Diffuse field equalized headphones recommendation

I really wasn't trying to hate on Grado products (I have two of them myself...). I was only emphasizing that collective taste changes from time to time and the target curve that is trendy one day may not match up with the collective desire of the next.

Koss... now they make some timeless stuff (BIG ESP/950 fan...)

 

I created a monster.

 

Went pretty smooth.
Just get an HD600, lel.

 

This is something that it's not clear to me for some time, I even mentioned it on this thread. Is it that hard to get several good engeneers and tweak headphones closest to good studio monitors in good studio? I'm oversimplifying it, but the point is clear.

 

Studios don't sound exactly alike if you leave one and move into another, even at the high end. Not to mention the many studios that would definitely be called sub-optimal, console position being off axis from the speaker, insufficiently suppressed room modes, and so on. It averages out to a flatter response over a large scale, but a single optimum sample or median is not easily found.

On the topic of pre-defined curves being a schlong fencing contest, one of the more interesting critiques of generalized room curves comes from Floyd Toole of Harman (you can taste the dissonance). He argues here that you cannot define one without detailed knowledge of the speaker dispersion and the room characteristic.


To address a point brought up before:
Diffuse field equalization is not based on the response of any "normal" room. It may alternately be referred to as the "reverberant field", but this does not adequately capture the meaning of diffuse sound field: equal sound energy approaching from all directions at once. You can measure the diffuse field response in a specialized reverberation room or measure in an anechoic chamber and average together the results from all directions.

 

@briskly I get it, but it doesn't have to be perfect. Monitors differ between themself, but there is some kind of consensus which sound flat and which don't, that, I supose, could be aplied to headphones too (subjectivly).

 

Above, briskly pointed to the Sean Olive powerpoint presentation for the recent paper 9392. The most interesting part is after the conclusions.

Bottom line (literally), headphones need bass and treble controls.



For reference, the EQ controls in the Harman papers are roughly -- bass shelf q=0.75 at 105Hz, treble shelf q=0.35 at 2.5kHz.

 

You can include average listening SPL as a variable too.

 

A friend of mine got LCD-X for mixing, and he's blown away how these headphones translate to monitors (for those who doesn't know, translation means that what you mixed on one system sounds good on other systems (translates), which is pretty damn hard(er) with headphones).

He told me exactly this



His previous headphones were HD650 but LCD-X (according to him) blows them away for purpose. (And yes, cost much more, but so does HD800)

I know these aren't DF, but since we are speaking about flat headphones (tho measurements don't look that flat, but they seem to work very good).

Shame he moved to London so I wouldn't be able to hear them.

Any expiriences with LCD-X?

 

That's just ridiculous for a headphone of that level/price.

 

I saw a picture of Macklemore wearing, I think, the LCD2 in the studio. Hell let me just link to it.

 

I'm not sure why trained listeners such as well known mastering engineers don't get consulted during headphone design.

The only product I know that was tuned this way is the UERM/UERR which is universally loved by all.

I would absolutely buy a headphone that was tuned with help from Bob Katz/Kevin Gray/Bob Ludwig etc... I also think it would be great for marketing: "Tuned by the best ears in the world!"

Hifiman/Sennheiser/Audeze/Apple (!!!) are you listening? Make it happen already. Please! The audio world will be a better place!

 

From what I get to understand here is that the needs for mastering engineers and the average consumer are rather different.

Also quoting @briskly studios don't sound exactly alike.
Makes sense since a mastering studio that masters classical stuff may monitor differently than a studio that for the most part masters mainstream pop music which is usually played back differently than the former.

Pioneer markets their SE-Master 1 as a result of a colaboration between "Air-Studios". Apparently that headphone is rather "bassy", much like the K812 (< impression from another forum).

However headphones like the HD800 (modified) already seem to be greatly appreciated by many folks, just looking at the results of Tylls Big sound.

I guess big headphone companies like AKG or Sennheiser are already working with studios more than it may appear to outsiders.
I mean when you follow their social channels you can see them raving about how they support artists...

 

Except they aren't really that far off....

Yes the mastering guys want ruler flat 20Hz-20Khz for their work which may differ slightly from whatever people prefer for pleasure listening. What nobody wants is a bigass 6K peak that fucks shit up.

My point is that these guys have trained ears; if you tell them "hey I want this headphone to sound a little warm like the B&K curve" or "hey I want this headphone to have a little more presence" they can judge that. Sure with three guys you might get three different opinions but they are going to differ by small amounts - a dB here and there. They certainly will tell you if your headphone has some sort of serious FR issue a la HD800. That alone makes their input invaluable.

The music you listen to was mastered in a listening space that had as close to a flat frequency response as possible. If you want to hear what the guys who made it heard in the studio (and if not.. why not??) your goal should be to get pretty close to flat with deviation (usually slightly warmer) to taste.

 

If a company had the the guys from Steely Dan tune a headphone I would jump at the chance of listening to it.

 

Sonarworks said a few months ago that it's impossible to release an average equalization curve that would make the typical Audeze headphone sound better so you have to mail your unit to Latvia to have them measure it.

 

Just finished listening to Audeze LCD-3, A/B-ing them with Sonus Faber Concerto, they sound fantastic (no shit for 2000$), never heard a headphone with such a good frequency response similar to good speakers. Have to hear HD 6X0 yet.