Headphones vs Nearfield Monitor vs HiFi Speakers

People in this hobby say that headphones and speakers serve different purposes depending on what you are looking for. Well my question is, what purpose do each of these situations serve? Not trying to find out which is better but just a comparison of what advantages each have. For the purposes of this thread I define nearfield as what fits on a desktop and HiFi as what you would use when watching TV on your Plasmatron 5000. Here are a few bullet-points I have been able to come up with.

Headphones:
*The best for detail retrieval
*Lowest distortion

Nearfield/desktop speakers:
*Hear exactly what the speakers sound like and not the room reflections
*Can easily be setup in any room (office, bedroom, garage, etc.)

Farfield/HiFi/Floorstanding:
*The best soundstage/imaging due to widest separation
*The best bass due to large cabinets and large drivers

What are your reasons?

 

The more room interactions, the more hassle and money to make your system sound good. It's my experience that even near fields will involve quite a bit of imperfection when compared to headphones. My far fields are probably on par with my 650s but cost 5x more, ignoring all the associated equipment and the room treatments my living room is full of. I rarely hear a set of speakers on par with my 800s and doubt I could match them without spending well into five figures. I've heard plenty of six figure systems that can't match my 009s for resolution.

I find near-field monitors to be a bit worst of both worlds... nowhere near the imaging of far-field and nowhere near the detail of headphones. Near fields still need room treatment - rear wall and first reflections as a minimum. I still have a pair for convenience, but they're just OK, and they're only OK now that I have them EQ'ed to fix the gross room modes in my office/studio space.

 

i can say that my Monsoon mm 2000 are on par with my basic stax system and with my He 400 headphones for the imaging and details soundstage....they sell that between 200 and 300 hundred dollars in 2001.... i pay them 80 dollars used some 6 months ago, it is the best buy i had ever made... Their planar hybrid technology is probably surpassed only by the mini maggies...They had practically no negatives for me...It is incredible that this near field technology was extinct , out of the market after 2 or 3 years only...I dont understand that.... There is a cult like following of the monsoon speakers line and understand why...the monsoon mm 2000 is the best they had built, i am incredibly lucky to have them... impossible to replace them with less than one thousand dollars speakers probably, because of their incredibly higher frequencies precision without distortion and their woofer is more than good...the mids are very well integrated by the crossover .... the mids are the weak link and they are good...with my Ember tube pre amplification,+morrow m3 cable, all is perfect... I am not jealous of my friend magnepan with that near field miracles speakers...best regards

p.s. the monsoon are so good that i am in a quest to beat them with some headphone... for now my eye are on the microzotl amp+ enigmacoustics dharma... will the dharma beat them if the microzotl is their pre amplifier also ? i will tell you in a year from now...

 

Agree so much with NoStream, speakers are just hard to get right off the bat, room modes and stuff make life difficult unless you invest time and money into measuring/integrating your system or have some luck with the speakers fitting in nicely. Headphones get me where I expect(not necessarily want) for much less effort.

 

I run all three types of systems. They all have pros and cons, and each best serve specialized purpose where they work best.

My desktop near field monitors are mainly used to find music that I am interested in and non critical listening. Simple setup, less to think about and tweak, and can be fun. I am usually doing multiple things at once while using this system. I can relax and try to just listen. The system is largely a function of the speakers.

My headphones are fantastic for critical listening and trying to hear every detail in a recording. Easy to get lost in the music. I think half of the fun is all of the variation in equipment, swapping components, etc. Also much more assailable on a budget - easy to get pumped up about a new $400 headphone (ala fostex x00), but swapping speakers will likely cost thousands.

As for my full sized speakers, these probably do the best job of recreating the live experience. I listen to a lot of jazz, and separation, space, and low end are all things that speakers do much better. Secondly, out of these options this is the easiest to share with others. Headphones and near field are really meant as 1 user systems, while someone sitting next to you can have a similar experience with speakers. Good speakers can be just as resolving and detailed, but as NoStream mentioned, at a much higher cost.

 

I also run all three types of systems.

The A5+ on my desk, fed by a Modi, running 320kbps Spotify are fine for background listening and an occasional preview of an interesting recording.

My main system is fairly big. Sits in a dedicated room fed from its own 100A subpanel. Each speaker is ~180lbs - Dunlavy SC-IV. -6dB at 18Hz in room. In the car world we refer to great steering feedback as being able to read the newspaper by driving over it. This is its audio equivalent. Krell electronics, VPI/Oppo105 front end.

I'd be lying if I said that my headphone rig is less resolving than my main system. More so, in fact. Yes, there's no soundstage - I call it a soundfield for a lack of a better descriptor - and cans can't pressurize a room, but the resolution can be rather remarkable.

Really, there's a time and a place for everything. I'm usually working at my desk, so the relatively shitty sound isn't a problem. When tying to relax, however, I'm not sitting in an office chair.

 

Or, one could do this for 30-40 years, having setup virtually every type of speaker imaginable in just as a big of a variance in room composition, and still have no idea how anything will sound until one begins working with the system. Just have do get down and dirty, and use several intelligent setup techniques to get what you're after. Some speakers are very easy to setup, examples being Audio Physic and Dunlavy. Others, not so much. My room is treated, but that was the last step in the process. Room nodes aren't that difficult to deal with, assuming one isn't living in a perfect square or a rectangle with two room dimensions of equal length, and that still can be worked around. As with everything, it comes down to experience. Good luck.

 

Speakers vs headphones- I agree with the thread starter on the use of HiFi speakers and headphones and NoStream on his impression of desktop speakers being the worst of both worlds. Such differences rarely dictate my choice of system to listen to at any given time. I am fortunate enough to have 3 rooms each with a loudspeaker and headphone setup (only one television in the house, though) and which room I am in dictates which system I listen to. The choice between speakers and headphones is dependent on my mood and company.

 

I actually want one room with a 4-way system using a DSP active crossover and another room with single driver fullrange speakers using vacuum tubes.

 

My favourite system is Omega A8 hempcone single driver speakers driven by a Cary X-Citer. Sublime with almost holographic imaging.

 

The horns look seriously impressive. I'm assuming it's the pic in your avatar.

 

Ha! Not my horns. Those belong to Nelson Pass. The black pipes in back are his subwoofers.

http://www.firstwatt.com/pdf/art_kleinhorn1.pdf
http://www.firstwatt.com/pdf/art_kleinhorn2.pdf
http://www.firstwatt.com/pdf/art_elpipeo.pdf

 

I would like to have really good nearfield monitors, although the "cupboard" that is my listening space would probably mean they would be wasted.

As it is, whenever I put on the HD600s, after a speaker-listening session, I am really overcome by the quality, which reminds me of speaker systems I have heard but could never afford.

 

I was just thinking about this topic.

My 5.1 system, which is perfectly calibrated with a microphone to deliver just the right level of sound from each speaker -- and each speaker is also independently equalized to deliver the perfect frequency response -- sort of sounds better than my TOTL headphones (e.g. HD800) IF THE SPEAKERS ARE PLAYED LOUD ENOUGH which is basically impossible in my city where everyone lives in an apartment. Also, it only sounds that good for the ONE PERSON SITTING IN THE SWEET SPOT. Move a few inches to the left or right and things are out of balance. So speakers are best, but for all practical purposes you have to stick to headphones.

For my computer speaker setup, I've tried so many options (all 2.0 or 2.1 setups) and none come anywhere near a headphone. Honestly a $300 headphone blows them away and it's not even close.

So in conclusion, headphone >>> 2.0 or 2.1 systems and, in the real world, headphone > properly calibrated 5.1 system too.

But if anyone has a 2.0 or 2.1 computer setup to recommend please do so. I've tried Bose, B&W mm1, Audioengine etc. basically all the generic crap you see at bestbuy and amazon. Note I need something small because I don't have a lot of desk space.

 

I am more inclined to go with near field monitors over headphones because there is something that feels unnatural about headphones. Something about the left only hearing the left and right only hearing the right whereas speakers go to both ears. I feel like my dedicated headphone rig needs some kind of crossfeed circuit.

On amazon they have the JBL LSR305 for $100 a speaker. It has a good reputation and is a steal at that price.

 

On all the headphones I've used, the L & R combine to make a unified sound.

 

I have a near-field set up and a headphone set-up. I like them at different times, for different purposes.

My near field set up is good for casual listening, you-tube videos, streaming services and the like. I have the line out from my Headroom max feeding an integrated amp and two Paradigm Atom speakers. The pair put out a good sound stage and reasonable extension, but lack bass. (What would you expect out of tiny bookshelf speakers?) The set-up works well when I'm working from home and I don't have to worry about bothering my spouse.

My headphone rig (either Headroom Max or TTVJ FET-A) offer a more mid-fi critical listening experience. I use DSP or the Headroom filter to add cross-feed and present a wider soundstage. The headphone rig gives me more detail and bass extension, at the expense of making some compressed recordings sounds pretty awful. I use this rig when I'm working late at night, or don't want to otherwise both the wife and pets with my odd musical choices (folk death metal, ala Eluveite anyone?).

I am glad I have both because switching between them matches my mood and the needs of those around me.

 

What speakers are you using?

 

TOTL M&K since I mainly watch movies with my system.