Reason and Headphones

[Skimrok]

Thank you everyone with their input it’s actually making me aware to certain models to put on a short list now I’m very grateful and I’m sure it will help others also so keep them coming so we hear others opinions also

[danc]

AKG 712 PRO (OPEN)
AKG 702 (OPEN)
Senheisser HD380 PRO (CLOSED)

In order of preference - favourite first.

I chose AKG after auditioning MANY headphones. Every person has their own personal taste and AKG is mine.

Really love my 712 PRO for every day studio use. I also use HD380 PRO when in public (office and train) as OPEN cans aren't an option - unless you want grumpy looks and fingers pointing at the NO NOISE sign on train carriage windows. 702 is less used, as I upgraded to 712 PRO after spending years loving the 702.

In studio I do use monitors and sub, but when it comes to doing surgery and mastering, then you have to revert to headphones. Plus headphones are a must at 3AM and you rather the neighbours not put a restraining order on you!

HEADPHONES (2).jpg (912.5 KiB) Viewed 2919 times

[Heigen5]

I got CB-1 Studio Headphones four months ago, after I read how good these are for James Bernard over Facebook.
He was right that these headphones translate well to monitors too.

[RobC]

Response curve is super important when getting headphones for mixing.

Frequency reproduction is. Curve doesn't matter.

[RobC]

These are the professional in-ear monitors I talked about. E40, E50 and E70.



Durable, with everything replaceable, too!

In-ears are especially unbeatable when it comes to sound design.

[antic604]

After a ton of research, I ended up with the E40 in-ear monitors from Audio Technica (very valuable series E50, E70 suggested by Normen).

Do they sit well in your ear? I have a pair and they're really difficult to position correctly - either they're too tight bordering on painful, or too loose and will drop out every few minutes despite the wire going around the ear. I like their sound a lot - when they're there - but number of times I need to adjust them simply makes them unusable for me, especially because the wire is pretty stiff

I was pretty surprised, but those are incredibly good: warm, transparent sound (I know, a bit of sontradiction ) & extremely comfy:

http://pl.jbl.com/JBL+Endurance+RUN.htm ... es#start=1

[MrBlue]

AKG K240 Studio...

[FlowerSoldier]

Shure SRH940. Pretty comfortable too.

[rgdaniel]

Sony MDR V6 - love these!

https://www.amazon.com/Sony-MDRV6-Studi ... B00001WRSJ

[botnotbot]

Response curve is super important when getting headphones for mixing.

Frequency reproduction is. Curve doesn't matter.

AFAIK the response curve is referring to the graph of frequency reproduction. Glad to be corrected if I'm mistaken.

[ScuzzyEye]

DT990 Pro. They're awesome in any DAW

Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro 250ohms. Can't beat them for comfort and checking detail. The closed back design is also perfect for recording

Heh, I have the DT880 Pros to round out the collection.

But I can't really recommend them. Their semi-open design is supposed to be the best of both worlds (closed- and open-back), but it's actually the worst. They don't have quite the bass response of the 990s, and you can't use them for vocal tracking because of bleed.

I'd rather have the 990s, as I use them mostly for a reference when mixing. But they'd be even worse for the rare times I record vocals, so I'd also need the 770s.

As for mixing infrasonic bass on headphones, I've heard of people using the Buttkicker Gamer or SubPac on their chair.

[Skimrok]

DT990 Pro. They're awesome in any DAW

Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro 250ohms. Can't beat them for comfort and checking detail. The closed back design is also perfect for recording

Heh, I have the DT880 Pros to round out the collection.

But I can't really recommend them. Their semi-open design is supposed to be the best of both worlds (closed- and open-back), but it's actually the worst. They don't have quite the bass response of the 990s, and you can't use them for vocal tracking because of bleed.

I'd rather have the 990s, as I use them mostly for a reference when mixing. But they'd be even worse for the rare times I record vocals, so I'd also need the 770s.

As for mixing infrasonic bass on headphones, I've heard of people using the Buttkicker Gamer or SubPac on their chair.

Thanks Scuzzyeye I’ve been doing some reading on all three very recently and with your opinion has helped me rule out the 880s in the future for my needs I was learning that way with other info out there elsewhere
Mind you I’m not a singer but I meight try to use my old beatbox skills in the future for fun and do a few rhymes and small snippets in rhyming but Im still stuck in 1989 he!he!

[ScuzzyEye]

Thanks Scuzzyeye I’ve been doing some reading on all three very recently and with your opinion has helped me rule out the 880s in the future for my needs I was learning that way with other info out there elsewhere
Mind you I’m not a singer but I meight try to use my old beatbox skills in the future for fun and do a few rhymes and small snippets in rhyming but Im still stuck in 1989 he!he!

I'd say get the 990s (or some other fully open-backed), since they offer the very best frequency response. Then use sealed ear buds for the few times you record vocals.

Honestly, I was surprised how much the 880s leaked. I have one track, where I was just speaking rhythmically to a click, and that bled through.

[botnotbot]

Thanks Scuzzyeye I’ve been doing some reading on all three very recently and with your opinion has helped me rule out the 880s in the future for my needs I was learning that way with other info out there elsewhere
Mind you I’m not a singer but I meight try to use my old beatbox skills in the future for fun and do a few rhymes and small snippets in rhyming but Im still stuck in 1989 he!he!

I'd say get the 990s (or some other fully open-backed), since they offer the very best frequency response. Then use sealed ear buds for the few times you record vocals.

Honestly, I was surprised how much the 880s leaked. I have one track, where I was just speaking rhythmically to a click, and that bled through.

I can absolutely confirm that the leakage from the 880s was surprising.

I got home and turned on some music at a level that was a bit loud but could was reasonable considering I wanted to test out the new headphones.

Within 30 seconds my wife was physically interrupting me to make sure that I wasn't committing some sort of suicide by sound.

And in that regard, I absolutely do not recommend open-backed headphones if you live/work in close proximity to others. There is no way to do anything enjoyably, let alone properly, without causing a disturbance!

If you live in the US and don't check out the Sony MDR-7520s ... well, don't say I didn't say something when I had the chance..

[antic604]

I'd say get the 990s (or some other fully open-backed), since they offer the very best frequency response. Then use sealed ear buds for the few times you record vocals.

That would be my advice as well. Bayerdynamics headphones - all models - are very comfortable, but the open-back models, like the 990Pro, have the additional benefit of allowing your ears to breathe, because they're not closed in a tightly sealed shell.

[RobC]

After a ton of research, I ended up with the E40 in-ear monitors from Audio Technica (very valuable series E50, E70 suggested by Normen).

Do they sit well in your ear? I have a pair and they're really difficult to position correctly - either they're too tight bordering on painful, or too loose and will drop out every few minutes despite the wire going around the ear. I like their sound a lot - when they're there - but number of times I need to adjust them simply makes them unusable for me, especially because the wire is pretty stiff

I was pretty surprised, but those are incredibly good: warm, transparent sound (I know, a bit of sontradiction ) & extremely comfy:

http://pl.jbl.com/JBL+Endurance+RUN.htm ... es#start=1

Yes, they do. After placing it the way the manual suggested, I felt that the Medium-sized silicone things (forgot what it's called in English) were too tight for me. Then I tried the Small ones, which were the best. Extra Small lost a bit of sub bass in my ear-canal. And clearly the biggest Large ones were way too tight.
In the past, I had some cheap sony ones for on the way. They always fell out, but then I tried a smaller silicone thing (yeah...), and then it fit. So it could be that you tried too big ones.
Now, with the E40's Small ones, it always is in place for me. Cable goes behind ears, down the neck, and I usually place it on my right shoulder, then to the system. I didn't even wrap the fix wires around my ears, just bent it a bit, so they go behind. The manual shows like it barely touches behind the tip of the ears. Since they sit well, I didn't change anything afterwards, didn't try to make it clamp on my ears, whatsoever. As long as the regular cable goes down straight, and doesn't pull, I'm fine. It may take some time to find the right 'setting', but it's worth it.
The E40's are ironically the largest. On a bad day, it can touch my ear, which can press and cause discomfort over time, but that's usually only, if I keep adjusting and pushing it for a few seconds "so it most definitely, surely sits well" - which is my own OCD stupidity. xD

I went with Normen's suggestion, cause these were really a bang for the buck. Can't have the chance here to test in-ears, so I couldn't check others. Regardless, it was worth it.

[RobC]

Frequency reproduction is. Curve doesn't matter.

AFAIK the response curve is referring to the graph of frequency reproduction. Glad to be corrected if I'm mistaken.

As long as it reproduces every frequency, it's fine then.

[Steedus]

+1 for the Beyerdynamic DT770 Pro (80 ohms), though sometimes I would've liked the option to quickly swap out the straight cable for a coiled cable (on-the-fly).

[botnotbot]

AFAIK the response curve is referring to the graph of frequency reproduction. Glad to be corrected if I'm mistaken.

As long as it reproduces every frequency, it's fine then.

That's a part of it. You won't ever get "every" frequency in a headphone, but indeed you want as many frequencies included as possible.

That said, the flatness of the frequency response curve is the first thing that I look at when checking out headphones for mixing.

[two shoes]

Imo you're better off with a small set of full range nearfields turned down low than the best headphones ever made, at least for stereo mixing and two track work. Yes, you'll get more detail out of the headphones and hear things you'd probably miss at first with monitors, but your sacrificing the stereo soundstage completely and I have yet to hear a plausible explanation of how one is supposed to create a good stereo mix with no stereo image Maybe if you have years of experience going back and forth between monitors and headphones on the same mixes cause you're a full-time engineer and you have a really good handle on how something is going to translate from headphones to stereo, but I don't know of anyone in this category who would try to mix on headphones or recommend it to anyone either.

There are plugins out there designed to make headphones behave more like monitors for this reason, including something called HM-1 or something like that in the RE format, but these have never worked well for me. I think you'll get more mileage in the long run from learning to mix on a small set of nearfields at low volume (i'm assuming volume is the issue that's driving you to try and mix on headphones in the first place) even ones in the same price rang as a good set of headphones.

All that said, there is the question of how much sense it makes to mix everything in stereo in a world full of people listening on earbuds or in cars - the rare listener who's sitting down in the sweet spot of a good set of loudspeakers probably isn't streaming your latest headphone mix from Spotify or Youtube in the firstplace. I get this argument and I'm all for discussions of the relative merits of mono vs stereo vs quadraphonic, etc in a world where streaming low bit rate audio to shitty earbuds is the dominant listening paradigm, but that's a different question than should you try to mix in stereo on headphones - the answer to that question is and always has been an emphatic no.

So unless you've already abandoned the idea of mixing in stereo (in which case i want to hear more about what you're doing instead and why) my two cents is get the best pair of nearfields you can and turn them down low enough so they don't wake the baby or bother the neighbors or whatever it is. Get good at that and when you do have the chance to turn them up to normal listening levels you will feel like you have hearing superpowers.

[PeterP]

I usually spend 50-75% of the time mixing in mono, only adding the stereo sweetening at the end, so I don't find the stereo argument very persuasive.

I do end up toggling between headphones and monitors a lot towards the end of the mix though, and always check on different speakers.

[Kalm]

whenever I use my laptop its headphones

[Desmondblack]

Sennheiser HD 518, not very expensive, super comfortable, excellent and neutral sound quality.

[BRIGGS]

These are the professional in-ear monitors I talked about. E40, E50 and E70.



Durable, with everything replaceable, too!

In-ears are especially unbeatable when it comes to sound design.

Those look interesting! How do they compare to the Shure IEMs?

[RobC]

These are the professional in-ear monitors I talked about. E40, E50 and E70.



Durable, with everything replaceable, too!

In-ears are especially unbeatable when it comes to sound design.

Those look interesting! How do they compare to the Shure IEMs?

I only had Shure headphones. They had a bass drop, and mid emphasis. The E40 has a more detailed sound.