Focal Utopia Open-Back Headphones - Official Thread

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@chrisnyc75

My current chain is Bifrost 2 into Lyr 3 or Valhalla 2. I’ve found that I tend to prefer Utopia on Lyr - IMO its sharper more incisive presentation emphasizes Utopia’s strengths.

That’s interesting. The Lyr 3 is about the least sharp, least defined, and narrowest amp I regularly use. It has the depth and harmonics of tubes, but not the wide stage or defined edges of my other tube and hybrid amps. You are indeed smoothing a lot of sharpness with the Bifrost 2 + Lyr 3 chain. I’d love to see your face when using the Utopia on an ESS Sabre DAC and THX AAA 789 (at least the sadist in me wants to see). The Lyr 3 and Bifrost can make most all of my headphones tolerable.

@chrisnyc75

Bouncing between Utopia and Arya, which I previously had believed to be a VERY detailed headphone, it sounds like a whole layer of sound is missing - when I listen to Arya now I find myself reaching, trying to find the details that I now know are in the music

You might try more technical upstream gear. I hear a lot more treble details or artifacts on some DACs. These are not necessarily musical or desirable. But no, you likely won’t beat the Utopia.

@chrisnyc75

A common theme is that it “only sounds good with well recorded music”. This is more or less true. But I would counter with: why are you listening to bad music in the first place? And why is it Utopia’s fault if your bad music sounds bad? Bad music is bad. Life is too short to listen to bad music, so just stop, and stop blaming Utopia.

This gets into individual hearing differences. I found the Utopia generated painful treble edges on my benchmark, definitively mild female vocals (i.e., tracks I previously considered safe on everything).

@chrisnyc75

Where does this “good music” exist other than in the poor recording? If it only exists in a state of bad sound, is it “good music” at all? I mean, to each their own and all, but I get very confused when people talk about music and recordings like they are two different things.

My true history with the Red Hot Chili Pepper’s song Californication:

It has California in the title. It has fornication in the title. What could possibly go wrong?

Years ago when played on the radio, I heard this song in the car only and it sounded “fine” by me. I wasn’t a RHCP fan and never owned the album or heard it outside a car. After getting serious headphones and looking for examples of male vocals, it came to mind. I played it on my Sennheisers and it sounded worse than any vocal track ever recorded. It has a special spot in my test track list, sandwiched between otherwise decent vocals. It’s a bloody awful recording, but the song itself is “fine.” Not a favorite, just fine.

Take away: The chain and environment matters a lot about how a recording will be perceived. One can fix the brightness of Californication through EQ, and disguise the fact that it has brutal clipping. One can’t preserve details in the process, but it at least becomes listenable. One can alternatively listen in a car with loud background noise and the track remains clear and audible.

That’s how I separate music quality from recording quality: Playback context, signal chain, and EQ modifications. I now only play this song as a test track, as it reveals how your chain will perform with bloody awful vocal recordings. I notice recording quality now.