I started listening to the HD600 again tonight after really not listening to them much in years. They are really really nice! I can’t believe I paid $119 for these. That’s all.
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I very recently got a pair of HD600s in for… less than $119, actually, and I have to say that at least as far as headphones I’ve managed to try go they don’t walk away with dirt on their face— resolution is ridiculously good and microdynamic performance is just exceptional even against much more expensive, newer headphones; while my upstream might have something to do with this I really don’t see how anyone can call these claustrophobic-sounding either, though I’ve long since stopped caring about sheer headstage size (within reason) and am instead more picky about “layering” of images, which the Senns do well.
Also, now that it’s more or less established that neither the HD600 and HD650 are being discontinued and are instead getting (bland) reskins, may be worth editing the first post in this thread before people start panicking again, @Torq 
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I used my HD-600s yesterday and felt the same thing. Every time I consider cost/benefit, I come away thinking there is no justifiable reason to buy anything else.
But I buy anyway…
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I mean there’s nothing wrong with wanting a flavour can or two— it’s why I doubt I’ll ever sell the HP-3s unless something does a v-shaped response as well with better technicalities (and ideally more refined treble); something like that’ll always have a place on my desk. I don’t see myself ever collecting headphones the way I do fountain pens, but I personally enjoy having a my-fi set as well as something with more balanced presentation.
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As long as you enjoy listening to whatever headphone they may be, that’s what matters.
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I am down to 2 headphones basically…after having more than a dozen here…
Focal Clears and HD600’s…had the 800s here for 2 days and sent them back…just too thin IMO.
That said lately I have been selling some of my amps but also bought a new Schiit Lyr 3 recently and its paired with a Shiit Bifrost 2…and using both headphones on rotation…
My favorite pairing for the HD600’s has been the BH Crack and Schiit Vahalla 2 (up for sale)…and have had hundreds of hours with the HD600s on these 2 amps, superb.
But I must say the Lyr 3 with the HD 600’s are indeed a very, very good pairing for me .
Getting some deep gutoral bass out of the 600’s isnt the most easy thing, and you cant defy the laws of physics no matter what our opinions might otherwise indicate…
But the Lyr 3 has allowed the HD600s to really blossom on the low end, really amazing…the Cowboy Junkies Trinity stuff and low organ music really shocked me at how good the 600’s really are.
So if your looking for a really great experienc at a low cost these HD600’s with the B2 and L3 are superb!
Alex
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I put my 600s on for the first time in a while tonight. After a few weeks of work on nearfields, they are a bit of wow I have to say. Listening to some Breeders, Sparklehorse, Wilco, Brian Blade, James Blake, Gorillaz et al. The details, sense of presence, overall experience and engagement are very compelling and satisfying.
I am listening through Tidal>Roon>RME ADI-2 DAC fs>customized Mapletree Audio Design Ear+ HD (GE Red Label followers and a Brimar Yellow T 6060)>HD 600s
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Tonight I have my 6xxMs (SBAF KISS mod) running with a NOS Valvo 6201 in my modded MAD HD+ (ADI-2 DAC source) and it’s a new level of holy-crap for me.
I picked up my 6xxs for $250 CAD. I HATED them for a couple months - I found them woolly and flat. “Why are people crazy about these headphones?”, I asked myself. I worked on them for a while and I figured out that they change dramatically with their source…and a quick mod really brings them to the next level.
Hella headphones.
tldr; 650/6xx scale to a great degree to the source. The SBAF KISS mod bring them to the next level.
I am listening through Tidal>Roon>RME ADI-2 DAC fs>customized Mapletree Audio Design Ear+ HD (GE Red Label followers and a Valvo 6201)>HD6xxMs (SBAF KISS mod)
f*******ck.
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Sennheiser just announced the all new HD560s on Head-Fi.
It looks like the HD560s will be a little brother to the HD660s, but with soundstage approaching HD800 levels of expansiveness. $217.99 in USD. Thus a direct price competitor to the HD599 and HD6XX.
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It’ll be $199.95 USD. Very interested to see how these play out alongside the 58x and 6xx
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Are you guys gonna sell this one?
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Yup we have a pre-order page up https://www.headphones.com/products/sennheiser-hd-560s. I suspect we won’t get our stock before the east coast guys though as that’s just the way shipping works to us poor West coast guys so I set the pre-order shipping date a little later. Might ship out sooner. Also grabbing some review pairs!
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Outstanding! Thanks 
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DMS has a review up that is absolutely gushing with praise for them, saying they render the 6x0 series obsolete and that he prefers then for detailed analytical listening even over the Sundara. Very strong words. I’ll wait until more reviews and measurements come in from others. Hopefully @Resolve gets his hands on a pair to review.
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As always, listen with your own ears. DMS also gushed about Audio-GD amps in his early days. The HD-6x0 series are now quite old, and Sennheiser likely has learned something new.
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The heyday of the audio GD Amps was before I got back into the hobby. Were they not very good, or did they have issues?
I looked for the original DMS review (then known as DMS3 TV), but it seems he took it down. In that review he waxed rhapsodic about “being able to hear things with Audio-GD that no other amp could do.” His comments were…innocent…he’s a lot more experienced and more credible now. [However, I thought his review of the old Magni 3 was spot on.]
Yes, different things come out of Audio-GD but they actually distort badly per standard measurements. They add in harmonic or other forms of distortion that some like(d). This strategy was not unlike some Schiit products that sought to warm up or increase the appeal of solid state amps. To each his or her own.
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My “hype-train-meter” spiked really high after watching that review. 
We should wait for Zeos before start collecting any passenger tickets. 
Seriously now, Sennheiser is probably looking forward in phasing out the middle-man (a.k.a. Drop) and minimize the bleeding in their profit margins for the HD650.
Cheers.
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The Mass(Drop) relationship exposed Sennheiser to 10,000s of new customers. With Focal eating their high-end and many others nipping at the low-end – I think the 6XX was a huge net benefit.
From the very early days of CP/M PCs (pre Apple) until the 1990s everyone worried about profit margins. The PC market exploded in size only when the margins came down.
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So, this is kind of interesting… at first I was going to suggest that this would be unlikely if you were referring to the HD 6XX because Drop has sold more than 111,400 of them. I was going to ask, if sales were holding firm (and that’s a big “if”), why would Sennheiser want to stop selling them?
But then it occurred to me that purchasing from Drop only really makes sense now for US customers, given the closure of its EU store, and that because of shipping and customs fees, folks outside of the US would probably be better off getting the full-price HD 650.
This, in turn, made me wonder if the HD 650 is, in fact, still being sold everywhere, so I checked the Amazon stores for various countries. This analysis is far from comprehensive or rigorous, I’m still drinking my morning coffee. I just picked a handful of countries in different parts of the world:
- some countries where Amazon isn’t selling new HD 650s: UK, India, Saudi Arabia, Australia
- some countries where Amazon is selling new HD 650s: Brazil, Japan, Germany
So, now I don’t know, maybe the HD 650 is being phased out?
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