Koss ESP950. Not worth the cost nor listening experience.
Realizing that after a dorm party, my old AKGās were filled with beerā¦they didnāt like it much and were given an honorable burial a few days later.
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Yikes! 
For me it was the HD650. I saw these hyped to hell and back forever, and then I ordered a pair.
Tried it for a few days. Mediocre soundstage, muddy bass and Lower mids, and shit treble. Was not a fan. The HD600, on the other hand, was extremely pleasant.
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Wow. I canāt relate at all. 
Muddy bass is a very common complaint, though. May I ask what headphones you would prefer over the HD650s that would outperform them in all mentioned regards and would be comparable in price? I am just curious.
Totally. Well obviously HD600. Also probably Hifiman HE4XX/400, AKG K612. Probably some others too but Iām blanking 
I used to have the HD580, then the HD600 and now the HD650, which I am planning to keep. To me the HD600 and HD650 were pretty close. Thatās why I was surprised and why I was curious. I also have the Hifiman HE400i, which I like, as well as the AKG K702, which I liked Ok, but since have sold. Iāve found the HD650 to be the best all around performer, but I can appreciate thereās a difference in the sound signature between the HD600 and HD650. Thanks for clarifying.
Cheers
I wish Iād seen Tellās review of Ultrasone before shelling out over 400 of our English pounds on some used Edition 8s. I kept reading about how special this companyās products were and figured I was missing something. What I was missing apart from some admittedly very good bass, was the ridiculous response curve I had to dial in to my DAPs to tame the painfully shrill high frequencies.
Like other posters, I too canāt get on with the Nighthawks. I listened several times to them at Canjam 3 years ago, but the vocals just werenāt right. One of my forever favourite tracks is Bob Carpenterās Gipsy Boy and it is quite a test for headphones. His voice should sound old, tired, and world-weary, not as if he has laryngitis.
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Totally. I know what you mean about them sounding the same. What I would say is that the 650 just sounded a bit more relaxed as opposed to the 600 which had just a little more energy in the treble and a bit less in the bass and sounded cleaner Imo
For me, the most disappointing headphone experience is when I inevitably do something stupid that damages a favorite set of phones. Like trying to force the Sennheiser PX-100s on my head through a Halo vest after had my neck broken in 2012. Should have used earbuds. The PX-100 cord has been intermittent ever since. Or when I rounded the steps too quickly last year wearing a pair of earbuds (canāt recall which) attached to an iPhone in my pocket. The cord caught on the railing and at the first anchor ripped out of the earbuds. I never learn.
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I have 2. The big one was sending back a pair of LCD 2ās I know most may think I was crazy but there was an almost inaudible fatigue that I could NOT explain. It felt like nails on a chalkboard to me and I felt my ears were almost ringing after listening. I described them as being sucked into a black hole of lifeless music. The second was a pair of M&J GL2ās I bought from mass drop. They were ALL hype and I found out they were simply rebadged Chinese cans that were sold under multiple labels (for much less $). They felt like a cheap kids toy with a hollow sound. As with everything all things headphone are subjective and it shows we all have varied desires and tastes.
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Do you have an āoriginalā Orpheus? Would love to see pictures of them, along with the energizer.
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Most are from shows. Ultrasone ED10. Nothing need be said.
AKG N90Q - Very clever, but severely lacking in detail for the money. Maybe it was the Bluetooth at fault, but I just never got what is so great about these headphones other than the clever ear-matching system.
Clarion ZH700FF. US$1200. I plugged in my iPhone, turned the volume up a bit and gotā¦clipping in the bass. WTF. One of those headphones that must have been the result of company bosses insisting that they need to enter the headphone space with some technology demo and end up getting a piece of not even half-baked rubbish.
oBravo IEMs. Clever idea, but it sounds like they didnāt even try and tune them at all.
K7XX. I bought a pair out of nostalgia for my old K701s. I went back and listened with them the other day and discovered how truly awful the bass is.
Ultrasone Edition 8. I hoped theyād be better than the ED9s but I must have gotten a pair with bad tuning as they were muddy and awful. I gathered afterwards that they had driver consistency issues and no two pairs sounded alike.
HD650: Too mid-forward, low bass is rolled off. I much preferred the HD600.
Sony Z1R: Iām told the earlier prototypes had a more conventional tuning and sounded fantastic. Why they chose the wacked-out tuning they went for I donāt really know. If the treble hadnāt been so weird, they might have pulled it off. They could have made a legendary pair of headphones but failed.
Audio Technica A1000X and A2000X: Nasty, thin-sounding cans that made absolutely no sense. I think they must have had some kind of management change after producing so many rubbish cans, because now they making headphones such as the ADX5000 which is insanely good.
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Hifiman HE-350 from Massdrop. It sounds so bad that I did not even thought of selling it or giving it away to someone.
I agree about NightHawks not sounding quite right, particularly when switching immediately from neutral headphones. I have (and like) NightHawks for two reasons: (1) long, low-fatigue listening sessions, and (2) they effectively correct poorly mastered bright/harsh recordings that cause instant fatigue on other headphones. Sometimes thereās a huge advantage to the warmth. It depends entirely on the sourceāI canāt stand them with alto female voices that were properly mastered (e.g., Adele, Amy Winehouse). They really donāt sound like the same singer.
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@generic thatās a good point, I didnāt try them on anything poorly mastered, I was using well-mastered FLAC files for my test.
Iād say Hifiman he400I, since I heard so many good things about them, but was so disappointed with the so called Planar base.
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I do have an original Orpheus HE90 headphone, but not the original HEV90 amp. Mine is from a group of 25 HE90ās that Sennheiser made for Meier Audio around 2004. This was a surprise final production run, all sold by pre-order. I was fortunate enough to get in on the buy. Iāll get a picture up when I get a moment.
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I was intrigued by the concept (and price point), but I came across the same findings that they were rebranded by different vendors and quality was lacking. That aside, I guess the sound didnāt really live up to your expectations either?
the first thing about them is they felt like cheap plastic and hollow. When I put them on my head all I heard was an echo-y ringing from the hollowness whenever the headphone cable would move. There was no dampening. I have Sony 7506ās that sound WAY fuller. I appreciate that all things headphones are subjective. A few folks told me to burn them in but my immediate feel for them was tinny and the sound harsh and lacking fullness. Just my opinions on them. I think I would still really love to try a set of OPPO PM3ās. Iām certainly accepting that several people love their MJās. I for one wonāt be trying any more of them.
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