THIS!!! Completely agree.
You’re probably after a Focal Clear or Utopia for the sound signature you’re referencing. Super detailed with an intimate stage.
Go for the clear. The Utopia just isn’t worth it. The clear is great and worth looking into for sure. It’s just not as exciting because of the neutralness. The sendy can get you hyped up, but the clear just gives it to you one way or another. The Elex has a less neural but more energetic signature that might be more interesting then the clear. I use the clear for some light mastering work, and it’s great, but I wouldn’t put it on to get hyped up.
I suppose it’s heresy to suggest that, depending on which frequencies in the treble are too sharp, a ply or two toilet paper in each ear cup might cure the problem.
If that works and you want something more official looking. Try these:
Don’t know if the AKG foam pads knock out exactly the same frequencies as toilet paper. But at $1.99… (These foam pads are what Josh Valour recommends for the 7-9 kHz peak of the DT 1990s.)
Interesting how differently people hear. Just watched the Max Settings review of the Aiva’s on YT. For him it’s the scoop in the upper mids that he feels is the weak spot. He loves the treble and esp. loves the over-all detail. Not to mention build, comfort and price.
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Sweet, thanks a lot Maynard. I’ll look into that.
But ive got to say i feel that headphones should not “engergize” or jazz up the sound in anyway. To me the best headphones should be neutral in bass, midrange, treble, soundstage and should have detail and proper placement. It should strive to reproduce what the artist intended and that is best accomplished through neutrality in every way i believe.
The Frequency response should be flat as a board. and if we want more treble or bass or midrange or whatever, is should be adjustable through the amplifiers.
Focal clear then? best for mastering (flat and very accurate in both detail and soundstage and imaging) around 1k range imo. Also the sendys are jazzing up the highs a bit.
It’s not just that. The timber is just not that natural on the Aiva. I just don’t waste time putting it on my head anymore when I have the Aeolus.
@ Antpage2 The entire Focal lineup minus the Elear would probably suit you well. The Elegia should also be on your list if you prefer this type of very detailed “up front” kind of sound with less silibant highs as the Sendys produce.
I think the elegia is a bit far sounding though compared to the clear, so I agree that the clear and the elex would be a better bet. The elear is just not that great
Also that’s not really a fair comparison lol. Biodyna vs a brighter planar, of course the biodyna is going to sound more organic lol
Uh oh. You just triggered one of my OCD flash points!
Trouble is there’s every evidence that purely electro-mechanical designed headphones can’t do that. Look at the FR of the Focal Clears:
The jaggies on the right make the Alps look like cushions on a sofa. I’ve looked at hundreds of un-smoothed raw graphs and this is typical. At least the lower frequencies are admirably smooth.
Here’s a nearly useless graph of the Sendy Aiva’s, but it seems to be all we have at the moment:
The overall shape of the FR line has been drastically altered, supposedly to show departures from someone’s idea of neutral. But at least we can see that now the jaggedness extends much lower in frequency.
And all this is ignoring the question of tonal accuracy.
Here’s the Sennheiser HE-1 ($60,000?):
That’s about as close to correctness as I’ve seen. So far as I know there are only three ways to get the FR accuracy you (and I) want. DSP, EQ and $60,000. Pick your poison.
That graph for the clear raw does not look correct. Where did you get that measurement?
Here are some compensated measurements below
Innerfideltiy: https://www.innerfidelity.com/images/FocalClearsnA1BRQE000007.pdf
RAA: https://reference-audio-analyzer.pro/en/report/hp/focal-clear.php
Purrin: https://www.superbestaudiofriends.org/index.php?attachments/focal-clear-fr-png.11212/
DIY: https://diyaudioheaven.files.wordpress.com/2017/11/fr-clear.png?w=1226
The clears have been some of the most natural sounding headphones for mastering I’ve used. Its a great balance between really nice neutrality when eq’ed properly and accurate music representation. Even without eq they are very neutral sounding, even if they aren’t perfect on a measurement.
Edit: and the sendys measurement is off of a minidsp ears, which really isn’t an accurate measuring system compared to others unless you are directly comparing minidsp ears measurements
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Also by correctness do you mean the Harman target? Just because it meets the Harman target doesn’t necessarily make it “correct.” I don’t really want to get into that argument but whatever
Oratory1990: https://www.reddit.com/r/oratory1990/wiki/index. He does this for a living. (His graph for the DT 1990 is the only one that matches my DT 1990. Yet his graph of the M50x doesn’t match my M50x. Old pads vs new? Dunno.)
The InnerFi graph shows exactly the same mountain range in the treble as the Oratory graph. Ditto the Purrin. The RAA graph is highly smoothed and DIY just copies that.
Heavens, no. A 6 dB bass boost isn’t neutral any more than Kool Aid is only tastefully sweet. My use of the Clear graph was purely to show an example of treble jaggedness being typical even in such a well-regarded headphone.
Certainly not claiming that the Oratory graph for the Clear is definitive. I can do a variance between it and the InnerFi graph if you want, but surely the raw data look very similar?
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oratory1990 stuff is usually fine, its just this raw that looks more exaggerated from 2k to 6k, compared to other raws. The main issue with raw graphs for trying to show most people an example of the freq response is its a bit misleading for those who don’t know how these measurements work.
Just checking on the harman thing, misunderstood what you were trying to say there lol.
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Also just look at oratory1990’s clear with eq (although still don’t agree with the raw)
that’s why I find the clear so great, you can eq it to excellence for music production
Zmf aeolus. Sennheiser 6xx
I’ll second this! The Clear should also be in consideration as well. All three are FANTASTIC headphones.
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don´t forget the sennheiser 660s - not the detail monster, like the Clear or my Elegia - far from wide stage and not sibilant but also not very warm. Don´t want to sell here, cause I sit in germany
me personally I sell them because I prefer my 1990s with A-pads and will probably get the Ananda(not for you)
I would still say that the 660 still is warmer tilted if you care comparing it to other headphones.
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I love my Sendy’s, noticed after a second viewing of Z’s review of them, they aren’t fazored anyone come up with some kind of mod to do it?
I haven’t really bothered with it because I think they sound good already. I personally like non fazored headphones like my lcd2.2 or other planars, but it could probably be done
Possibly might be able to do a fuzzor mod or something like that