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Audeze LCD-X Review (2021 Edition Headphone)

SRKRAM

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It's a shame they are still shipping the long leather strap that touches the headband. Defeats the purpose of being suspended!
And they do carry a shorter leather strap, so I don't know why they keep sending out the longer ones!

This is my former XC with short leather strap bought from Audeze's Customer Service. Comfort increased 1000x.
I wonder what Audeze are doing with their headbands. Below is a photo of my 2020 LCD-2s and 2021 LCD-Xs. I contacted them about the LCD-X headband and they sent me a replacement, but it just the same as the original. Time to get out the hole punch.
Audeze headbands.jpg
 

Matias

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I wonder what Audeze are doing with their headbands. Below is a photo of my 2020 LCD-2s and 2021 LCD-Xs. I contacted them about the LCD-X headband and they sent me a replacement, but it just the same as the original. Time to get out the hole punch.
View attachment 144166
It shouldn't be too difficult to measure a strap so that it stays a few millimeters away from the headband, right? I mean, they have all the R&D for Fluxor magnets and nano scale diafragms... How hard is to get a leather strap right ffs??
 

SeriousSam70

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It's a shame they are still shipping the long leather strap that touches the headband. Defeats the purpose of being suspended!
And they do carry a shorter leather strap, so I don't know why they keep sending out the longer ones!

This is my former XC with short leather strap bought from Audeze's Customer Service. Comfort increased 1000x.

View attachment 143679
I haven't found the shorter leather strap for LCD-X 2021 (or any other shorter strap) available for purchase on their website, in the headphones accessories department.
Do I need to contact them via Support Center and order a custom one ?
 

Matias

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I haven't found the shorter leather strap for LCD-X 2021 (or any other shorter strap) available for purchase on their website, in the headphones accessories department.
Do I need to contact them via Support Center and order a custom one ?
yep
 

TopQuark

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I wonder what Audeze are doing with their headbands. Below is a photo of my 2020 LCD-2s and 2021 LCD-Xs. I contacted them about the LCD-X headband and they sent me a replacement, but it just the same as the original. Time to get out the hole punch.
View attachment 144166
Before taking out the punch hole, ask someone to check the gap while the headphone is on your head. It may touch the metal (or carbon) band when not worn but there is a good chance there is still adequate gap while worn.
 

Ddd

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I wonder what Audeze are doing with their headbands. Below is a photo of my 2020 LCD-2s and 2021 LCD-Xs. I contacted them about the LCD-X headband and they sent me a replacement, but it just the same as the original. Time to get out the hole punch.
View attachment 144166
One can always mod their suspension strap to turn them into just like a HFM headphones Strap with massive gap you always dream of without needing to worry about leather stretch (now you will wish the strap longer the better with this mod) :) also significantly help with weight management

*But do take note, this mod is recommended to do with the Long Extension Yokes*

Sharing my ideas , wonder why I've never seen anyone doing it? :D
X_HiFiM Strap 2.JPG
X_HiFiM Strap_3.JPG
X_HiFiM Strap4.JPG
Sample.png
 

SRKRAM

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Before taking out the punch hole, ask someone to check the gap while the headphone is on your head. It may touch the metal (or carbon) band when not worn but there is a good chance there is still adequate gap while worn.
The metal headband definitely touched my head. I've had to shorten Audeze headbands in the past when they've stretched after use, but it's surprising to have to do it from new. This is how much I removed, and now have around 1cm clearance.

20210731_000148.jpg
 

Luke Lemke

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My understanding here is that the LCD-X measures extremely well, specially when it comes to distortion levels. I also believe they're very close to the LCD-3, but the latter has a high impedance. What's the point of high impedance headphones? Is there any objective advantage? Why would Beyerdynamic, for example, produce 600 ohms headphones?
 

zoid

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My 2021 pair of LCD-X's arrived about a week ago. I really enjoy them, however it took me a while to get used to the sound. There is a noticeable lack of sub bass and vocals and treble seem somewhat laid back, although I actually like this since I'm treble sensitive. In my opinion they are satisfactory without EQ, but the EQ completely changed them for the better. I gave a shot at the Roon EQ using amirm's settings, and I can definitely say that the sub bass extension does wonders for this headphone. I also don't mind the elevated treble as it adds clarity and resolution, but I toned it down a notch.

However, I came across some issues while I was EQing. I also wanted to mention that I am a total noob when it comes to EQ (and I've never used Roon before), so please accept my sincerest apologies regarding my inexperience and the questions I'm about to ask.

Anyways, I was somewhat surprised when I noticed the headphones began to clip and distort. While I'm by no means a basshead, I tested various songs that I knew had lots of sub bass and observed that they did in fact distort (Roon was showing the red clipping icon). The average song was absolutely fine, but for those 1% of tracks I tested (mostly hip-hop, which despite me not being a fan of tends to have a lot of low frequencies) there was noticeable distortion. An example of this was "Middle Child" by J. Cole, where the bass completely muddled the rest of the frequency range.

I managed to remedy this somewhat by enabling volume leveling along with headroom management at -8 db, which caused the clipping icon to disappear. -4 db was fine for the overwhelming majority of tracks, but for those aforementioned sub bass monsters it was not sufficient. And the default -3 db wasn't really sufficient for the majority of bassy songs because it also clipped.

I was wondering if setting the headroom so high somehow impacts the dynamic range or fidelity of the music. I'm currently enjoying the heck out of these headphones, but as someone who's new to EQ I have a lot to learn and would really appreciate if someone could let me know what I'm doing wrong. My setup is a Jotunheim 2 with a Modius running balanced connections.

Thank you very much!
 

Bimbleton

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I’m by no means an expert, but what I’ve learned is that during EQ, you set the pregain to be (negative) the highest EQ peak.

So if the biggest EQ change is +10db at 32Hz, set the pregain -10 or lower. That usually prevents clipping.

Would also like to recommend trialing oratory1990’s LCDX EQ profile, which is quite excellent.
 

zoid

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I’m by no means an expert, but what I’ve learned is that during EQ, you set the pregain to be (negative) the highest EQ peak.

So if the biggest EQ change is +10db at 32Hz, set the pregain -10 or lower. That usually prevents clipping.

Would also like to recommend trialing oratory1990’s LCDX EQ profile, which is quite excellent.

Thank you so much! Now it all makes sense why I was hearing that. That also explains why -8 db did the trick, since the highest peak is at 8 db. Looks like I still have tons to learn!

And I'll definitely check his profile out. Thanks again!
 

MrEWhite

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Can we use the roon EQ for the LCD-X with these, or will we need to wait for a 2021 version to be put in Audeze presets?
 

Jimbob54

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Can we use the roon EQ for the LCD-X with these, or will we need to wait for a 2021 version to be put in Audeze presets?
Doesn't hurt to try but the FR is different so really an update for the new version would be as audeze intended.
 

MrEWhite

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Doesn't hurt to try but the FR is different so really an update for the new version would be as audeze intended.
I've been using the EQ for a day or so, and it sounds pretty darn good to me. Would love for it to sound better though. :)
 

Predatowned

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If I use roon with Amir’s EQ curve, will I be able to simultaneously use the EQ with asio? I looked into windows APO EQ apparently it cannot be used with asio or wasapi. Just recieved these headphones and wanna try different EQ settings. Never felt the need to EQ my hd600 so this is all new to me lol. Gear is topping d30 pro, drop 789 balanced. Using a balanced cable for the lcdx as well.
 
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tifune

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It's probably right in front of my face, but I can't tell how to determine what edition of LCD-X I have? I ordered used from Amazon and it was not specified.
 
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Jimbob54

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If I use roon with Amir’s EQ curve, will I be able to simultaneously use the EQ with asio? I looked into windows APO EQ apparently it cannot be used with asio or wasapi. Just recieved these headphones and wanna try different EQ settings. Never felt the need to EQ my hd600 so this is all new to me lol. Gear is topping d30 pro, drop 789 balanced. Using a balanced cable for the lcdx as well.
Yes, roon will use the asio driver for the d30 assuming you've installed it and enabled the d30 asio as a device in Roon (in settings-audio-devices). Applies the eq to the chain then outputs
 
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