This may be true for the house sound in general, but does not apply to the entire brand. The LCD-X, LCD-MX4, LCD-GX, and LCD-1 are all relatively more neutral to neutral bright.
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There’s a neutral bright audeze? Which one? Anytime I have looked in their lineup it’s always a neutral ish treble or dark
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Specifically the LCD-X I’ve seen described multiple times as neutral bright. I’ve only had a very brief listen in a shop about a year ago, so memory may not serve the best, but I recall thinking they were a little bright for my taste relative to the LCD-2 I also demoed.
lcd-2 I tried was most definitely dark Like not just dark but like you just sucked all the treble out kind of dark definitely interesting sound to it. It took them to go to a headphone costing $1,200 to get to my preferred sound signature? Jeez, at that point I would just stick with my beyers
I’d say you could probably appreciate the sound of the LCD-1 a bit more as well. Definitely not what I consider dark, but comfort might be a miss based on your previous comments around fit.
trust me, if I could reduce the size of my ears and head I would lol. It is quite an issue for someone in trying to be in this hobby. Suppose I can give the lcd-1 a look next time I get a chance though. won’t hurt
Has anybody tried the Audeze GX? it might stand out like a sore thumb to my wife, though, with those red trimmings…
But is it less dark? more tamed?
@SpeleoFool, you mentioned you have these, no? I haven’t heard them, but based on reviews I’ve seen they stray a bit from the Audeze house sound and trend more neutral but still with good low end impact.
I do, but unfortunately I don’t have much exposure to most of the Audeze line. I’ve heard a few of their more expensive cans at shows, and I’ve had LCD-2 Classics slip through my fingers 2-3 trimes. So I can’t offer much in the way of comaprisons to other Audeze cans or their “house sound.”
What I can say is that the build is in line with their newer models–it feels like any other Audeze LCD headphone. The weight didn’t bother me at first, but I’ve gotten too many headaches from long gaming sessions with the GX for it to be a coincidence. It’s not neck pain or anything–I think restricted blood flow through my scalp eventually catches up. Granted, my idea of a “long gaming session” is like 12 hours, lol, so grain of salt. They’re no problem at all for a few hours at a time.
They are also extremely easy to drive, sounding quite good even out of an XBox controller. They perform admirably for gaming, though I feel like they might be a little better-suited to casual gaming. They image well, but staging isn’t as good as, say, Beyer 1990s. I find the 1990s more effortless to pick up spatial cues, though GX do an adequate job.
I haven’t listened to a great deal of music on the GX–just a little bit here and there. What I have heard is good and makes me want to explore the Audeze line more. That was one of my plans this year before COVID threw a wrench into life and all the shows got canceled. Audeze has too many high-end / “flagship” cans for me to just start throwing money at them without hearing them, and my opportunities to hear them seem to have evaporated until CANJAM in December, if that even still happens.
Hey @SpeleoFool thank you for the info.
I have a couple questions, if you don’t mind,
- Have you been able to compare it to other planar magnetic headphones or maybe something like a focal elex/clear?
- How is the sound isolation, meaning, how transparent is sound coming from outside the headphones? like if someone were to talk to you while you’re wearing the headphones, would you be able to hear them clearly? or would they sound too veiled/muffled?
- How is the mic?
- Do you run them balanced or with the standard cable?
Thank you.
I’m looking for a headphone that will be good for gaming where I need to be able to hear my wife about 6 feet away, as well as something that will be good for music listening (predominantly while playing games)
It doesn’t have to be the best gaming headphone in the world (although for the price, one would assume that lol), but rather I’m more in need of this specific task explained above.
Do you have any different suggestions that think might fit my use case? or would you say the Audeze GX could be one to keep on my short list?
The X to me sounds neutral but renders detail like the focal clear. It’s a monster. I kind of love it
listened to a sound test… fairly decent. Sounds like the mobius could be the same mic honestly. Not the most crystal clear of sounds of course compared to a regular boom mic
Yes, actually. At least insofar as my limited music-listening experiences with the GX have allowed. But I own Ether CX and easily like the LCD-GX better. The Audezes sound like $900 headphones to me–very clean and detailed with no real flaws to quibble over in the sound signature.
I also picked up Sundaras, and might be in the minority, but I found them a little boring (very clear, but just a little too “polite” of a sound). LCD-GX are more engaging and fun to me.
They might be more on part with something like Elex or Clear. I haven’t done any A-B comparisons to really dig in, but I’m a huge fan of the Focal house sound and would probably grab either of those before the GX for listening, but that shouldn’t be taken as a slight against the GX–I may just need more time with them and music.
They’re more of a semi-open sound in terms of isolation. If they’re not doing much, then you can hear your environment, but once they start pumping out sound it’s more or less sign-language time. If I know my wife is talking to me, I can pick out some words, but if I don’t then it’s easy enough to stay focused on the game (i.e., external sounds are minimally distracting).
In terms of isolation of the headphone sound bleeding into your surroundings, they’re more open, which leads into your next question…
The mic is decent, but not great. It does the job just fine, though informal survey from a few friends suggests that the Mod Mic is a solid step up. It’s not a garbage mic, but it could be better.
The one area where the mic does suffer is a tendency to pick up sound bleeding out of the headphones. I have to fine-tune headphone levels and mic gain a little to get into a sweet spot where I’m not bleeding back game audio or echo into chat, but once dialed in everything is fine.
Just standard cables so far. It comes with two–the mic-integrated 3.5mm TRRS and a second “audio” cable with a little bit nicer build quality and a combo 3.5 / 1/4" stereo termination. These take the same mini-XLR connections as other Audeze cans as well as ZMF headphones, the latter of which I have several balanced cables for. I could borrow a ZMF cable for the GX, but I haven’t done that yet.
BTW, before you ask, the orientation of the XLR plugs on the Audeze earcups are different from the orientation on ZMF headphones, so unfortunately you can’t just use the GX mic cable on Eikons and win at life (I tried). The mini XLR locking button on Audezes is to the rear of the cup, and on ZMF is to the inside, so the mic will point straight out from your haed on ZMF cans. Bummer. The boom is not long or flexible enough to get away with a sharp U-bend.
Definitely has to be open-back then. Even though I just called them boring, I wonder if Sundara might be a good fit? Anyone else try those gaming yet? I have not, but they’re not terribly expensive, they are pretty decent for music, and their combination of “politeness” and more open style brought those to mind as something to consider.
If you want to go higher up the chain, I really like DT 1990s for competitive style play, though I’m torn on whether those would be good for hearing the wife. GX are better for general gaming / immersion and I’m tempted to say they might be more of an all-rounder for music (don’t hold me to that), but again they’re a mixed bag for hearing the wife. Elex are quite open and quite a nice choice for immersive gameplay. I like them as All-rounders for music, too. I suppose that might be my pick if you want to go higher end than Sundaras.
Thank you for your responses, they do really help.
If the GX isn’t more “open” than the HD6xx or Aeon 2 Open (haven’t tested this one yet as it hasn’t arrived) I might need to inquire more about Elex/Clear. I have the Focal Elegia and so far I enjoy playing games with it, but obviously I wouldn’t be able to hear my wife with them on lol, but would be good reference for the house sound signature idea.
I don’t have any beyer so I haven’t seen whether the openness allows for outside voices to be understood easily or not.
beyer fanboy here. Can confirm that I can hear sounds outside my headphones fine depending which one I am wearing. though if sounds loud it tends to block a lot out. Probably due to the light weighted design and extremely airy pads and the like. No issues here
I think my concern for hearing my surroundings through the 1990s is more me than the headphones–I tend to wear them for open world heavy-action games where spatial information matters, and as a result my attention tends to be more focused on the game than it might be for something more casual. 
I kinda feel like 1990, LCD-GX and 6xx are all similarly open. Elex is far more open, and Utopias are like wearing nothing but earpads, lol.
Since you have Elegia, you’ve already got a sense of what Elex is all about, at least in a general house-sound sort of sense, and very much in terms of the build. I used my Elex a while back to play Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, and that was excellent. I specifically went closed-back (1770 Pro) for Alien: Isolation because I did not want any outside distractions. I pre-arranged for my wife to text me from the couch for any interruptions, lol.
The biggest argument against Elex might simply be to add more variety to your collection. Then again, if you like the Elegia, you’ll like the Elex. I got a friend of mine into headphones and those were his first two cans, and he’s been perfectly happy with those (he just ordered Eikons, though–hooked him! lol).
lol yeah, part of me says just grab the Elex and you should be happy. And another part of me says, experiment with other sound signatures.
Beyers put me off a little because of the brightness they tend to have and these days I seem to be more sensitive to bright headphones, so I’ve tried to stay away from them. I was told the Tygr ones are not as bright.
I have not had any problem with the focal Elegia, so the Elex would be a safe pick, specially if it’s as transparent as I’m reading in here. The Sundara are also transparent from what I gather from the comments here, and all hifiman in general, for that matter. Figured Hifiman XX Edition, Ananda, or Sundara, or Focal Elex, or Clear, or Audeze GX, or, depending on the brightness, DT 1990 pro
I’m sure I just missed some above.
Anybody have any experience with the ZMF Aeolus?
If anyone walked up to me and said the tygr was bright even remotely… I would think their ears were completely broken or they have the worst case of treble sensitivity on the planet lol. Its barily even a V signature only like that due to a small peak in the mid to upper highs
Sounds like you got some good suggestions so far though.
Ended up finding a used Focal Elex for what I think was an acceptable price and it’ll be here on Thursday. On the plus side, it won’t stick like a sore thumb since I already have the Elegia, and I like the comfort and look. Part of me still is itching for the Edition XX.
Guess next up is the monoprice Liquid platinum.
Aeon 2 open arrived today so hopefully I can try them out soon!
Thank you so much, everyone!
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Congrats! Post some impressions here once you get some time with them. Would love to hear if they meet expectations!