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Has anyone here compared the Alpha Dog to the Prime?

Discussion in 'Headphones' started by a44100Hz, Feb 12, 2016.

  1. a44100Hz

    a44100Hz Friend

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    I really like the Alpha Dog I just purchased off a user here, and the ~$200 upgrade to the Prime will be offered again soon. But I saw someone in the Ether-C thread describe the Primes as "broken." Any insights?
     
    a44100Hz, Feb 12, 2016
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  2. joeq70

    joeq70 New

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    I have compared these two headphones. It has been a while, though, so take that into consideration. I thought the Prime had better detail, bigger soundstage, and more sub bass. The difference is not massive, but if it were me, I would pay $200 for the upgrade.
     
    joeq70, Feb 12, 2016
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  3. Hands

    Hands Overzealous Auto Flusher - Measurbator

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    The Prime I heard sounded broken. It might have been for all I know. I'd stick with the Alpha Dog.
     
    Hands, Feb 12, 2016
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  4. a44100Hz

    a44100Hz Friend

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    What do you mean by broken?
     
    a44100Hz, Feb 13, 2016
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  5. Hands

    Hands Overzealous Auto Flusher - Measurbator

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    Sounded so bad and weird that it just sounded broken. You know that weird sound you get when your headphone cable isn't plugged in all the way but still has sound coming out of both channels? It kinda sounded like that, but not exactly.

    Maybe something was wrong with it. It was pretty bad. Alpha Dog isn't perfect but it at least sounded mostly good.
     
    Hands, Feb 13, 2016
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  6. a44100Hz

    a44100Hz Friend

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    That almost certainly had to be an actual hardware issue with the one you listened to? I've been looking at reviews or user impressions and they're almost all positive. How confusing :p
     
    a44100Hz, Feb 13, 2016
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  7. a44100Hz

    a44100Hz Friend

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    Yeah, I'm definitely having a hard time separating the wheat from the chaff. Reading the Ether C thread, several of you guys seem to dislike the MrSpeakers products in general. But I really like the Alpha Dogs already, so I'm wondering if the Primes will be a worthwhile upgrade because I won't be able to undo it. I doubt I know anyone who has one that I could borrow from.
     
    a44100Hz, Feb 13, 2016
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  8. purr1n

    purr1n Desire for betterer is endless.

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    The Alpha Dogs are pretty good. To me, they are neutralish / bright with a detailed snappy incisive sound. The Alpha Dog's main weakness is that it has a bit of a hard glare not too much different from the HD800. The Alpha Primes are a different beast compared to the Alpha Dogs. The tonal signature of the Primes is a bit different with a more laid back sound. In terms of technicalities, the Primes seem to be a set backwards with what I would term a low fidelity midrange. Personally, I think the knurling process on the T50RP driver basically screws up the sound.

    If you like the Alpha Dogs and are unable at this time to know how you would like them to be improved, I would keep them in favor of spending more money on the Primes.

    What makes discussion of the Alpha Primes difficult is that there seemed to be some product variation. The best Prime I've heard was a CanJam at MrSpeakers table. The three others we've obtained by ourselves were different levels of confusion. Two of these units were returned to MrSpeakers, who stated that they were catastrophically defective or something like that. The third unit was one we purchased ourselves through retail channels. The third unit really wasn't any worse or better than the first two, although the first unit sounded very strange in terms of frequency response (very shouty).
     
    Last edited: Feb 13, 2016
    purr1n, Feb 13, 2016
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  9. Claritas

    Claritas Friend

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    I've heard only one A-Prime (Dan's) and it sounded pretty good, better than the A-Dogs. It seemed to even out the mid-treble spike by being more consistently bright overall, instead of being more generally neutral with a spike. It also sounded a lot more open.

    I'd consider that one particular sample to be an upgrade, but enough guys have had defective or "bad-sounding" units that I don't think it's worth the risk. It makes more sense to mod your A-Dog instead to make it more neutral.

    PS HF indiscriminately locked pyrates out of their A-Prime thread, including guys like me who never commented there. Caveat emptor!
     
    Claritas, Feb 14, 2016
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  10. a44100Hz

    a44100Hz Friend

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    Huh. So I guess it's a roll of the dice thing, then. Shame. My audio engineer friend described my AD's as "good, revealing, but with bloated bass and a spike at 3 kHz that makes them sound crunchy." I'm still not sure what he meant by crunchy. (His favorite pair and reference he uses for mixing is the HD-600.) I'm trying to figure out where this puts me on the overall sound spectrum if they're my favorite cans to date. I suppose time will tell, I was only able to listen to them for one night thus far.
     
    a44100Hz, Feb 14, 2016
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