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Post by Deleted on May 27, 2015 13:15:20 GMT
Afternoon all I know Gordon from over on head-fi and he mentioned this place when we spoke a few months back. A mere 3 months later and I've finally got my finger out and registered....I am nothing if not tardy Really good write up on the Spirit Pro Ian and also the comparison with the Classic. I had both a wee while back and was really impressed with them. Much like the HD600/650 you can tell the Spirits are stablemates but each has their own distinct sound. I did spend some time comparing both against my HD600 and my feeling was that the Classic was remarkably similar sounding to the HD600 with perhaps just a pinch of the HD650's flavour in there too. I generally prefer a somewhat warmer / bassier sound so was surprised that I enjoyed the Pro more than the Classic. I really found their clean, even handed and quite neutral (based on my idea of neutrality rather than anything more scientific) was very more-ish and endearing. The ear cups as you say are very small though, perhaps comparable to the original Momentum?, so most will find they sit slightly on rather than over ear. Comfort is an issue for many although I found them fine after a bit of getting used to. Gordon - I recall your Vmoda pads being rather capacious by comparison, although they may have been the XL pads? A relatively inexpensive headphone that I really like and rate up their with the Focals is the Yamaha MT-220 and it might fit your requirements Gordon. It's somewhat similar to the Focal Spirit Pro sound-wise but with a touch more warmth, a bit more of a mid-bass hump (sort of a half-way house between the pro & classic) and with more forward mids. A 'phone or tablet will drive them just fine. I found them particularly good for watching movie & tv shows from my tablet. Isolation seemed about average for a closed back 'phone but think it'd be fine unless listening at high volumes. The pads are accommodating for most ears but are quite flattish so ears do tend to touch the driver covers slightly, but not so much that I found comfort to be an issue. Potential downsides? They are hardwired with a coiled cable but it's not especially heavy and may in fact be a good thing for bedtime use as it avoids cable spaghetti. Treble isn't as refined as the Spirit Pro say, but with most genres of music it isn't a problem and it's easy to open up & dampen the cups if it is. New stock seems to be drying up and prices increasing but they do come up quite often come up on Amazon marketplace in very good condition (either damaged box or returned by customer under Amazon's 30 day return policy) for around £75-£80. At that price I think they are darn hard to beat and if you don't like them Amazon will take them back with zero hassles, so all you'd be down is the cost of return postage (if you use Amazon locker I'm guessing a fiver or so). Link to the Amazon Warehouse page: www.amazon.co.uk/b?ie=UTF8&node=3581866031To be honest the marketplace is always worth a quick look when buying headphones. Sometimes the savings are negligible but from time-to-time you can can strike it lucky and make some really good savings vs buying new. Cheers, Mark
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Rabbit
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Post by Rabbit on May 27, 2015 16:47:15 GMT
Hi Mark. Welcome to DIYAH.
Interesting that you find the treble of the mt220 not so refined. I thought I was the only one. I mentioned that on HF and got shot down by an angry owner. I have one here and it is indeed the treble that I'm less keen on. It's kind of unfocused.
The focal has settled over a week as far as comfort goes and I don't have a problem with them. I get the top of my ears in and I think the bottom rests on my lobes!! Seals fine though. They do have a very clean sound and I also preferred the leaner pro. It just shows inner parts so well. The Classic is Senn like which is why I felt that they'd suit Gordon. He really likes the hd650 a lot and the Classic is close. I have a feeling he'd like the sound but the price of the Classic is still hyped up a bit. Pro is cheaper.
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Post by Deleted on May 27, 2015 23:54:19 GMT
Hi Mark, long time no see. Glad you made it over here, it's a cool place with grown-ups. I'll take your recommendation on-board for the Yamaha's. Amazon doesn't have them at the moment though. I wish I hadn't had to sell my V-Moda's because they ticked all the boxes but you know why I had to sell everything. Buying the Ember has really worked out well for me, I must say. It's probably my end-game rig paired with the HD 650's. I'm going to buy one of the 650 filters when they become available & hopefully that'll be it. I think I'm going to take a punt on a pair of refurbished PX 200-II's to see what they're like & if they do the trick I'm good for headphones. What about you? Still using the Pandora's? I'd like to hear those some day. I'm going into hospital tomorrow for a long overdue operation so I might not be around for a bit but I'll be back. Stick around Mark, I'm sure you'll like it here. Regards, Gordon.
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Post by Rabbit on May 28, 2015 6:02:32 GMT
The px200 really doesn't sound like a 100 Gordon. It's colder with not so much bass. It also has very small earcups that can be difficult to seal.
Hope all goes well in hospital.
Unfortunately, the Sprit Pro has jumped back to £185 now. Prices seem to really fluctuate.
I still feel that these are one of the most balanced closed headphones I've heard. Nothing jumps out at you. Bass is at a lower level than my Philips but the clarity down there is terrific.
I have found that comfort issues can be helped by fitting the cups so that they cover the tops of your ears and rest on the lobes. Raise the bottom of the cups and drop them and then swivel them left and right until you feel the pressure is even or if you prefer, harder on the front than back.
Once they're adjusted like that, they're absolutely fine for me. The memory foam pads kind of take up the shape of your ear and you become quite unaware of them.
I can listen to these at high or very low volume and they seem right to me. I'm currently listening to the X1 at volume setting 20 and it's absolutely fine. That's 20% of full volume. It's low level but the focus is still there. I think the reason for that is the mids are extremely good. They stay there at whatever volume while to the two extremes alter on volume change. In fact, the more I listen, the more I like these. They seem to give a good 'average' and consistent sound between different quality recordings. You hear faults easily but they never sound 'offensive' like the Sony mdr7506 can in the treble. Having said that, I still don't mind the Sony at all since they work well to monitor and are extremely realistic with acoustic music.
The Spirit is quite 'special' to me though. It has a really balanced sound that is quite 'monitor speaker' like. I really like them a lot.
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Post by solderdude on May 28, 2015 10:38:58 GMT
Ultrabike measured them as well. His measurements seem quite 'realistic' and trust his ears as well. His findingsinteretingly he also compares them to HD600 measured on the same rig. I had these on the 'recommended' list for a long time already.
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Post by Rabbit on May 28, 2015 11:25:41 GMT
I'd say on a level with hd600, Frans.
The weird thing was that when I first put them on, I felt that they were a bit mundane, with nothing in particular that was that good about them. There wasn't really anything to 'notice'. Maybe a little warm in the lower treble. (A dip in fr perhaps?) maybe I'm hearing the 3 to 4 khz dip there on that graph, although it's nothing nasty. The mids on there are sloping down which accounts for the smoothness perhaps. It doesn't 'ring' that much either. The obvious competitor is the Nad and that doesn't look so good in the treble tbh.
Slightly more in bass than the hd600 and perhaps less in the top, although I'm not hearing that!! Compaing his graph with Tyll's shows differences as well. His shows a peak and Tyll's a dip in the treble. Tyll uses an 'ear' on his monitoring equipment whereas the CS guy doesn't. I think I'm hearing the 5 khz suckout rather than the CS 5 Khz peak.
The comfort issue was pretty short term for me. It's more important to get the fit right and the cups are kind of stiff left to right, but that allows you to adjust for any pressure in subtle ways since the cups then stay in position. Once you find the right place, you can wer them without discomfort actually. Your first thoughts are ..... 'Head clamp alert'!!! I see that someone on Changster mentioned the fit and how adjustment helped. That's what I found. I lowered the cups a bit as well and the clamping lessens.
Going back to Sony mdr7506 showed that they are comparatively glassy in the top. (I use them as mobile monitors rather than the hd25 tbh - They're more revealing) so I went back to the Spirit and realised that they were showing as much detail as the Sony without the edge. Way more pleasant actually.
So extended listening at home and I realised that they are doing a lot more than I felt at first. Comparing them directly to some monitors showed how close they get to them as well. Perhaps more detail though, I think but similar in tonality.
I hadn't mentioned them on here because I thought there was nothing remarkable about them but extended listening has shown just what a good job they do. They are terrific as monitors and double up as nice 'musical' headphones at home. I had compared the pro with the Classic and if the Senn sound is really peoples' thing, the Classic is probably better. I thought I'd prefer the Classic myself until I adjusted to the Pro.
It isn't over sensitive to listening volume and allows profoundly low volume to focus. That is different for me with the Senns. They need a bit of push to snap in, but these don't seem to have such a sense of a 'sweet spot'. They just fade away or grow without the sound degrading too much at all. Being able to monitor at low volume until the end is an ear saver!!! I tried mixing at very low volume and then playedback over speakers. The mix was fine with very minimal adjustments needed. So they are working well at low volume.
Although a 'pro' headphone, the build of the headband might be an issue although it's modular. Lead comes off. I have another straight lead on the way from Focal at the price of £29. They don't see cable exotica whatsoever and the cables are priced properly. So I have a short cable, a coiled cable for desks and a long one for home. Better than the Yamaha mt220 as well; especially in the treble. That's another closed headphone that like.
I have no idea what's going on with the prices. They seem to fluctuate,but I have to admit, it's a good headphone.
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Post by solderdude on May 28, 2015 12:57:24 GMT
This is how Tyll measured the FSP but this plot is NOT using his usual 'correction' (which is the wrong one) but he used OW correction. It has a good resemblance/relation to UB's measurements. It is taken from THIS Innerfidelity pageThis is how Tyll measured (OW correction) the HD600. That plot is quite close to how I measured the HD600 and shows the bass drop off which the FSP doesn't have. The 2-3kHz peak isn't present... I think it is an 'error' in the OW correction curve, although the HD600 does have a slight raise in FR around 2-3 kHz.
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Rabbit
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Post by Rabbit on May 28, 2015 15:29:01 GMT
When I first heard it, I felt that it sounded thin but it seems ok now as well! Bit strange. It's a bit ragged looking up top but sounds really quite nice.
The two worst things about it are my suspicions concerning the headband with large heads and the silly entrance into the cup for the cable plug. Too narrow for a standard 3.5mm jack plug. It has to have narrow shoulders which is a shame since it limits what cables you can in fact use.
The low price of the cable surprised me although I realise now that it might not actually sell to people outside the industry at that price. I'm not fussed about coiled cables unless I need movement over a desk and they make you have to sit close to your source unless you don't mind the pulling. The straight Classic cable is 4 meters long!!!
They're a very friendly company and I really like their monitors. They make a very nice monitor called an SM9. I spoke to them direct in France. Mais, un dificulte ..... Ils ne parlent pas l'Anglais, donc c'est difficile pour acheter quelque chose d'eux.
They then put me in touch with a UK rep who they contacted for me. Nice people.
The ring in the left ear cup that the CS guy mention isn't there with mine. I always test for noises/ringing with no music playing by tapping cups and tapping my teeth together. Sometimes, tapping your teeth points out resonances going through the headband which suggests a 'ringing' headphone but the Spirit is very 'dead'.
Not only great for monitoring, but super for mobile use and 'pleasure' listening.
You know, with these frequency response charts, I do wonder whether it's necessary to do them with compensation. A raw measurement would give more consistency so we can all learn what humps and bumps we like for our ears. We need to have an accepted standard or just put out raw graphs with an 'ideal' graph superimposed? Problem is that they do need some interpretation, let alone the inconsistencies between testers.
That dip at 7-8 Khz is more what I'm aware of I think than the peak. Not because I 'hear' it, but the sound is not as open as an actual open headphone might be. That could be that dip. It still has a good treble response though and imo it does bass better than the hd600. More defined and shows better clarity.
Pros and cons with them all really, I guess. This is one of the best portable closed headphones I've heard though tbh.
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Post by Deleted on May 28, 2015 15:29:35 GMT
Thanks for the warm welcome gents! You do seem to be a very welcoming, friendly and level headed bunch. It's a refreshing change to the tribalism, showboating and all out warfare that a few members on another forum can be prone to. I think as long as we all agree that the Lyr is the best amp since sliced bread we'll get along famously --- Ian, I'm completely in agreement with you on the MT-220's treble. I suspect you were just a bit ahead of your time with such radical thinking as there are a few fellow owners now who would very much concur with you. You can mod them but in my opinion the best you can achieve is to disguise rather than correct the lack of cohesion in the treble. In its price range it's probably only fair to expect some compromises I guess. Which cable did you order? The 4 metre 'skipping rope' that comes with the Classic (good cable btw)? I seem to remember the Pro coming with both a coiled & shorter portable cable. The portable one not sounding quite so good as the other pair iirc. It's interesting that the thread Frans links to suggests the Pro & HD600 are very similar. To me the Classic was much closer to the HD600 although I suspect that both Focals probably don't measurement all that differently from one another across much of the spectrum. I do think they were all on the same level though putting aside obvious +/-'s inherent with closed & open backed design. --- Hi Gordon, Yes it has been a while! Hope you are doing okay. No probs on the MT-220. They are quite different sounding to the HD650 but I figured that because you liked the M100 you weren't entirely against something with a different flavour. They do come up on the warehouse fairly regularly so don't imagine it'll be long before another appears if you do decide to give 'em a go. Really pleased to hear that you are enjoying the Ember so much. In some ways I'm a bit envious that you have been lucky enough to find a headphone you are happy to settle down with and can just concentrate on tweaking it to get that last few % improvement out of it e.g. amp upgrade , tubes, filter (which looks very interesting indeed). I do still have the Pandora and still very much enamoured with it despite the iffy comfort. After going through a stupid amount of headphones the past couple of years I think I have now finally settled upon 3 that I am really happy with along with the JVC FX850 for portable use. btw I ended up keeping the DT-150 and now wondering why I ever considered letting it go! Once your op is out the way & things are back on an even keel we'll definitely need to get something organised. Would love to hear what you think of the Pandora, good or bad, and wouldn't mind a quick listen of your Ember myself. I've also just been given the nod to look for a new amp (possibly Gustard H10) so we may have a few things to listen to. All the best for tomorrow & hope the op goes well Mark
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Post by Rabbit on May 28, 2015 15:54:54 GMT
Hi Mark. The other place is full of people who seem to look for superiority and they are pretty aggressive sometimes. However, I know that Jude gets quite concerned about it sometimes and he generally tries to knock what he sees on the head before it gets too serious. What makes me laugh is how you get someone who's been into headphones for a year or two, getting aggressive if you dare to say anything they don't like about their headphone!! None of them are perfect and I accept that in the 20 - 30 or so that I have!! i normally end up giving them away!!!! I've only just realised that the people that I've been dealing with for both the headphones and cables are trade people and won't sell to people outside, so I'm not sure that the cables can actually be bought. I think you are right - the Classic is warmer sounding with a fatter sounding bass which makes it sound more like a Senn. Detail, I think is on the same kind of level though. My Pro is going to be a multi-tasker though and monitoring is one of the jobs so it needs to be analytical while retaining some semblance of musicality for home listening!! Now that's a job and a half for a headphone. The one I have on the way is the uncoiled one, which is 4 meters long. Huge!! I have... Short one for garden/moving around the house. Curly cable for working on a mixing desk. Long one for front room listening. The headphone is pretty sensitive but it also scales up nicely with an amp so it will suck up some current when it's available. The weird part is how I felt they were just ok, when I first heard them but I now feel that they are extremely good. It's normally the other way around. I start by thinking they're good and eventually start to notice flaws. Also, for some reason, they feel 'smoother' in sound to me now than they did at the start. I'm not particularly fussed about the idea of 'burn in' so perhaps my head has adjusted, but I'm finding them more revealing and less shouty now than I first did. Way better than I first thought actually.
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Post by Deleted on May 29, 2015 9:25:37 GMT
Yeah, I don't envy the job that Jude & the mods have. They can't win really and I think also having to look out for the interests of site sponsors doesn't help matters either. 20-30 pairs?...and I thought I had it bad! I thought things were getting a bit out of control when I was juggling 6 or 7 pairs at any given time, so started to downsize It is nice to have the variety though and be able to pick a pair depending on mood, music genre, whim etc. I've also recently started giving away some I'm done with to friends & family but it sometimes feels like I may have been better off giving them to the dog...he'd appreciate them I'm sure. I only used the Pro for home listening but it does seem like it could double for studio use too. It isn't an easy job by any means. You are right about the Classic as it certainly doesn't lack detail but you do kind of need to go looking for it a bit more than with the Pro. The 4 metre cable is indeed a bit of a monster! Quite weighty too but if you need the length then it is very good and comes with a pre-attached velcro cable tie to help keep things organised. The brown colour may muck things up if you are going for the stealth black look tho' I'm not to bothered about burn in either. I used to put it down to mental adjustment but there has been the odd headphone that has got me wondering... Gordon, probably still more than you are looking to spend on an occasional headphone but Amazon Spain currently have the Classic for around £180 delivered. You can use your Amazon UK sign-in details and pay in Euros or sterling (Euros may work out cheaper depending on your banks currency conversion rate). Have bought from them the various Amazon EU sites a few times and quite often it's Amazon UK who will actually fulfil the order from one of their warehouses....sunny Dunfermline for me If you are as lingually challenged as I am the Google Translate plug-in for Chrome helps wonders for site navigation. www.amazon.es/gp/product/B00FYZUQP0/ref=s9_simh_gw_p23_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=A1AT7YVPFBWXBL&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=0DSXY2HKM236ZWRADMGR&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=455357567&pf_rd_i=602357031
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Post by Rabbit on May 29, 2015 9:53:17 GMT
My last house was very large Mark, and I couldn't be bothered to look for headphones, so I used to leave them around all over the place!! Also used them for work and as a tax claim.
I never knew that the other cable is brown. No big deal though!!
Many monitoring headphones are designed to be used for short periods at a time so they can be tight. They are also far from neutral normally since they're just a tool for listening for wierd things on recordings. I found the Sony 7506 pretty good for this but many music fans don't like it because of the qualities that I like for working with .... The analytical properties.
The Spirit pro is pretty clean sounding and actually sounds nice for music listening too.
With regards to Amazon ... Can we also use the USA Amazon here in the UK? Or just European ones? I might looking at other orices in that case.
The Spirit Pro comes out at just £158 there.
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Post by Deleted on May 29, 2015 11:45:27 GMT
A large house would definitely help and if there are tax advantages all the better! My headphone / pc space is limited to the corner of our dining room so I need to employ quite tight stock control Amazon.com is also an option but unlike the EU stores you do of course need to factor in import tax/duty. They do quote this before checkout and bill you up front so at least there are no nasty surprises on arrival. Biggest problem with Amazon US is that they won't ship many headphones to the UK (presumably down to distribution agreements with certain manufacturers) and if you had to return something it would be costly I'd imagine. btw I noticed you'd mentioned CamelCamelCamel in another thread. Not sure if you are aware but there are german, french, spanish & italian variants too for monitoring the other Amazon sites too. Despite the EU sites quite often sharing the same pool of stock the price differences between stores can be massively different (e.g. a £260 headphone in the UK might cost you £160 from Amazon Italy) so well worth a look around before buying. The only negative I can think of is that if you do buy from the EU stores and the headphone arrives faulty then you need to return it to the relevant country, regardless of where it was sent from. Only had to do so a couple of times and the several hundred pounds worth of savings I've made over the years far outweighs the £20-30 of return shipping costs I've incurred.
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Post by Deleted on May 30, 2015 3:23:36 GMT
Hi folks. I didn't really understand just how big an operation I was going into hospital for I won't be using headphones for a good few weeks now sadly. Pissed off to be honest
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Post by Rabbit on May 30, 2015 8:36:54 GMT
Can you wear 'in ears', Gordon?
Two weeks in and I'm still very much enjoying the Spirit Pro. The headband has eased off a little now and the pads do actually warm up and 'melt' into your ear shape.
They are extremely good as monitors tbh. Not at all glassy but very revealing. I have done some really close listening with difficult mixes and they really do show inner parts well. This morning, listening to a high resolution copy of Bjork's recent album has shown just how well these headphones do bass. There are moments in her album where she's used only low sounds with some extremely deep sounds. No top at all. On poor headphones, it can sound a bit murky and you get just a rumbling sound. You get more of an overall view of the sound. With the Spirits you can hear individual lines weaving in and out of each other. The bass also goes down a long way if the recording has it there. Unfortunately, if it's a mediocre mix, there IS no bass to speak of. They don't plant a mid bass bloom in any way so they can sound mean and edgy if not given a good mix. Makes you wonder what some engineers are using actually.
The reason that I think the bass is so easy to follow; even with multiple bass lines going on, like in Bjork's album is that the drivers are really fast reacting. They don't hang on and there is no bloom to muddy it up.
The top is very smooth. I'd say a fraction darker actually than the Senn hd650 if anything. Maybe because they're closed, that's really what I'm hearing. Not as open as an open headphone, of course. Thing is, it IS closed so your ears ought to detect that they are closed, I guess. By artificially trying to tune them to sound open might cause all kinds of problems in fr.
The mids are excellent and this is a key imo to good headphones. The presence area is the one that we naturally adjust volume for without thinking too much about it and then we tweak for bass and treble. If the mids are 'wrong', headphones can be difficult to focus without treble glare or bass bloom. These can focus pretty low in volume and turning up raises bass and treble, but bass doesn't bloom and treble never goes sharp. The mids focus whatever. So it doesn't seem too fussy about volume and sound good at high and low volumes actually. Really smooth sounding.
I find that my feelings about these headphones have gone the opposite way to the way I normally feel. When I first hear a headphone, I normally spot the strengths straight away and focus moreso them. After a period, those very strengths can become the bain of the headphone. Ie; a big fat impressive bass may be great at the start but after a long period, you feel that the bass dominates everythingand plants itself over everymix that you listen to. Same for so called 'sparkly' treble which can be very wearing.
With the Spirits, I wasn't fussed on first listen and felt that the bass was weak. Nothing really stood out and everything sounded kind of bland. Then I started to listen to perhaps better mixes where I started to notice improvements. With time, I'm feeling that it does an awful lot more than I first thought with a stunning bass response. Spot on mids. A curtailed treble perhaps, but smooth as heck.
Build worries me since I have read many reports of the headband snapping. I wait with bated breathe because I'll be devastated if mine snaps. Apparently, Focus have responded to this by 'curing' the plastic better. Could be a porky pie though. They recognise that there was a problem with the first 800 that went out with regards to the plasticity of the plastic used. I really hope it doesn't go on me.
My new flat lead arrived today. It is 4 meters of luxury. Lovely cable. I don't know whether they sell to the public but the Classic lead is just quality. Heavy, long with great plugs. The cabling makes this a great all rounder. I think they should sell them with all three cables since changing them around is nothing. Short one for mobile. Works fine with a stop/start button on it. A volume adjusment would have been nice, but it's a good quality cable. The curly lead is good for short distances and provides stretch for movement. So across a mixing desk or actually, if you have a portable amp on the settee in the front room or something, where you're likely to move around. The flat lead for tv or from a remote amp because it's so long. All three are useful and very good quality.
Sennheiser should have done something similarwith the hd6** range really. It makes sense.
I said earlier that this was perhaps the best closed I've heard. I really think it is.
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