I think a small dealer network makes sense when you’ve only built <150 units since launch (at least based on unit numbers on the RAD site).
Agreed, it right thing for this stage of there life of their business. Honestly, it was great talking to Alex directly about my order. His passion comes through. It also one thing I also like about ZMF.
My Rad-0 was 116 units built ( why it is just under 600 grams), but one of the first 100 units sold.
The changes show they are listening to there customers, which is a good thing since they are still boutique and refining their first product.
It’s a double-edged sword.
New customers, getting the benefits of any refinements, love it. Early adopters/existing customers, often tend to get a bit pissed off if those refinements are not subsequently available to them.
Early adopters paid the same price. The product has the same name/designation. But now is potentially perceived as not “current” or “as good” or has lower resale vs. more recent versions of “the same thing”.
I’m not typically of that mind. I was (and am) happy with what I bought, at the price I paid, at the time I bought it. It’s performance/comfort doesn’t change just because newer models are different.
But I can see both sides.
Put another way …
The FIRST question anyone selling a set of RAD-0 is going to be asked right now is “How much do your set weigh?”. And that’s assuming the ONLY changes are in their weight.
It is something manufacturers have to be very careful with. Especially when they’re only just into triple-digit units sold in a very niche, and close, market.
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I understand where your coming from.
Weight issue seems a bit overblown since RAD Claimed weight is 650 Grams, ( mine is 599 grams ( so it is a 51gram variance this could be based amount of wood vs polymer used in the outer ring or foam bad density) compared to more portly Audeze LCD-4 @ 735 Grams and the Heddphone @ 700 grams.
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RAD can “claim” what they like …
Actual weight on my unit, on a calibrated industrial/reference scale (cost more than my RAD-0) is 714g. Exactly the same as my LCD-4.
You’re making my point for me.
You’re happy because you got a usefully lighter set. Early adopters that do have weight issues are worse off.
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With that data point, I agree with you 17%. variance in weight is a little rough
Grabbed unit #8 and absolutely love it. Sold the LCD-4 to afford it, was very happy to confirm it’s a solid step above the LCD-3 within the first minute of listening (I literally breathed a sigh of relief, worried over hearing a couple non-owners say they heard it was just an overpriced LCD-2). From there I’d say it’s maybe halfway between the 3 and 4, with an equal distance traveled sideways from that point. But the portability and warranty make it a no-brainer vs the LCD-4 IMO.
Two things I’m wondering that someone that knows this stuff better than me could probably answer.
First, I was surprised to find that besides Audeze, the sound this reminds me of most is actually the ZMF Eikon. I perceive both of them as having a slightly warm tilt in the mids, but my favorite part of the Eikon was this sweet spot in the upper mids where say guitar solos get just exactly the right amount of sweetness and edge. I was very slightly disappointed that the VC doesn’t have this spot in its tuning, and hearing it in the Rosson was a totally unexpected surprise.
Am I just imagining that? Is it just me? Does anyone else hear it? Can anyone else find any plausible candidates for what I’m hearing on the graph? If I can figure out what it actually is, that would be great information to have in the future.
2nd, I perceive the sound coming off of the LCD-4 as having been just a tiny bit “bigger.” I want to say the driver was actually physically larger and that that explains it. But I wonder if I’m misremembering here and it’s just the non-dropped treble that keeps me from blasting the volume on the mids up so hard. (I was a fan of the stock EQ on the LCD-4, however far from “correct” it admittedly was.)
What’s the warranty?
On the RAD-0, it’s lifetime—and transferable!
Rosson has said he isn’t sure he wants to keep making headphones next, and it’s a 2-3 man shop, so that could be cause for worry. It’s not like he’s a grifter on the scene, though. He co-founded Audeze and has been in audio his whole life. A rep for failing promises because he can’t stand behind his own work would hurt him anywhere, audio or not for that matter. The lifetime warranty probably won’t mean much in 60 years, but it’s still better than anything you’ll get anywhere else, and you don’t run the possibility of paying an additional $1250 to $2500 every decade you own it as you do with an LCD-4 (assuming driver failure right at the end of every 5-year warranty). Is the LCD-4 better than the RAD-0? In my opinion, for the things I love it for, yes, but the gap isn’t enormous. Is it worth the risk of paying up to an extra ~$7000? Hell no.
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I had no idea about that. I might have grabbed one sooner if I’d known. Now I gotta save up my money again!
That might be the daftest thing I’ve read on here in a while.
I hope you understand that any legal obligations towards a lifetime warranty dissolve the moment the company is no longer operating.
I’d much rather have a three year warranty on a product from a company that is actively growing, than a lifetime warranty from a company that isn’t sure it wants to be in business for the long-term. Though I’ve heard nothing about Rosson getting out of the game, so I’m not going to stoke that particular fire.
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I was kind of worried about that too. He’s banking on Rosson’s name, but over time he get frustrated and want to stop supporting it, particularly if the business fails.
Fortunately, while the name may have been useful in generating initial interest, now that’s done the product absolutely stands on its own merits.
It’s a very impressive headphone, never mind for a first release.
The every-unit-looks-different model is both a selling point and a challenge. It makes production more involved, and introduces a level of variability in how desirable any given unit is (which affects both first-party sales, and the used market).
If scaling-up is something they want to pursue, I could easily see there being a follow-up line that is the same headphone but doesn’t have the unique cups and is based around a single/or limited number of solid-colors (including black), or easily reproduced patterns (e.g. black with metal flakes in it), and some choices for hardware color (black or silver), at a somewhat lower price point and with more availability.
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Not sure how that response is supposed to show my comment is “daft” when we aren’t disagreeing on a single fact, and you just made exactly the same points I made. The only thing we differ on is that after acknowledging those facts, we have different feelings on where we’d want to place our bets.
The fact remains if the RAD had an early-Audeze failure rate and Rosson quit in 2 years and never repaired any after that, every single one of them would be dead before long, and that would be a serious blow to his credibility anywhere in audio. People quite reasonably expect a “lifetime warranty” not to be meaningless in a handful of years, and that’s all that matters as far as public perception is concerned. If in 5 years he starts a different company making speakers, it would still be a mark on his resume that he has 100 disappointed customers with 100 dead headphones out there from his last venture. I’m wagering 100 people that spent a quarter of a million dollars together on unrepairable headphones would be quite vocal. So I’m not even wagering on his name for anything but the assumption he’ll want to stay in audio. You don’t have to bet the same way, but there’s nothing “daft” about it when we both know the whole thing is a gamble either way. Even if my reasoning holds out, some people will still do better betting the other way, likewise the other way around.
It’s daft because you’re speculating without data, let alone “facts”.
Unless you have failure rates for the LCD-4, there’s no reason to assume it is going to be a problem. There’s no indication it has an unusual failure rate since the update to the 200 ohm driver four years ago (there are no 5-year old models to compare to - and the 200 ohm update was free to anyone that wanted it). Even the LCD-3, which very much did seem to have a major reliability problem, hasn’t been so since 2016.
There’s no indication that the RAD-0 has an unusual failure rate, either.
And rumoring that a manufacturer may not want to stay in the business is a good way to harm their business. Fair enough if there’s actually a referenceable source for that, otherwise it’s a bad idea.
And what people expect with warranties, and what actually happens, aren’t guaranteed to coincide. Even companies that do still exist, but have dropped products that have a lifetime warranty, can’t always give you the same product/repair it, so you wind up with whatever they think is “equivalent” (which is invariably NOT, and extremely rarely better).
If a company stops producing a line of headphones, or gets out of that business entirely no amount of goodwill or good intention will keep the supply of spare parts around for very long … especially if there’s the presumed high mortality rate that would make this relevant in the first place (unless they are shared with another model).
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I don’t know why you’re misinterpreting me so uncharitably, but the thing I’m actually saying is barely removed from something I’ve seen you say yourself: that the Rosson probably poses a better value proposition for many people compared to the LCD-4.
The “facts” are that an LCD-4 costs $4000 new. It also costs $1250 to replace out of warranty. In the worst case scenario this could possibly happen every several years. In addition to a lower entry price, Rosson offers a lifetime warranty. On face value, it seems to represent the same kind of sincere pride and confidence in his work that Zach has with ZMF. There are coulds and probabilities all around here, including that Rosson could move on from making headphones. Weighing them all in the balance, I think there are many people for whom the Rosson is a better financial gamble.
Nothing about that is “speculating in the absence of facts.” And my reasoning doesn’t require that these points be anything more than odds and probabilities on different uncertain outcomes.
And I, personally, feel more comfortable with a Rosson than an Audeze. I, personally, feel it’s a better bet given my personal finances and level of risk tolerance. Whether you want to think of yourself as making a personal attack or not, you are calling me daft by claiming my reasoning on this is daft.
Yet, I made a point to emphasize very clearly that I’m not calling “you” (or “your reasoning”) daft if you feel opposite and would have more trust in Audeze: the way I see it, we’re talking about a gambling scenario where the whole premise is that none of us can be 100% certain what the outcome will be.
I don’t have exact numbers on failure rates, but neither do you, and if anything the fact that we don’t have them would only lend support to my argument that the Rosson makes a better value proposition. Because everyone knows Audeze has uniquely had wide concerns about driver failure - justified or not. Well, if the statistics were exonerating, it stands to reason they’d want to release them and be proud of those numbers. The fact that we don’t have those numbers could stand for a variety of reasons, but “it’s because they actually aren’t very exonerating” will continue to stand as a possibility unless Audeze actually does choose to release them.
This was never and still isn’t part of my own argument, I’m just explaining why it’s not a good part of yours. The idea that there’s “no reason to assume driver failure could be a problem” unless you have numbers on failure rates is beyond ridiculously silly when the only entity that could publicize those numbers is the company in question, which would not want to publicize them if they didn’t look good. Anyway, that whole thread is irrelevant to anything I’m actually arguing, because I’m not assuming any specific failure rate for either headphone at all. I’m reasoning from the vantage point of someone for whom that’s completely unknown.
It’s extremely odd that you can’t see how these two criticisms flatly contradict one another. In one breath it seems you’re trying to smack down my claim that the Rosson makes a better value proposition on the basis of the warranty. You open by saying you hope I realize there’s no legal obligation once the company dissolves (of course I do, here again you’re implying I’m an idiot whether you want to acknowledge that and own it or not), and you go on to continue arguing against my reasoning that desire to keep a high reputation would still have a meaningful (not absolute, but still meaningful) influence on what Rosson chooses to do.
Then you just as adamantly criticize the claim that Rosson could potentially move on from headphones. Well, if that criticism holds, it only makes the other conclusion you just argued against even stronger: the more definite Rosson’s long-term commitment to headphones is, the more obviously true that the Rosson is a better medium to long-term proposition for many people.
The weirdest part of this reaction is that I don’t think you’re actually trying to argue that the LCD-4 is a better value proposition. I’m certain I’ve seen you say otherwise for other reasons. But that’s the only way you could actually be arguing against me here. So either you do think people at the edge of affording gear like this should save more for the LCD-4 on a long-term value basis alone, or you called my thoughts “daft” without making any effort to understand them before making an insult.
And even if the former is what you think, I’ve emphasized already that I don’t think it would be “daft.” All that would be “daft” is thinking either preference is “daft” when we’re dealing with inherently uncertain gambles on the future. Different people are willing to tolerate different risks of different costs for different amounts of time. At a bare minimum, I’ll have plenty of forewarning if Rosson does move on. So for me that still eliminates the inherent uncertainty I had owning Audeze.
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So back to the topic of the RAD-0 and our impressions.
I spent the afternoon, between conference calls, demoing the Chord Qutest vs. Topping D90 on two amps TCA HPA-1 and SPL Phonitor x. with Audeze LCD-4.
At some point, I decided to pull the RAD-0; it reminded me why I like these headphones, substantial detail, tonal balance, speed, lighter weight, kick drum still hit with authority. It is so much easier to drive. The LCD-4 is darker than the two headphones.
At some point, I now ready to pull down the Audeze plug-in so I can eq the LCD-4. I am sure I am going to have questions about this for community.
One thing it was easier to hear the difference in the dynamic of the two DAC’s with the RAD-0.
On power needs on SPL for the two headphones at 11 o-clock, the RAD-0 is loud enough, and you need to turn up to 2 o-clock to get the LCD-4 to close to equal volume.
They are both very nice but RAD-0 right not hit all the right switch for Music I like listening too.
Hope all of you are having a Happy Valentine’s.
Time to go cook dinner on Big Green Egg with a nice glass of wine.
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I sincerely hope that nobody is considering headphones that they plan to listen to on a regular basis as some sort of investment. Nor are tulip bulbs that you are growing for flowers.
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Hey, I miss the Tulip down here in Austin, I usually only see them as cut flower now. When I lived in North County San Diego we had a number of beautiful growers fields in Carlsbad.
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Thanks for your comments, but now I’m in a dilemma. I can’t afford to fit those into my collection this year (still have two Focals to purchase before moving on to something else) but for next year I decided it would be a one-unit year, plus a new amp. So far I have been considering either the Meze Empyrium or the err… (I always forget that name) Abyss AB-1266 Phi TC. And now this falls into the picture. I find them aesthetically stunning (the Abyss I find ugly but it sounds like angels), and I also enjoy the sound of the Meze big time, for once a high-end can that sounds as its cost. Value is rare at that level. Looking at the Abyss online shop almost every week (I just did again lol) I also became interested in the Xaudio Formula S but changed my mind after noticing it has no connectivity to digital input, you need a separate DAC for that so the cost would be way above my means, making the duo almost as expensive as a Moon DAC/HP amp. Glanced over Marantz and Schitt but found nothing too exciting there. Suggestions welcome.
The last one-unit year was when I bought the Hifiman Susvara and I don’t want to repeat the mistake of getting my hands on something just for looks and build. Don’t get me wrong the Susvaras don’t sound bad at all but to me they are not worth what I paid for them. They don’t get along with the DAC V1 and I don’t want to buy an expensive Hifiman HP amp that would work well with just for one pair of phones. The other Hifiman phones that I have are the Sundara and HE560 but those aren’t fussy like the Susvara. So if any of you have tried both The RD0 and one (or both) of the other two I mentioned, how would you grade them, comparatively? Keeping in mind that the less the phones cost the more I can lay on a DAC/HP amp. Like I mention I have a Naim DAC V1 currently but its performance varies a lot depending on the load you feed it.
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