Anyone notice the headphone bandwagon?

[lini]

tjohn: I'd say it rather was HeadWize - HeadFi came in a bit later... But yup, the headphone market surely seems to have expolded since the late 90s, and nowadays it indeed seems like everyone and their sister would be offering headphones and/or headphone amps.

Greetings from Munich!

Manfred / lini

 

[Longaevus]

For me, they are different. I love headphones, but I won't be selling my speakers. For one thing, speakers are a shared experience and headphones are more of a personal experience. I don't really have huge speakers, though, so regular sized speakers were a better solution for me on that front.

Yes I guess it depends on the character of your listening sessions but if you are the only "audiophile" at home I guess the need for fancy speakers will be very hard pressed if you justify and get a pair of high-end headphones. I never owned expensive ones but if the sub $50 I did can have such an impressive performance I can only imagine what some hundred dollars can do, probably miracles! Maybe it will sound like the singer is whispering at your ears! Everything is apparently so much easier to control in a small "room" than in a big one... endless possibilities.
A downside I can sense is the diminished sense of genuine sound stage in a sense that a loudspeaker playing loud music in a room may resemble more to a live concert experience than headphones.

 

[uofmtiger]

Yes I guess it depends on the character of your listening sessions but if you are the only "audiophile" at home I guess the need for fancy speakers will be very hard pressed if you justify and get a pair of high-end headphones. I never owned expensive ones but if the sub $50 I did can have such an impressive performance I can only imagine what some hundred dollars can do, probably miracles! Maybe it will sound like the singer is whispering at your ears! Everything is apparently so much easier to control in a small "room" than in a big one... endless possibilities.
A downside I can sense is the diminished sense of genuine sound stage in a sense that a loudspeaker playing loud music in a room may resemble more to a live concert experience than headphones.

It is also the way you feel bass notes with speakers rather than mainly hearing them with headphones ( I know some people pair their headphone listening with a sub to try to get that same feeling.). That being said, the detail you can get from headphones is hard, if not impossible, to reach at the same price points. Also, I like having a few pair with different sound signatures and all of them can fit in one small box and be exchanged by unplugging from an amp and plugging in something else. Speakers take up much more room and harder to switch out. You would have to use EQ to try to get the same quality of sound (it would be difficult to make one set of speakers sound like K701s and Senn HD580s, though)

 

[Longaevus]

It is also the way you feel bass notes with speakers rather than mainly hearing them with headphones ( I know some people pair their headphone listening with a sub to try to get that same feeling.). That being said, the detail you can get from headphones is hard, if not impossible, to reach at the same price points. Also, I like having a few pair with different sound signatures and all of them can fit in one small box and be exchanged by unplugging from an amp and plugging in something else. Speakers take up much more room and harder to switch out. You would have to use EQ to try to get the same quality of sound (it would be difficult to make one set of speakers sound like K701s and Senn HD580s, though)

@uofmtiger, I think that you have just touched where it hurts the most, to say that guys who are spending who knows, thousands of dollars on heavyweight speakers, could have just shell out like 300 bucks and get the same sound stage on an unobtrusive and portable pair of headphones that simply require something like a tube amp to sound likee heaven takes guts!

But is it really true?

 

[Tom Brennan]

But is it really true?

There is no objective truth here, it's something a person decides for himself.

 

[uofmtiger]

@uofmtiger, I think that you have just touched where it hurts the most, to say that guys who are spending who knows, thousands of dollars on heavyweight speakers, could have just shell out like 300 bucks and get the same sound stage on an unobtrusive and portable pair of headphones that simply require something like a tube amp to sound likee heaven takes guts!

But is it really true?

I think the soundstage is one of the advantages to speakers in addition to bass "feel". However, you also lose with portability with speakers, so I think it is best to have both. I don't think they are the same experience, so IMHO you can't replace speakers with headphones or headphones with speakers...without making sacrifices.

 

[JoeESP9]

Both my portable and desktop headphone amps are from a retailer in Bozeman Montana called Headroom who makes their own line of gear here in the US. The desktop amp I purchased new in 2012. The portable amp I purchased used off of eBay and it's a model from the earlier 2000s. I stick with this brand because up until recently all of their amps had a Meier cross feed circuit which mimicks the barely perceptible time delay one experienced between both g their ears when listening to speakers. It improves imaging and soundstage a little helping to relieve the "in your head" experience that many who prefer speakers get from headphones.

Where can I get an amp with the Meier circuit? With anything other than a binaural recording for me all headphone music comes from a line directly from one ear to the other. I experience this with every headphone I've ever tried in the last 40+ years.

 

[JoeESP9]

@uofmtiger, I think that you have just touched where it hurts the most, to say that guys who are spending who knows, thousands of dollars on heavyweight speakers, could have just shell out like 300 bucks and get the same sound stage on an unobtrusive and portable pair of headphones that simply require something like a tube amp to sound likee heaven takes guts!

But is it really true?

What soundstage? I've never heard any type/sort of soundstage from any headphones ever. Every single sound comes from a straight line from one ear to the other. The only exceptions to this are binaural recordings of which I have a few.

 

[Longaevus]

What soundstage? I've never heard any type/sort of soundstage from any headphones ever. Every single sound comes from a straight line from one ear to the other. The only exceptions to this are binaural recordings of which I have a few.

Well I guess you could say the exact same thing for speakers, unless you are in a very controlled listening space with off the charts speaker positioning and more than two speakers, "soundstage" is nothing but another fancy word "audiophiles" like to use to describe the tricks that are being played on their mind each time their listening conditions affects their setup. "Soundstage" as we usually write is not even in the dictionary, we shouldn't make a bid deal out of it.

 

[brian222]

could it also mean that millions just want to withdraw from it all?

 

[Tom Brennan]

If you don't need a good soundstage that's swell but the effect exists and many audiophiles enjoy it.

I think of headphones as a type of direct musical injection, so to speak. Though (arguably) they don't provide the spacial cues and directionality needed to reproduce the feeling of listening to a live performence in a hall they provide good tone and clarity in spades and the ability to hear all the nuances of the music itself, as it existed in the composer's mind before ever being performed. I like a good soundstage but I don't miss it either and I enjoy the immersion in the music I get with phones. But perhaps I'm making a virtue of necessity.

 

[asilker]

Not sure I would quite say bandwagon from an audiophile perspective. Sure, there are a lot of bluetooth and consumer offerings because of the successful Beats company a few years ago. But that same phenomenon also brought more serious buyers to high end audio and allowed audio developers a broader base to develop products around.

Compared to a speaker setup, you need less components (no power amp), you can save a lot of space, and per dollar you'll likely get better realism and resolution. Companies like Sennheisser, Audeze, Fostex, etc are making great cans. DAC development is flying, tube implimentation is back in force, etc. For the younger generation, a more cost effective and tech savvy way to be involved in music quality seems like a good idea. You don't need a treated room to rock planars.

PS I'm a young guy who does not currently own headphones because I much prefer speakers. However I got married young so I'm not sharing space with roommates and my wife is particularly graceful. FWIW I'm sure I would be a headphone guy in different circumstances

 

[Longaevus]

Ironically and as far as I know, Beats by Dre, what started it all, are really bad for what they cost, just bass oriented, nothing audiophile about them.

There is a space for headphones, even speaker lovers can get a nice pair for long listening sessions that extend through the night.
Additionally they are a fantastic way of fooling room acoustics and the likes, you just need your head hehe

 

[JoeESP9]

Well I guess you could say the exact same thing for speakers, unless you are in a very controlled listening space with off the charts speaker positioning and more than two speakers, "soundstage" is nothing but another fancy word "audiophiles" like to use to describe the tricks that are being played on their mind each time their listening conditions affects their setup. "Soundstage" as we usually write is not even in the dictionary, we shouldn't make a bid deal out of it.

No! You can't say the same thing about speakers. I regularly experience a soundstage from my speakers. It's not some sort of trick nor is it a product of anyone's imagination. Two "decent" speakers properly set up in a decent sounding room will always exhibit a soundstage if there is one in the recording. If you don't hear a soundstage with classical and Jazz recordings you should probably look to your system as not producing what's there. OTOH, if you don't listen to classical or Jazz you're listening to music that usually doesn't have a soundstage to reproduce.

If you don't have access to any Direct to Disc LP's (they all have a soundstage) give an audiophile CD label a listen. I recommend anything from Groove Note. Groove Note recordings are recorded directly to a two track master usually via a passive mixer driven by a minimal number of microphones. No studio manipulation or post processing is performed.

 

[Longaevus]

If you don't have access to any Direct to Disc LP's (they all have a soundstage) give an audiophile CD label a listen. I recommend anything from Groove Note. Groove Note recordings are recorded directly to a two track master usually via a passive mixer driven by a minimal number of microphones. No studio manipulation or post processing is performed.

I was not trying to say that there is no "sound stage" but if it is possible to properly simulate with two speakers a 3 dimensional place for the listener, where some instruments sound seems to have traveled a longer distance than others and when the singer moves from L to R, the headphones should be able to get close to that.

Anyway, I will look into it more with those Groove Note suggestions

 

[Whaddup]

tjohn: I'd say it rather was HeadWize - HeadFi came in a bit later... But yup, the headphone market surely seems to have expolded since the late 90s, and nowadays it indeed seems like everyone and their sister would be offering headphones and/or headphone amps.

Greetings from Munich!

Manfred / lini

Actually headphones golden age was the 90's. Starting in 1989 with the Sony R10. Sennheiser he-90 and Stax sr-omega(origianal) soon followed. So way earlier than late 90's. At best were in a silver age now.

 

[Whaddup]

What soundstage? I've never heard any type/sort of soundstage from any headphones ever. Every single sound comes from a straight line from one ear to the other. The only exceptions to this are binaural recordings of which I have a few.

Akg k-1000, Stax sigma and to a decent but less degree sennheiser hd800.

 

[lini]

Whaddup: Mind you, my post wasn't about what I'd deem the "golden age" of headphones, but about when headphones/headphone-based listening seemed to have become interesting to a much larger audience than before.

Greetings from Munich!

Manfred / lini

 

[JoeESP9]

I was not trying to say that there is no "sound stage" but if it is possible to properly simulate with two speakers a 3 dimensional place for the listener, where some instruments sound seems to have traveled a longer distance than others and when the singer moves from L to R, the headphones should be able to get close to that.

Anyway, I will look into it more with those Groove Note suggestions

As I've said before and am saying again now "no headphones I've ever heard in 50+ years in this hobby has ever produced anything but sound in a straight line from one ear to the other". Any and all binaural recordings are the exception. Unfortunately binaural recordings sound very underwhelming through speakers.

Studio recordings have no soundstage to reproduce because there isn't one in the first place. You can't simulate what was never there. Direct to Disc LP's (always) or audiophile CD's (mostly) have a true soundstage.

 

[uofmtiger]

There is a long discussion of "head stage" over at head fi. It gives me a "head ache" to read that thread, but it discusses the differences between head stage and sound stage in great detail. To me, headphones don't sound like a direct line from one ear to another and the open headphones often make you feel that you are listening to instruments outside your head. However, they don't create the same stage as speakers, either.