YACP: Yet Another Cheap Planar: TidalForce

Brent Butterworth did a review or them as well.

http://www.soundstagexperience.com/index.php/equipment-menu/815-tidal-force-wave-5-headphones

I actually won a pair of these on Facebook...they`re not horrible. Something funky going on with the mids & treble. Sub bass is present, but not strong (I could hear the Chesky 20hz heartbeat) and mid bass is elevated, but still arguably tasteful, I`d be willing to ship these out for measurements if there`s any interest.

 

@Jinxy245 any change you've heard the MonoPrice M560? If you havem any comparisons? Any comparisons to any other similar planer?

 

I haven't heard the Monoprice. The only planar that I've owned is the HiFiMan 400s that is mentioned in both reviews, and I have since sold it (to help fund my Eikon). I found the 400s to be a bit on the boring side...less bass overall, and less treble extension as well. Since I don't have them on hand to compare, I really can't give any more detail than that.

 

Geeze, monoprice has two NEW planers! One for 200 and one for 150. The 150 ones are iSine clones.

 

What may help is a comparison to the HD600, since that's more of a known quantity.

I'd say bass extension is about the same, although it sounds like the TFW5 has more because of the mid bass bump. The planar also has a bit of bleed into the mids but I don't think it's horrendous, I only hear it on certain tracks. Adele's voice sounds a little more hollow on many tracks to me. Upper mids aren't as smooth as the Senn, which gives good clarity, but could be fatiguing (I personally find the 600s mids fatiguing on some music). Treble has more sparkle than the 600, which can be good or bad depending on your sensitivity to treble.

 

People may or may not find this interesting.

I am not a fan of the midrange on these....way to forward for my tastes. I experimented with securing (just using the clamping force of the headphones themselves) a set of ZMF protein pads, and got some positive results. Unfortunately you cant pad roll these (hence the experiment).

These headphones have a proprietary pad set up...the common magnet attachment, only with their own pin set up, so pad rolling is out unless you want to rip up the pads.

Since I won them, I figured I'd contact them to see if I could buy a pair of pads to modify so I could try some pad rolling. Helm Audio (Tidal Force changed their name to Helm Audio. No joke. I don't thin they're going to last very long.) responded that they didn't have any available for purchase, but there was a pair of pads from a pair that failed QC that they'd ship out free of charge.

Well long story short, the ZMF pads did help the bring the mids to a more listenable level for me, brought the bass down a notch or so too. Not bad, but not a sound signature I'm really crazy about. I'll likely post these for $20 to cover PP & shipping at Head Fi, unless someone here has any interest at all. I can't post them in the FS section obviously. If anyone is interested, drop me a line.