using this but i dont feel that bassy sound and they are not loud enough, Otherwise they are not bad. http://gearpop.com/wp-content/uploads/2 ... 411002.jpg

Still want an upgrade, its hard buying headphones when you cant test them in store, some you can but you cant plug them into youriPod or whatever and samples they use dont help much.
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Icon_of_Sin
Mallcore Kid

Joined: Wed May 24, 2006 8:28 pm
Posts: 25
Location: United States of America
PostPosted: Mon Jan 11, 2016 9:03 pm 
 

I've been using the Panasonic RP-HT21 headphones for years because they are cheap (extremely cheap, about $6). I want to move on to something better (especially because it leaks sound like crazy and I can hear outside noises as if I weren't wearing any headphones) and I'm breaking my head over three choices:


Bose SoundTrue Headphones

Sennheiser HD 380 PRO Headphones

Sony MDR-V150 Monitor Series Headphones

The Bose headphones are my highest consideration since people claim that they are comfortable. I really don't want my headphones to clamp and squeeze my skull to mush.

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Dudemanguy
Metalhead

Joined: Tue Mar 30, 2010 7:19 pm
Posts: 2449
PostPosted: Mon Jan 11, 2016 10:18 pm 
 

Out of those three, I'd pick the Sony because it's the cheapest. But you probably don't want any of those.

So here's the mandatory questions. What's your budget? And also: What kind of sound are you looking for? Bassy? V-shaped? Lots of treble? Flat, etc.?

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Metantoine
Slave to Santa

Joined: Sat Jun 21, 2008 5:00 pm
Posts: 12030
Location: Montréal
PostPosted: Tue Oct 18, 2016 7:46 pm 
 

Reviving this thread to talk about my newest purchase. I needed a new pair of headphones and I went with the classic Porta Pro from Koss due to a recommendation of fellow MAer PhilosophicalFrog. I'll receive them soon but I'm excited. I didn't want to pay a lot since I'm rough with my headphones and those were around 60 bucks with the taxes and shipping. I've read a bunch of reviews and they all say it's one of the best sound in this price range. Any of you guys own some?
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