Driving Miss Daisy? For those of you who have seen the movie you might get the analogy. You hear a lot on HiFi forums regarding the Sennheiser HD650s. Phrases like ‘legendary’ abound in many amateur (and some professional) reviews and you get the impression that these headphones are the best thing since sliced bread. Glowing superlatives regarding sound stage, imaging, bass control, detail retrieval are there in droves. I own the HD580s and love them so eventually I bought a pair of the 650s just to see what the hype was all about. And my initial...

AUDEZE LCD-1 Review There are only two reviews of the Audeze LCD-1 in the reviews section, both from Headfiers who already have Audeze headphones that are considerably more expensive than these ones. With that in mind I thought I’d review these from the point of someone who doesn’t have TOTL gear and is looking for an upgrade that might transform their listening experience. Background: My headphones consist of three Sennheisers (HD580, HD6XX and the older wired Momentum 2s) and the exceptional Flare Gold iems. I tend to use the Golds as portables...

Burson Playmate 2 After my PLAY died for the third time and the warranty had expired, Addicted to Audio offered me the chance to buy the PM2 for a substantial discount. I’ve had it for nearly four months now and it’s time to pen a few words about it. Build: The big plus for me is the new heat sink style cover which barely gets mildly warm as opposed to the Play and Playmate which could get very hot. My belief is that the PLAY power supply failed because of the heat generated but that’s only a supposition. I also like the push button power switch on...

Burson PLAY V6 Vivid DAC/Amp There have already been some reviews of the various iterations of the PLAY. I’ve had mine for a few months now and it’s time to comment. My foray into the world of headphone amplifiers occurred because I bought a pair of Sennheiser HD280 Pros. I bought them for their isolation and their sound as they were well reviewed. It was at this point that I discovered that the resistance in ohms of a pair of headphones doesn’t necessarily reflect how easy or hard it is to drive them. They are a modest 64ohms but I discovered...

A few caveats and some background before my review. I have owned headphones for decades and have had some quite good pairs at times because I really like the way that headphones can immerse you in the music without turning the sound up too loud. Budget was a problem in the early days. And I remember distinctly the first time I heard a pair of Sennheiser HD580s in the high end audio store and my jaw just dropped. However, I couldn’t afford them. I had the HD540s at the time and they would have to do. This has changed in the last ten years and I’ve...