I will continually update this post as my headphone collection expands.
But to start i will review and compare the Sennheiser HD650's and Grado SR225, both with totally different sound signatures.
Both headphones are powered via a Graham Slee Solo amplifier with PSU2 connected up via QED Qunex 2 cables to a Rotel 1062 CD Player.
The Graham Slee Solo is a solid state amplifier with an output power of 1W, it has a reasonably flat response so the tests are fair. The Rotel CD player is fairly flat, with a slightly biased sound towards the lower frequency spectrum so i will take this into account
The HD650's have been burnt in for around 50 hours with a mixture of pink noise and music, the SR225's have been burnt in for 30 hours using only pink noise.
Onto the testing, i will categorize this with the following sections: Bass, Treble, Mid Frequency and Comfort, Aesthetics, Build Quality, reliance on equipment, Cost
Bass:
I decided to start with the Sennheiser HD650's and listening to Pendulum, a very bass intensive album. The 650's performed pretty well with the bass, delivering a deep well extended bass without becoming distorted or overpowering of the rest of the music. However it seems to lack a little impact that would be nice, it needs more authority. it can also tend to be bloated and not as detailed as i would like from a reference headphone. The SR225 is a different story, for what it lacks in quantity (compared to the 650's anyway, which are a bassy headphone) it makes up for in unsurpassed quality. The bass rattles the ear drums with significant impact, with fine texture and detail that extends to all but the lowest audible frequencies. It lets the rest of the music shine through as it is neither to weak or powerfull.
Mids:
The HD650 have a silky smooth presentation in this department, they offer a very laid back, detailed and easy to listen to sound. It conveys instruments such as the cello and guitar with quite a soft nature, maybe a little to soft and 'calm' for rock music. Voices are beautifull, Newton Faulkners voice is tunefull and detailed with an airy but welcome feel to it, it's also portrayed with good realism which definitely convinces me I'm there. Whilst he plays the guitar you can clearly here the decay of the guitar strings and fingers sliding up and down the strings. Now for the SR225, simply put these headphones laugh in the face of the 650's. Guitars are presented with astonishing detail and realism, with a brash presentation exactley like a real guitar, every squeak is audible. Voices are incredibley realistic also, with things such as breathing easily hearable. The Grado's are incredibley involving and are full of fun and excitement, were as the Senns make you close your eyes and lie back. I also prefer the Grado's in this department.
Treble:
This time i will start with the Grado's. The treble is very prominent here, cymbals are crisp, maybe slightly to crisp. Higher frequency notes on almost any instrument are extremely detailed and unforgiving of any artifacts, badly recorded tracks can be piercing and fatiguing to the ear, there is also quite obvious sibilance - but this is gradually dissapearing with more burn in. However if the track is recorded well, the highs are very nice. Really involving you in the music, making it allot more realistic and 'like your there'. The Senns have a rolled off high frequency response, the treble is sweet and nice to listen to and doesn't get piercing or fatiguing like the Grado's - but it also lacks detail which makes the Senns seem rather boring to listen to in comparison, however there is no sibilance whatsoever, which i like.
Comfort:
The Senns win here easily. The full sized design means they cup over your entire ear. The band is also nicely padded. Due to the open nature of both headphones the ears don't get hot and sweaty either. However the Grado headphones have a retro look to them, a fairly badly padded strap and a Super Aural design (the cups rest on the ears) means they can start to become quite painful after an hour or two. However the comfort can be improved by soaking the earpads in warm water for a while, and then refitting them once dry.
Aesthetics:
To me the Senns look okay, there grey headband and cups create an unasuming look. Apart from that theres not much i like about the look of the headphones. The Grado's to me look really cool, there retro look is definitely nice.
Sennhesier HD650:
Grado SR225:
Build Quality
The Senns feature an adjustable headband, with a thin metal strip that slides in and out of the headband to alter the size, some metal grilles cover and protect the drivers inside, the build quality is nothing special but pretty good. The Grado's are hand built in Calafornia USA. The driver housing is made of handcrafted wood, and the headband is made of strong bent strip of metal covered in genuine leather. The size is adjustable by sliding each side of the headphone up and down a thin metal pole, about 3mm in thickness. The wires connect well and feal fairly strong - the Senns clip out so there is no chance of ripping them from the headphone. Overall though the Grado's are built better.
Reliance on Equipment:
The Senns are 300ohms and really benefit from the added power of a dedicated headphone amp over the head-out of a CD Player, they run at barely audible volumes through a MP3 player, they are only as good as the source as allways. With a dedicated amp the bass is much improved and the detail in the treble is a bit clearer. Whilst the Grados are a much lower impedance rating and will run off a MP3 player or CD player fairly well, they still like any headphone benefit from a dedicated amp. The grado's are much less fatigueing through a slightly warm source, but this means the sound is untrue of the original recording.
Cost:
Both headphones are expensive for headphones, £220 for the sennheisher HD650 and £180 for the Grado SR225. However i beleive they can be got a lot cheeper in America. The Graham Slee Solo amplifier cost £475, and the Rotel 1072 CD player cost £600 and the QED Qunex 2 Interconnect cables £30. A fairly expensive setup. However headphones easily can cost upwards of £500 or even £1000, like Grado GS1000, Stax Omega 2 etc etc.
-------------------
Closing comments, both headphones are fantastic and i wouldn't want to choose either over the other to keep. I like them both for different music, the Grado's slam and attack plus wickedly detailed mid range means there fantastic for rock and metal music. Were as the Senns are good at classical and bassy music.
The senns also offer a larger soundstage due to the circumaural design, however instrument separation is more defined on the Grado's. The Grado's earpads also vibrate a little if bass is very prominent in a track, which is a bit annoying and distracts you from the music. Neither headphone has good noise isolation as there both Open Back design, they have practically no isolation from ambient noises at all. Both headphones sound very big and airy due to there open design.
Within the next few weeks i hope to have got some AKG K701 headphones with a much flatter response (unlike the the highs of the Grado's and lows of the Senns) and also the Sure SE530 IEM (in ear monitors). And if my wallet allows i will also be purchasing either a Heed canamp or a Woo Audio amplfier. Of which i will be reviewing also.
Thanks !.
But to start i will review and compare the Sennheiser HD650's and Grado SR225, both with totally different sound signatures.
Both headphones are powered via a Graham Slee Solo amplifier with PSU2 connected up via QED Qunex 2 cables to a Rotel 1062 CD Player.
The Graham Slee Solo is a solid state amplifier with an output power of 1W, it has a reasonably flat response so the tests are fair. The Rotel CD player is fairly flat, with a slightly biased sound towards the lower frequency spectrum so i will take this into account
The HD650's have been burnt in for around 50 hours with a mixture of pink noise and music, the SR225's have been burnt in for 30 hours using only pink noise.
Onto the testing, i will categorize this with the following sections: Bass, Treble, Mid Frequency and Comfort, Aesthetics, Build Quality, reliance on equipment, Cost
Bass:
I decided to start with the Sennheiser HD650's and listening to Pendulum, a very bass intensive album. The 650's performed pretty well with the bass, delivering a deep well extended bass without becoming distorted or overpowering of the rest of the music. However it seems to lack a little impact that would be nice, it needs more authority. it can also tend to be bloated and not as detailed as i would like from a reference headphone. The SR225 is a different story, for what it lacks in quantity (compared to the 650's anyway, which are a bassy headphone) it makes up for in unsurpassed quality. The bass rattles the ear drums with significant impact, with fine texture and detail that extends to all but the lowest audible frequencies. It lets the rest of the music shine through as it is neither to weak or powerfull.
Mids:
The HD650 have a silky smooth presentation in this department, they offer a very laid back, detailed and easy to listen to sound. It conveys instruments such as the cello and guitar with quite a soft nature, maybe a little to soft and 'calm' for rock music. Voices are beautifull, Newton Faulkners voice is tunefull and detailed with an airy but welcome feel to it, it's also portrayed with good realism which definitely convinces me I'm there. Whilst he plays the guitar you can clearly here the decay of the guitar strings and fingers sliding up and down the strings. Now for the SR225, simply put these headphones laugh in the face of the 650's. Guitars are presented with astonishing detail and realism, with a brash presentation exactley like a real guitar, every squeak is audible. Voices are incredibley realistic also, with things such as breathing easily hearable. The Grado's are incredibley involving and are full of fun and excitement, were as the Senns make you close your eyes and lie back. I also prefer the Grado's in this department.
Treble:
This time i will start with the Grado's. The treble is very prominent here, cymbals are crisp, maybe slightly to crisp. Higher frequency notes on almost any instrument are extremely detailed and unforgiving of any artifacts, badly recorded tracks can be piercing and fatiguing to the ear, there is also quite obvious sibilance - but this is gradually dissapearing with more burn in. However if the track is recorded well, the highs are very nice. Really involving you in the music, making it allot more realistic and 'like your there'. The Senns have a rolled off high frequency response, the treble is sweet and nice to listen to and doesn't get piercing or fatiguing like the Grado's - but it also lacks detail which makes the Senns seem rather boring to listen to in comparison, however there is no sibilance whatsoever, which i like.
Comfort:
The Senns win here easily. The full sized design means they cup over your entire ear. The band is also nicely padded. Due to the open nature of both headphones the ears don't get hot and sweaty either. However the Grado headphones have a retro look to them, a fairly badly padded strap and a Super Aural design (the cups rest on the ears) means they can start to become quite painful after an hour or two. However the comfort can be improved by soaking the earpads in warm water for a while, and then refitting them once dry.
Aesthetics:
To me the Senns look okay, there grey headband and cups create an unasuming look. Apart from that theres not much i like about the look of the headphones. The Grado's to me look really cool, there retro look is definitely nice.
Sennhesier HD650:
Grado SR225:
Build Quality
The Senns feature an adjustable headband, with a thin metal strip that slides in and out of the headband to alter the size, some metal grilles cover and protect the drivers inside, the build quality is nothing special but pretty good. The Grado's are hand built in Calafornia USA. The driver housing is made of handcrafted wood, and the headband is made of strong bent strip of metal covered in genuine leather. The size is adjustable by sliding each side of the headphone up and down a thin metal pole, about 3mm in thickness. The wires connect well and feal fairly strong - the Senns clip out so there is no chance of ripping them from the headphone. Overall though the Grado's are built better.
Reliance on Equipment:
The Senns are 300ohms and really benefit from the added power of a dedicated headphone amp over the head-out of a CD Player, they run at barely audible volumes through a MP3 player, they are only as good as the source as allways. With a dedicated amp the bass is much improved and the detail in the treble is a bit clearer. Whilst the Grados are a much lower impedance rating and will run off a MP3 player or CD player fairly well, they still like any headphone benefit from a dedicated amp. The grado's are much less fatigueing through a slightly warm source, but this means the sound is untrue of the original recording.
Cost:
Both headphones are expensive for headphones, £220 for the sennheisher HD650 and £180 for the Grado SR225. However i beleive they can be got a lot cheeper in America. The Graham Slee Solo amplifier cost £475, and the Rotel 1072 CD player cost £600 and the QED Qunex 2 Interconnect cables £30. A fairly expensive setup. However headphones easily can cost upwards of £500 or even £1000, like Grado GS1000, Stax Omega 2 etc etc.
-------------------
Closing comments, both headphones are fantastic and i wouldn't want to choose either over the other to keep. I like them both for different music, the Grado's slam and attack plus wickedly detailed mid range means there fantastic for rock and metal music. Were as the Senns are good at classical and bassy music.
The senns also offer a larger soundstage due to the circumaural design, however instrument separation is more defined on the Grado's. The Grado's earpads also vibrate a little if bass is very prominent in a track, which is a bit annoying and distracts you from the music. Neither headphone has good noise isolation as there both Open Back design, they have practically no isolation from ambient noises at all. Both headphones sound very big and airy due to there open design.
Within the next few weeks i hope to have got some AKG K701 headphones with a much flatter response (unlike the the highs of the Grado's and lows of the Senns) and also the Sure SE530 IEM (in ear monitors). And if my wallet allows i will also be purchasing either a Heed canamp or a Woo Audio amplfier. Of which i will be reviewing also.
Thanks !.
