[obobskivich]

First, a poll isn't going to pick up anything meaningful about a headphone like the koss950, because few have experienced them.  That doesn't mean this is strictly a popularity contest, rather that its a comparison amongst the readily available headphones.  So in that regard, there is an element of popularity involved.  I mean, I could include some old school yamaha ortho's, the k1000, and lots of obscure headphones, but they don't have a chance vs a headphone that is readily available and commonly reviewed.  I'm not saying your crazy for suggesting it.  I was impressed when I heard the Koss950, just the nature of a poll makes putting it in there kinda futile.  

Alright, I could agree with this reasoning. Honestly when I first clicked into this thread, I expected "R10, L3000, K1000, O2" as the options.
 

I realize flat FR and waterfall plots aren't an accurate representation for what is neutral, since there are variations between distance of the driver and ear drum, reflections caused by the pinna, differing interpretations/rational for peaks n valleys etc.  Also in looking at the graphs I think most people would argue these headphones seem to be clustering around some theoretical ideal FR  Looking at them, I think you could also make an argument for any of the headphones I listed as being closest to this "ideal" curve.  So I guess my point is the headphones are more similar than different, which suggests they are aiming for the same thing.

See that's where I'm sort of confused with your reasoning. The T1 and HD800 are fairly bright, while the LCDs are nearly inverted from that.

So my opinion on grado's is just an opinion, I would have liked to include them in this for that reason.  I think they sound drastically different from the others in the group.

Certainly!

Only in the T1 I notice has a peak at 10khz... and none of these headphones have peaks/valleys as high as 30db.

Okay I'll behave - I should've put my normal qualifier out there about Beyer. :veryevil:

It's kind of a running bet I have with myself - we've gone from cans like the HD 600 which aren't really bumped up at all, to the new Beyers that are 10-15 dB up, and the newer Ultrasones that are just silly up there, and I'm half-seriously believing they're racing to the top.

Edition 10s existence doesn't negate either of our opinions.  Cost has an imperfect correlation w/ quality, which odd as it sounds I think you agree.

I agree to an extent. Where I have a gripe is when we want to talk about things in terms of "headphones $500-$750 are equal in performance" - well, no, not really. There's some very expensive bologna and some very cheap caviar in there. Of the models you listed up above (that I've heard), I'd probably vote Denon - but I'd also qualify that I don't think they're $1000+ quality (and the market sort of agrees, and that's part of my point; they're KILLER $600 headphones, but remember that the Beats Pro can be $600 headphones if you get the special edition, or the Beyer T70 at release, etc).


Just saw this on IF:
http://www.innerfidelity.com/content/highest-fi-always-best-fi

 

[daveDerek]

Quote:

Most Grado's are purposefully colored and stray away from the herd.

 
this is true of the john grado phones, although much less so with the ones they manufacture for alessandro.
it is NOT true of the joe grado hp1000. these were built as studio reference monitors and serve well in that capacity, they were voiced to be tonally accurate to allow the engineer to hear what was going on in the mix.

 

[Subsequence]

Your cans might be neutral but your ears could well be colored so in the end just use whatever sounds best.

 

[Lorspeaker]

the earth is definitely FLAT....

 
 
something above midfi...my ears say the Alexandro MS-Pro. (its a flagship of sorts...no?)
it sounded like a clearer HD600.

 
i heard all of the cans u put up...owned half of them once or twice...
all on diff setups..so tat disqualified my guess right from the start..
 
i would take out the LCDs..Denons...they give diff taste to the bass..is it boosted..??
u have to be in the recording hall to judge, but realism...definitely. oh boy do i love these.
boinnnnnnnnnnnnnk.

 

[RPGWiZaRD]

I think you need to separate what's objectively measured neutral and what's perceived as neutral. People's view of what's neutral can be heavily skewed and somewhat personal and often people are not looking for an objectively measured neutral sound to begin with. So I think it's rather silly to speak about neutral in that sense. What's interesting is also I find a lot of people thinking they are pursuing the optimal neutral sound when they aren't, they think they are but they don't know their true personal taste well enough.
 
As music listening hobby, there's no greater need of this, however for the music recording industry, objectively measured neutral is more important than anything as if it sounds right on the objectively measured neutral headphone then it'll work as a good middleground that sounds as good as possible for a wide range of equipment as the headphone's sound to strive to sound somewhat neutral as that's concidered a key aspect to sound quality in general but yea we see lots of fluctuations around that which is logical as people have their own personal tastes, if that wasn't the case there would be no market for 100.000 different headphones. 

 

[Chris_Himself]

Ahh HD800, looks like 30+% of you guys know what you're talking about
 
 
 

 
this is true of the john grado phones, although much less so with the ones they manufacture for alessandro.
it is NOT true of the joe grado hp1000. these were built as studio reference monitors and serve well in that capacity, they were voiced to be tonally accurate to allow the engineer to hear what was going on in the mix.
 

 
Very true, they're not headphones for listening pleasure, they were designed back when they were the best tool for the job at hand for engineering tracks. They just happen to sound good and the cool factor is through the roof due to their rarity.
 
I also think they're one of the coolest headphones today as well.

 

[RexAeterna]

tonality wise i always found pioneer monitor 10's and the 240DF's to ''sound'' most natural especially in the midrange from my experience. for planers the fostex t50rp is a winner if you know basic knowledge about speaker enclosures/room acoustics and know how to tune by ear(that's what i did with mine).

 

[Oderi]

Accidentally voted for HD800. My vote was supposed to go to LCD-3. I like graphs.

 

[Sweden]

A lot of the so called neutral headphones are somewhat bass light and or bright and you can see this from the graphs as almost every open dynamic headphone drops in the low bass by result of the design. I agree with the reasoning behind going up about 3 dB from roughly 200 Hz in order to compensate the lack of bass impact and chest compression you get from speakers.
With the LCD-3 I'm not sure I have "absolute neutrality" what now that is, but more importantly I have the sense of realistic and natural music reproduction. Hope to listen to the SR-009 some day but until then this is my benchmark over the HD800. I'm skeptical about the weight the SR-009 will carry in the bass but real music comes from the mids.
 
I find it interesting that someone could prefer measured neutrality before perceived neutrality. Some headphones that measures like they would have good bass response such as the Beyer T70 sound anemic as well as most single balanced armature in-ears I heard.
Transparency trumps so called neutrality every day is my point.