Known for their professional microphones and having
which just released their first headphone: the NTH-100 - currently available for US$149 from multiple vendors.
These are targeting audio professionals. They look really well built and comfortable. Let’s hope they sound at least half as good as they look. 
I’m anxious to see what a headphone enthusiast review with a proper FR measurement looks like. Until then there’s this: Rode’s first pair of headphones offer a comfortable and balanced way to monitor audio - The Verge
I’ll put together an article on this headphone shortly but wanted to post the measurements and some quick notes here first.
RODE NTH-100 frequency response taken on the GRAS 43AG with KB5000 anthropometric pinnae:
Assessment: While at first glance this looks decent and in general I’d say it is decent, there are some subtleties to this that should be pointed out. Strict target adherence acolytes will likely rejoice at a result like this, but others may find it a bit on the thick/muddy side of things. I find myself in the latter camp on this one.
There’s quite a lot of masking going on in the upper bass and lower mids that tends to obscure the clarity of the upper mids, yielding a kind of sound more cynical audiophiles might describe as ‘warmpoo’. But the bigger issue in my view is that this has the same kind of problems that affected the Drop Panda, in that the treble region is a bit too rolled off - especially in relation to the elevated midbass and lower mids.
With that said, there is still a lot of good here as well, specifically with the upper mid section of the ear gain being about where you’d want it to be, so maybe the better way to describe the NTH-100 would be “warmpoo done right”, if such a thing were possible. Moreover, this one is going to be very easy to improve with EQ, which is commendable as well.
Channel Matching:
I had a slightly harder time getting the right channel to seal, but for the most part, as we’d expect, the bass level is determined by the coupling. Otherwise, this unit does damn well on the channel matching front.
EDIT AGAIN: I tried it both with the connector plug out and with it in (and with the cable swapped to the other side), and there’s essentially no change to the right side bass. So it’s likely just to do with subtle differences in the pads or coupling.
Harmonic Distortion (not as meaningful as people think):
Normally the harmonic distortion on modern headphones is low enough for it not to matter, but in this case I think it’s worth pointing out. This is taken at 94dB at 1khz (externally calibrated), which is loud, but at a level where I’d expect this to be better kept in check. What’s more worrying is the elevated 3rd and 5th (almost reminiscent of BA driver behavior). Is it audible? I’ll need to spend some more time with it, but I dare say it might be given that the higher order products are also quite elevated.
Notes:
- Excellent build quality & comfort, with a unique arm extension system. I can see this being very useful for Rode’s intended audience (pro applications, creators, and so forth). It’s also very lightweight.
- The pads are triangle shaped, which is interesting. I think this will work for most people, but I have abnormally large ears so I think they could’ve been a bit bigger for me.
- Subjective qualities are generally acceptable, apart from some blunting on trailing ends of tones.
- Some minor smearing/haze with generally poor image separation, but also potentially as a result of the tonality masking issues in the mids and rolled off treble.
- Isolation is pretty good actually, but I’ll need to test this more because my studio is a quiet environment.
All in all, the AKG K371 still reigns supreme for closed-back sound quality on a budget - at least for those who want a high degree of clarity from their headphones. But I do think RODE mostly hit their target with the NTH-100, as it offers a fantastic build and design (that’s far superior to the K371), with good isolation, and sound quality that, while not dethroning the well-established leaders at this price, is at least competitive. I imagine anyone looking for a warmer and thicker presentation will find something to like here. For the rest of us, it’s really just a matter of tweaking the lower mids and bass the tiniest bit to get it there.
EDIT: Upon further listening, there’s definitely some blunting going on for trailing ends of tones. I’m going to remove the front-damping felt piece and measure afterwards to see how this improves things.
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Thanks for the impressions and measurements.
- Did you insert the plastic cap on the open port for the measurement? Apparently it has an effect on FR and channel matching.
- Do you think when EQ’ed, NTH100 is a better buy than K371? (SQ, build and comfort considered)
Why would you EQ a professional studio headphone…kinda defeats the point 
Earlier I watched josh’s video and according to him there is some unit variance going on. I wonder to what degree and will Rode adress to it. Maybe like every product on the market potential buyers should wait for the later batches. Still a good first try on their end, not they are completely rookies though.
Why not? Every headphone can benefit at least a little bit from EQ.
Also not everybody is interested in this headphone only for mixing and monitoring. I see a perfectly capable headphone that looks and built better than K371. If it sounds good too, I’m gonna choose this over the AKG.
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That might be true. But he based the opinion on two different units which were tested by two different people. He hasn’t heard more than one unit himself.
Any unit variance can be proven by measurements. Even going back and forth between two volume matched headphones won’t be enough in most cases.
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Then why buy it? there’s a plethora of audiophile “based” sets that are targeted to just that
Oh sorry, maybe I wasn’t paying attention much. I thought he also heard his friend’s unit too.
There are a couple of additional measurements I’m going to do next week when I get back to the studio, including doing a light mod to the front damping to see how things change.
EQ’d I’d say yes there’s an argument for the NTH100 over the K371, the only issue would be the higher order distortion stuff.
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Have you tried the Austrian Audio Hi X-15? I’d love to hear your take on how they stack up vs the K371 and NTH100. I haven’t heard the NTH100 but own the other two, and think they’re both amazing considering their price.
Further critical listening has revealed even more insight into the performance of the NTH-100.
Listening at a low SPL avoids non linearities in the frequency response(the treble roll off), detail loss, distortion and the degradation of other performance metrics. These hold performance together even with very dense tracks at low volumes. The more the drivers move, the worse their performance gets. On sparse tracks without any low frequencies, you can crank the volume up way farther. That means for podcasting/speech they should be more suitable as opposed to music.
My impressions were very favorable after a long listening session at a very modest near background volume while I was reading. This explains my very favorable impressions after that particular listening session.
Bring up the volume and the detail retrieval, high frequencies and distortion all take a turn for the worse and worse. And this occurs at a level that is in a range where many people, including myself sometimes, would want to listen in.
My LCD-X, my personal benchmark(unfair comparison alert), if I want more volume, I turn the knob and it just makes MORE SOUND in a completely linear way that leaves the quality of the sound completely unchanged.
Analog mechanical devices can be quite non linear and exhibit it in complex ways. This headphone is very well engineered and impresses me quite a bit. But they are not perfect/flawed.
Now that I know more about the conditions that they thrive in I will be able to enjoy them more effectively.
I will be spending many hours outdoors with these gently caressing my ears while I read. The level of practicality is off the charts. These have provided me with a lot of listening enjoyment to be away from my desktop rig and loudspeaker setup and without having to shove anything into my ear canal or paying very much.
I like these a lot, but a recommendation to others would have to come with a disclaimer regarding the specific caveats they exhibit for music playback that would certainly be unacceptable to some, possibly most and workable for others.
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So, I’m not sure what you mean by this. I think maybe this is what it might seem like, as in, maybe it feels like the more you push it or the more busy stuff gets the worse it sounds or something along those lines. But a driver moving faster really just means it’s producing more upper frequency stuff. Not saying your experience isn’t of a real thing happening, merely that we have to be careful about what we attribute the cause of that experience to.
As far as the distortion stuff is concerned, this is a bit of an interesting one. 94dB is definitely loud but you’d want to see better harmonic distortion behavior. The flip side of it is that for the most part it’s in the lower frequencies, and that’s where it’s going to be more difficult to hear. I’d suggest that a lot of this perception is really just frequency response and masking, like when the images ‘fall apart’, that can also be an FR thing.
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A good read @MAMMALHAMMER sheds some light on my experiences with my Dad as a electronics salesman in the 60’s & 70’s. His observation was that he sold more stereos when he was allowed by the store to turn the volume up ( which the other salespeople & some customers complained about ). That does tie into the Louder = Better aspect that you highlighted.
I’ve always had a habit of finding an acceptable volume level ( Speaker or Headphone ) and sticking with it. It seems to me that by being consistent with volume, and rarely touching the knob, I get to hear what the recording engineers were trying to do.
Mark Gosdin
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I use one of these with REW software to level match different equipment setups. It’s not very good for measuring absolute FR but I think it’s accurate enough to measure SPL.
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That’s a great solution to compare setups and to A/B headphones on the same amplifier that has a digital volume control!
A great tool in the toolbox for more objective listening comparisons.
That’s what I like to see!
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I just double checked and it had very little effect on channel matching, at least nothing that couldn’t be attributed to slight coupling differences. I even tried swapping the cable to the other side and found little to no difference in the bass.
Here’s the result with the plug in:
It’s honestly close enough that this likely won’t play a role in channel perception when worn on an actual human head.
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Have you had a chance to measure the Shure SRH840A with your rig?
I saw the review yesterday via DMS but was wondering if you have measurements also.
Regarding the Rode, it seems the CAL has a more balanced sound 
Especially the new SE version.
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@Resolve ’s video review of the RODE NTH-100 is now live. Watch out Shakira, Resolve is here instead.
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