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Do you know of any closed over-ear headphones that have a completely flat frequency response curve?

fountain

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I am trying to make a new purchase of headphones and I am looking for the purest sound possible, I would like them to be closed-back because I would like to use them both outdoors and indoors and I already have some open ones that fulfill their function for when I am at home
 
I am searching for the most detail as possible too.
 
I don't think such a thing as a transducer with completely flat frequency response exists. Furthermore, it appears that, in order to have the requisite level of detail and extension into the frequency extremes, the frequency response of a headphone has to be something other than "completely flat". Amir pointed to the AKG K371 as having the correct response - to subjectively have "flat" response. I own a pair, use them frequently and do not have that impression. Though I can hear the thickness of the lower midrange/upper bass of the Drop 6XX headphones, they still strike me as more linear overall than the AKG 'phones. I can recommend those, although it appears you're already covered in that department. There's a "cuppiness", a closed-in quality to all the closed over-ear headphones I've owned, and I think it's built into the formula. Your chances of having a linear response with outdoor headphones is greater with IEMs - inner ear monitors or earbuds. They don't have that cupped sound and can have a lot of detail and deep bass. They are also the best at reducing ambient noise.
 
If you want the purest sound possible, a completely flat frequency response isn't what you want, it's a Harman in-room linear frequency response. This is their approximation of what a flat speaker+room frequency response sounds like in a headphone. I don't know of any headphone designed to adhere to this, but you can EQ an AKG K371 to this target. I bet you won't prefer it, though.

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Regarding detail, every full range headphone that isn't broken is going to allow you to hear all the same details. The main component to the perception of a headphone being more detailed seems to be the relative frequency response around 2 KHz, so you'll want to make sure that region isn't recessed.
 
I can't answer your question but flat response is not generally desirable in headphones and the Harmon curve sounds more natural/neutral to most listeners, but preferences do vary. What is the Harmon Curve?

If you don't get an answer here, maybe just Google. ;)

Also high frequencies can vary depending on how they interact with the ear, and low frequencies can vary depending on fit & seal.

The Harmon curve includes a bump-up in the bass and the AKG K371 has a slightly bigger bump.

I am searching for the most detail as possible too.
"Detail" isn't a defined term but Dan Clark (headphone manufacturer) says that headphones with distortion (in the mid-range, I think) are often described as "detailed".
 
thanks guys for all the info, I'm going to check K371 and all abot Harman curve :)
 
I'm just checking K371 and seems that are exactly the ones I was looking for, thanks a lot!
 
Denon AH-D5200 but in hause only and on loud only level. Good part is seal and surce impedance not dependent.
 
Each of us has a different "hearing profile". Usually caused by abusing your ears, or just getting older.

All the online reviewers and contributors have different ears, so we have to take their recommendations as a starting point in our search for the best match for us.

So my best advice is to avoid "flat response" or even Harman Curve comments, and just try as many headphones as possible to find your ideal within your budget.

I have a collection of under $1,500 phones and IEMs, and each one sounds different. I prefer not to depend on EQ to sort out unsatisfactory sound profiles.
 
The Hyperx cloud orbit is made with Audeze planar magnetic drivers and the onboard flat equipment profile really sounds that way. Closed back and the mic detaches. On eBay you can steal a pair on a good day. Also the Autoeq database has settings to flatten out existing headphones.
 
What FR contour sounds balanced to your ears depends on many things including listening gain/volume and will pretty much never look like a FR graph from a truly flat FR AMP/DAC.

I suggest the smartest thing is to get a cheap, comfy closed set of iems, or HP with low distortion, find a volume you like and EQ it until it sounds flat (equal volume) to you with a pure tone testing website. Then you'll see that flat/equal loudness to you has nothing to do with a flat line on an FR graph, and you'll know how to shape your own EQ and the objective FR graphs will actually be meaningful to you for buying decisions.

Doing that is vastly cheaper than cycling through thousands of dollars searching for a non-existent perfect set. As has been said, if you think you need more "detail" try adding bits of EQ in the mids and highs to achieve that effect before you decide a set doesn't do details well, because that's mostly just FR and possibly, maybe impulse decay rate (which should be a non-factor for virtually all headphones nowadays).

If EQ-ing, just don't forget to lower the pre-amp gain by at least your maximum individual band gain increase, or only EQ by lowering the band gains, otherwise you can and will introduce intersample overloading that will cause output clipping somewhere in your audio chain, which sounds like the driver tearing itself apart with distortion. It's not being damaged, and it and your DAC/Amp are actually being protected by the clipping, but it sounds scary and like you are ruining stuff, but no, just how the protection clipping sounds. If doing what I suggest, you lose a bit of your maximum volume, which is generally fine, but can be a no-go for inefficient sets connected to less powerful amps. The above is the key to digital EQ, and failing to address that is why so many people think EQ is bad. They are wrong, and just don't know how to EQ properly to avoid that one simple pitfall of EQ in the digital domain. I never ran into that with EQ in the analog domain, myself.

Cheers!
 
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