Due to various room and situational limitations, it has been pointed out that changing from speakers to headphones could well be in order. This has a lot of merit and i'd like to pursue it, but (as a long-term speaker user) I've a vast ignorance of headphone setups and have some serious reservations that I'm hoping people might be able to help me with before I make any costly mistakes.
The best of my headphone experience so far is a pair of sennheiser HD598SE phones, which were bought mostly for use with portable devices and laptops (I've never had a dedicated HP amp). They are comfortable over-ear and open-backed types, which I think suit my preferences, and work well enough for casual listening. I've also tried a variety of in-ear types which on paper should be preferable, as I don't really like having to wear stuff, but none that I've tried have actually been as comfortable and/or stayed properly in place for long sessions.
But... I've still not taken to using the Sennheisers for serious music listening, partly because all the sound appears to originate inside my own head - not from a soundstage spread out in front somewhere - which seems deeply artificial. Not sure if this is something i'd get used to with time but (aside from having to wear stuff) it is probably the biggest source of dissatisfaction with the setup (there is also no physical feeling of the sound-waves of course, but in the current situation I can't have speakers loud enough for that anyway).
So.. my initial question is very general, but IMO important to understand the realities (rather than manufacturer or enthusiast hype): if I'm going to move for the first time towards a headphone setup for serious listening, what do i need to be looking at for significant improvement? Or would I just need to alter my expectations and get used to the differences?
Many Thanks,
Kev
The best of my headphone experience so far is a pair of sennheiser HD598SE phones, which were bought mostly for use with portable devices and laptops (I've never had a dedicated HP amp). They are comfortable over-ear and open-backed types, which I think suit my preferences, and work well enough for casual listening. I've also tried a variety of in-ear types which on paper should be preferable, as I don't really like having to wear stuff, but none that I've tried have actually been as comfortable and/or stayed properly in place for long sessions.
But... I've still not taken to using the Sennheisers for serious music listening, partly because all the sound appears to originate inside my own head - not from a soundstage spread out in front somewhere - which seems deeply artificial. Not sure if this is something i'd get used to with time but (aside from having to wear stuff) it is probably the biggest source of dissatisfaction with the setup (there is also no physical feeling of the sound-waves of course, but in the current situation I can't have speakers loud enough for that anyway).
So.. my initial question is very general, but IMO important to understand the realities (rather than manufacturer or enthusiast hype): if I'm going to move for the first time towards a headphone setup for serious listening, what do i need to be looking at for significant improvement? Or would I just need to alter my expectations and get used to the differences?
Many Thanks,
Kev
Sennheiser 598SE is an expensive headphone. ~ $250.
It should be as good as can be.
I think you would benefit from having a good headphone amplifier.
Portables and laptop are not the ultimate sound sources.
It should be as good as can be.
I think you would benefit from having a good headphone amplifier.
Portables and laptop are not the ultimate sound sources.
Sennheisers are ok, i have many models including 598, but planars are much better. Try hifiman.
Good headphone amp helps.
Good headphone amp helps.
I have a Schiit headphone amp. ( Asgard) Drives about anything. JDS is also a very popular amp. Like many things, you can pay thousands, but get only bragging rights for what you spent. "Balanced" is the current craze that is about as useful as bi-wire if speakers. But of course, the slick sheet rags and on-line subjective reviewers will proclaim you must have a $1000 and up balanced headphone and $3000 tube amplifier. Don't forget the magic power cord and cable.
See if you can try out whatever you are looking at. I have some old Yamaha's and a Grado's. On ear. Worked fine. Tried some HD 560's. Over ear but still open back. Nice, except they reflected the "ocean sound" back so much as to be unusable for me. This varies person to person.
ALL headphones need some to quite a bit of EQ. Far more than speakers. It is personal, but I don't use them for serious listening. Just a U-tube when I don't want to disturb my wife. Besides the different imaging, they do bring out low level details that often are not good. Accurate, yea. Musical, not always.
See if you can try out whatever you are looking at. I have some old Yamaha's and a Grado's. On ear. Worked fine. Tried some HD 560's. Over ear but still open back. Nice, except they reflected the "ocean sound" back so much as to be unusable for me. This varies person to person.
ALL headphones need some to quite a bit of EQ. Far more than speakers. It is personal, but I don't use them for serious listening. Just a U-tube when I don't want to disturb my wife. Besides the different imaging, they do bring out low level details that often are not good. Accurate, yea. Musical, not always.
Thanks, everyone; thats useful. The 598SEs were a black-friday deal several years ago so weren't that kind of money, and perhaps I've undervalued them as a result. Either way though, it is good to hear that they're at least reasonable as a baseline for other comparisons to start from.
Yes if I were to go this way I'd be wanting a suitable headphone amplifier, likely DIY or perhaps bought (possibly a dedicated DAC too). Looking at various review and measurements around, it seems that they need not be especially costly. Though I hadn't thought they would help with the perceived position of the music and soundstage etc, so thats interesting.
I'll look into planars too; I know very little about them but they do seem quite potential. Certainly, a fairly large improvement is needed over what i have now if I'm going to move properly to headphones for serious listening.
Yeah, I'm long over my days of audio-myth and snakeoil, which is partly why I asked this question to the knowledgeable people on here rather than some audiophile fanclub somewhere. I've worked in human perception in the past so realise that our appreciation of such things is complex, but I'm mostly just interested in real and objective improvement myself; especially as I don't have a very large income these days.
Thanks again,
Kev
Yes if I were to go this way I'd be wanting a suitable headphone amplifier, likely DIY or perhaps bought (possibly a dedicated DAC too). Looking at various review and measurements around, it seems that they need not be especially costly. Though I hadn't thought they would help with the perceived position of the music and soundstage etc, so thats interesting.
I'll look into planars too; I know very little about them but they do seem quite potential. Certainly, a fairly large improvement is needed over what i have now if I'm going to move properly to headphones for serious listening.
Yeah, I'm long over my days of audio-myth and snakeoil, which is partly why I asked this question to the knowledgeable people on here rather than some audiophile fanclub somewhere. I've worked in human perception in the past so realise that our appreciation of such things is complex, but I'm mostly just interested in real and objective improvement myself; especially as I don't have a very large income these days.
Thanks again,
Kev
I would go open back. Something like sundara.
https://store.hifiman.com/index.php...ij2gle0glN4QZjLxqCpEK6cyqPheQTbRoCbJkQAvD_BwE
https://store.hifiman.com/index.php...ij2gle0glN4QZjLxqCpEK6cyqPheQTbRoCbJkQAvD_BwE
Your headphones are fairly easy to drive.TPA6120 based amps are the usual recommendation for almost anything up to the highest level. SCHIIT, RNHP and many other commercial amps use it. If you want to go with diy kits you have a very large range of choices unlike audeze or hifiman headphones owners do. Although i made about 10 headphones amps of all sorts from tubes to ic's or even germanium transitors, tpa6120 sits right where it should be, in the centre of all choices.
A good TPA6120 setup can be found in many forms and shspes but it will never dissapoint.
On the other hand i bet a lot of IBM lenovo-thinkpad laptop users can swear they have very decent experience right from their usual headphones port already cause i have 3 of them and none are bad sounding on headphones although they're probably using very cheap class d chips.
A good TPA6120 setup can be found in many forms and shspes but it will never dissapoint.
On the other hand i bet a lot of IBM lenovo-thinkpad laptop users can swear they have very decent experience right from their usual headphones port already cause i have 3 of them and none are bad sounding on headphones although they're probably using very cheap class d chips.
YMMV
A stereo source designed for headphones is preferable. Perhaps the only thing worse than a mono source would be "Beatles" type stereo with a hard-panned left and right, overlayed with mono. This may be fine with speakers but with headphones it can be jarring.
If changing the music preferences is not option, some kind of channel mixing could also be considered.
A high output resistance amplifier could also help lift a veil of distortion of ferromagnetic and inductive origin. But before you build an amplifier, experimentation is possible by adding a pair of resistors in series (e.g. 120 ohms) with the L+R output cable connections.
My Beyerdynamic DT 880's are also open-back, which is nice, but I sometimes wish I had gotten the 770 closed back version instead.
Personally, I cannot stand in-ear types that pressurise the ear-drums. Other people will tolerate nothing else.
Others have already mentioned dedicated amplifiers. This can create a marked improvement over direct laptop/etc sources. I've had great results with a custom amp for my open back Beyerdynamic DT 880's, which has variable output resistance (high resistance at high frequencies, and servo feedback reducing it in the bass). Pass Labs has a lot of reading and material on open-drain type amplifiers, which are naturally voltage-controlled current sources, adjusted by the application of negative feedback.
Tubes could be another way to go. A Nutube gain stage could be nice with a MOSFET output stage. Going full tube? I don't know. Aficionados swear by them. Others seem to have an unproven belief that the addition of harmonic distortion makes things sound better. It makes no sense to me because inter-modulation distortion is also created, so it's unlikely to be that. So there's a lot to experiment with.
A stereo source designed for headphones is preferable. Perhaps the only thing worse than a mono source would be "Beatles" type stereo with a hard-panned left and right, overlayed with mono. This may be fine with speakers but with headphones it can be jarring.
If changing the music preferences is not option, some kind of channel mixing could also be considered.
A high output resistance amplifier could also help lift a veil of distortion of ferromagnetic and inductive origin. But before you build an amplifier, experimentation is possible by adding a pair of resistors in series (e.g. 120 ohms) with the L+R output cable connections.
My Beyerdynamic DT 880's are also open-back, which is nice, but I sometimes wish I had gotten the 770 closed back version instead.
Whatever suits you.
Personally, I cannot stand in-ear types that pressurise the ear-drums. Other people will tolerate nothing else.
Others have already mentioned dedicated amplifiers. This can create a marked improvement over direct laptop/etc sources. I've had great results with a custom amp for my open back Beyerdynamic DT 880's, which has variable output resistance (high resistance at high frequencies, and servo feedback reducing it in the bass). Pass Labs has a lot of reading and material on open-drain type amplifiers, which are naturally voltage-controlled current sources, adjusted by the application of negative feedback.
Tubes could be another way to go. A Nutube gain stage could be nice with a MOSFET output stage. Going full tube? I don't know. Aficionados swear by them. Others seem to have an unproven belief that the addition of harmonic distortion makes things sound better. It makes no sense to me because inter-modulation distortion is also created, so it's unlikely to be that. So there's a lot to experiment with.
Yes, I selected the current headphones to be easy for lower powered devices and they will work suitably loudly with most things, though with varying quality. It is less of a requirement now but good to know they're still not bad for general use.
Thanks for the amp recommendations. It would be fun to make something, so i shall look at TPA6120 projects and I've also found the whammy and ACP+ threads to work through. I don't have golden ears but by the comments I've read it seems those kinds of amps would satisfy me even if I did!
Thanks also adason for the planar headphones suggestions. I'm in the UK so the prices are somewhat higher but the sundaras are equivalent to about about a month's rent for me, so not out of the question if they manage to put the soundstage where it should be. I can't find anywhere local to audition them but they are at least available here, mail order.
Thanks for the amp recommendations. It would be fun to make something, so i shall look at TPA6120 projects and I've also found the whammy and ACP+ threads to work through. I don't have golden ears but by the comments I've read it seems those kinds of amps would satisfy me even if I did!
Thanks also adason for the planar headphones suggestions. I'm in the UK so the prices are somewhat higher but the sundaras are equivalent to about about a month's rent for me, so not out of the question if they manage to put the soundstage where it should be. I can't find anywhere local to audition them but they are at least available here, mail order.
Ah, interesting stuff, thanks. I'm stuck with the recordings being what they are, but on top of previous comments maybe I need to look at various forms of mixing and DSP. It must be said that my physical sources are probably intended for stereo speakers, which clearly have quite a completely different physical setup. I shall also have a play with the impedence, perhaps even fiddle about with some simple amps just to see what kind of differences one could expect.
Cheers,
Kev
Though.. I have now read a few things that suggest the spatial impression of headphones might always be seriously compromised compared to speakers. Not sure if that is actually true, or pure gibberish by speaker fans, so i'd appreciate any insights people on here have.
At least, it something that I need to find more about before spending any real money on this. Having the band/orchestra sound more or less where they could plausibly be (e.g. in a live situation) seems to be quite important for my own impression of the music being at all real; certainly more important than minor increases in sound quality, for example.
Thanks,
Kev
At least, it something that I need to find more about before spending any real money on this. Having the band/orchestra sound more or less where they could plausibly be (e.g. in a live situation) seems to be quite important for my own impression of the music being at all real; certainly more important than minor increases in sound quality, for example.
Thanks,
Kev
Beatles recorded in Wall of Sound technique(not mono, not steteo).
These are my main headphones as well.I found sennheiser 650 a little bit better in the mids and highs.Not sure where 598se stands apart from its very different impedance and 9db difference in sensitivity, but sennheisers cannot withstand the sheer power beyerdynamic can .DT880's are brutal in the level they can take in both base region and highs , the complete opposite of studio rated AKG.
Not that marked though...I think it depends on the laptop...not all of them were born equal.
You need to make your own experiments and you'll understand that there's no belief...adition of harmonic distortions can be either benign or malign...it's just there's no fixed recipee for everything and headphones shouldn't be treated the same as speakers nor high sensitivity speakers should be treated the same with low spl speakers...I made both OTL and output transformer tube headphones amps and i can tell that output transformer ones are completely different beasts .
Headphones are super high sensitivity speakers attached directly to your eardrum.
Almost no rule that applies to normal speakers apply to headpones .
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"A stereo source designed for headphones is preferable. Perhaps the only thing worse than a mono source would be "Beatles" type stereo with a hard-panned left and right, overlayed with mono. This may be fine with speakers but with headphones it can be jarring."
No kidding! Gad there was some bad mastering back then.
BTW, from barely "decent" cans on up, headphones have much lower distortion than speakers and with no crossover in the middle of the critical hearing range, so can be far more accurate, but that does not always mean enjoyable. My old Grado's were accurate, great when I was ripping LPs. Not great for music. My old ( 40 years +) Yamaha YH-1's are far more enjoyable to listen to.
No kidding! Gad there was some bad mastering back then.
BTW, from barely "decent" cans on up, headphones have much lower distortion than speakers and with no crossover in the middle of the critical hearing range, so can be far more accurate, but that does not always mean enjoyable. My old Grado's were accurate, great when I was ripping LPs. Not great for music. My old ( 40 years +) Yamaha YH-1's are far more enjoyable to listen to.
To whom were you addressing? If to me, I totally agree and have done so, but I live in a house with nice brick walls and neighbors far enough away I don't even worry about my HT bass.
As far as laptop vs head amp, no laptop, none, can approach the quality of even the JDS, Schiit or Topping. Not in the amp, not in the DAC. Yes, some are far worse than others. Some high end sound cards may be much better. Even a COY will improve a laptop output. As decent cans start around the $300 range, it makes sense to start with an amplifier that can drive them and be reasonably clean to start with. Some cans are much easier than others.
Tubes do not have to be high distortion. That is a audiophool myth, They are actually very good voltage amplifiers. It is up to the engineer. One can design a buttery warm distorted amp, or a squeaky clean one. In power amps, compare a Cary with a VTL as an example. I suggest some of the sonic signature to have more to do with the rest of the circuit, like the output transformer, than the use of tubes.
Tubes do not have to be high distortion. That is a audiophool myth, They are actually very good voltage amplifiers. It is up to the engineer. One can design a buttery warm distorted amp, or a squeaky clean one. In power amps, compare a Cary with a VTL as an example. I suggest some of the sonic signature to have more to do with the rest of the circuit, like the output transformer, than the use of tubes.
I pretty much echo what's been said. Headphones are a very different experience, but great for critical listening. From experience I recommend - open back headphones, a good headamp and good source - here the DAC can make big difference to the finer audible nuances and details.
My previous post addressed to op starter was not meant to discourage from serious headphone listening. On the contrary.
It just seems his expectations are not realistic.
While headphone listening can not replace great speakers in the great room, it can have other benefits.
Its more intimate. It eliminates room acoustics. It does not cost as much as top speakers (well, it can, but in general headphones are cheaper to manufacture). It does not disturb neighbour or loved ones. Its portable. And its fun. And it can yield amazing sound (while somewhat different from speakers).
Buy.
It just seems his expectations are not realistic.
While headphone listening can not replace great speakers in the great room, it can have other benefits.
Its more intimate. It eliminates room acoustics. It does not cost as much as top speakers (well, it can, but in general headphones are cheaper to manufacture). It does not disturb neighbour or loved ones. Its portable. And its fun. And it can yield amazing sound (while somewhat different from speakers).
Buy.
Thank you, this is exactly what I was trying to get a feel for; what my expectations could/should realistically be with respect to what might actually be achieved. This is very helpful, as i can now start to make some decisions on the trade-offs, rather than starting to pursuing costly pipe-dreams that will never be realised.
It seems that I would benefit from learning to appreciate the strengths of headphones more, and so mitigate what I currently see as disadvantages. But nor will I plunge in entirely and give up on the speakers; being so different there does seem to be a good argument for having both. Maybe i'll look seriously at nearfield listening for those.
Thanks again,
Kev