I’ll start off with the obvious: We all hear differently. Having said that, the more I’m involved with this hobby, the less stock I put into a given reviewer’s impression of any specific headphone. They tend to be all over the place with likes/dislikes.
Early on, I would try out headphones based on reviews. I learned pretty fast that my impressions more often than not didn’t align with the reviews. Many of the planar magnetic cans I auditioned were very uneven. Yes, they have some desirable characteristics, BUT, the frequency response is anything but linear with many of them. Also, found out the hard way that a lot of headphones (especially planers) suffer from deviations within a given model offering.
I value even linear frequency response (minimum deviation) above all. The Sennheiser HD 600/650 type of performance fits the bill for me. The Grado HP100 SE with F Pads closely mirrors this linear response. Put the G Pads on, and the upper mis/lower treble is overly emphasized. Yet, I read on the site here that others don’t care for the sound of the HD 600/650. One can’t discern how to correlate all these divergent opinions. Then there’s measurements, which also seem to be all over the place. I somewhat trust the Sonarworks calibration curves, as they seem to work as one would think they should. In general though, the measurement curves seem to deviate from one source to another for a given headphone. The curves do not always correlate to what one hears.
Another variable is the playback hardware. Some headphones are perceived as not to sound good with well regarded hardware, but connect them to different hardware, and voila, the sound suddenly snaps into place. I’ve learned over time that a given headphone can sound a lot different with different playback hardware.
Along the way, one starts to work out what they like, and what bothers them when headphone listening. That’s one of the big reasons the market on Head-Fi is constantly in flux. Headphone enthusiasts seem to buy and sell headphones with amazing regularity. The reviews can be entertaining, but don’t really mean much to a potential customer who has their own unique circumstances.
Bottom Line: Trust what you hear. Don’t be surprised that as time passes, your perception of what’s important when headphone listening changes.
I couldn’t agree more and wish there was a place to test products out before I roll the dice. Some have it better than the rest of us, and that’s just fine with me.
Ok. I’m NOT going to take that much of deep dive into it and I’m not keeping the HD560S headphones. I’m new here but not new to the game. Your points are generally well taken.
There are several reasons why I’m sceptical, if not outright cynical, about many headphone reviewers, and their view of what sounds good is but one. To be honest, it’s not at the top of the list, either.
But on the subject of how things are described as sounding, in my opinion their is absolutely no substitute for getting them on my ears and listening myself. No review comes close on that point. The problem is that doing so is not always easy. Or possible.
So if I pay attention to a reviewer’s comments on sound, it only really helps much at all if I am familiar with a number of other headphones AND with reviews by that specific reviewer of those same headphones, and if our ‘take’ on them is broadly similar. Then, if that reviewer really likes something I haven’t heard, the odds are decent that I will like it too. And that is enough to probably get that ‘phone added to my “listen to this” shortlist. But that’s as far as it goes.
Where I do find reviews help, and especially geting a broad range of them, is on less individualistic issues like, for example, build quality and comfort … though on comfort it also helps if my opinions on other ‘phones also coincide, ‘cos in addition to us all hearing things differently, we tend to have different head shapes/sizes too.
In short, I find it quite interesting what the reviewers I watch regularly have to say, but there’s no way I’d base buying decisions on that alone. Critical to me is either, where possible, hearing them first, or at a bare minimum, buying them from somewhere where they can be returned if I’m not happy with them. Fortunately, consumer laws here in the UK are quite helpful on that point.
Headphone reviews are just to help newbies make informed purchases, for those deep in the weeds to get purchase validation, or purely entertainment (which is why I watch Zeos, his enthusiasm is infectious).
I’ve actually had good luck buying “blind” but with a positive review from @Resolve or @listener. Yeah it’s best to confirm with your own ears, but I think it’s hard to go wrong if you pay attention to what the majority of reviewers say is the best headphone for a specific sound profile and price range. The key is to pay attention to comparisons and tier lists and ignore reviews of a single product unless you know the reviewer and their taste - assuming their taste isn’t “everything new is great”.
I think this gets a bit easier as the price range increases too. EX: in the < $200 price range there are so many choices each with at least one significant issue, so it’s harder to find your match without hearing them to see how much the issue bothers you.
Also while I agree Zeos is almost pure entertainment, when he compares headphones I have found his comments to be spot on with my experience.
I have found that the audio journey, and the comparable interactions online regarding them are extremely unique. Still, part of my journey was finding someone on YT who has the same taste as I do and the majority of the headphones I own were from his recommendations. Another part were impulse buys or forum related purchases. Even then there WILL be stinkers. R7DX has Zero bass for example. We all have different lives and experiences even in audio. The fact that we can manage to put something so subjective together and find common ground is beautiful. There are so many nuances to this hobby and communicating about it that I’m blown away sometimes. For myself…. I have NO idea what linearity is in headphones, it’s just not in my hifi catalogue. But I adore the 6xx for many reasons. Namely transparency to hardware, love of tubes, and at times feeling like a singer is right in your face singing into you the mic.
There is no better way than getting your hands on it and doing it yourself. At which point you can find out how/where you align with a certain reviewer.
Zeos was the start of my mid/hifi career and I have to say, I agree with him more often than not. I’ve owned a couple of dozen headphones partly from his reviews and I know in and out where I agree with him and where I don’t. Maybe it’s his enthusiasm however…. that I don’t watch his channel anymore because my pocket book get’s hit harder than Tyson wanted to hit Paul. But without his part in my audio journey I wouldn’t have my end game gear in progress. He touted the Argon pretty hard and got me with the Tungsten. Say what you will but basically everyone agrees on how good it is. Don’t have mine yet though.
My point being that this is all a two path journey, one you walk and cross with other’s in the hobby. I know now that I like bass, tubes, and hard to drive headphones. It has taken me more than my current endgame setup will cost to realize what my endgame setup is. I have gone from $13-$2500 in single purchases and made many of them. I have written reviews, I have debated/related online about audio and I’ve enjoyed all of it.
I like DMS and Super* Review alot. But it isn’t very clear to me what DMS is saying in this video. Or why I should care about a population average when looking at measurements on a specific measurement rig with its own particular response or HRTF. Maybe someone here can help me understand this better.
I still much prefer raw measurements btw, because it makes it much easier to apply my own targets or compensation methods for EQ or other kinds of comparisons. Already compensated measurements make that much more difficult imho, though I think they can also have their place.
Thankfully, Super* Review’s squiglinks allow measurements to be viewed either way, which is quite helpful.
I still have some questions about the above. But a couple links in DMS’s video led me to the video and article below which explain some of the rationale behind compensation curves like JM-1, which are based on a population average.
My understanding is that the 5128 ear canal and coupler are based on an average of a number of humans. So I could see some justification for using an average human DFHRTF for measurements of earphones inserted inside the 5128 canal.
If the goal is to see how both earphones and headphones behave on an average human though, then a better solution is to equip the 5128 rig with a different head and ears that measure closer to that.
DF is not the preferred response of most listeners though. Most listeners prefer a response close to the in-ear response of neutral speakers in a semi-reflective room. So that is really the reference point we should be going for at this point imho.
