Harman Curve Compliance

[TTT15]

Ok so had a look myself - Where I live the best sellers in HiFi dealers are Meze, Focal and Sennheiser. High street Apple and Sony. JBL are popular in the budget segment. So objectively based on the metric that matters the most it doesnt appear there is a particularly strict correlation between people’s headphone preferences and the harman curve? That seems to suggest that while people may indeed have a preference for the harman curve for the FR it is not the only or most important criteria for purchasing a headphone.

 

[FTB]

Welcome back! Since you are here, I think some of the replies to your OP are a bit too diminishing of the importance and applicability of the Harman Curve to us as individuals. The "64%" figure is too easily dismissed as meaning that over 1 in 3 don't prefer it in a broad and general sense. That is misleading.
[...]

Thanks for this clear feedback, it is a clear summary of the PDF given previously in this thread.

I just wondered how useful the harman curve actually is in helping to choose headphones and how. How do you know your preferences and to what extent do people’s actual headphone preferences correlate to the harman curve. If it was just the harman curve wouldn’t everyone prefer say the Dan Clark Stealth? For sure some do but it doesn’t seem to be the most popular. For sure based on the testing done there is a preference for the harman curve but to what extent does this translate to headphone preferences appears to be less clear. Maybe sales figures would be an indication.

Yes your are going in circles.

It's simple why people doesn't necessary prefer the Dan Clark Stealth : it's 4k $.
I'm sure I would like it but there is no way I can afford it and I'll may never listen to it.

 

[FTB]

Ok so had a look myself - Where I live the best sellers in HiFi dealers are Meze, Focal and Sennheiser. High street Apple and Sony. JBL are popular in the budget segment. So objectively based on the metric that matters the most it doesnt appear there is a particularly strict correlation between people’s headphone preferences and the harman curve? That seems to suggest that while people may indeed have a preference for the harman curve for the FR it is not the only or most important criteria for purchasing a headphone.

Why don't you trust people who made reliable research in audio and headphones measurements ?
Sean Olive is the Floyd Toole of headphones and he didn't find the Harman curve already made on his table...

 

[solderdude]

while people may indeed have a preference for the harman curve for the FR it is not the only or most important criteria for purchasing a headphone.

The most important factor is probably: fashion statement (looks), price, wanting to be seen with popular gear (Apple, Sony, JBL) and perhaps comfort for the majority of folks.
Must be wireless... they all hate wires.
Must look cool !

Then there is the smaller market that actually buys based on sound (EQ can do a lot), price and comfort.
A very small portion of those actually care about the headphone being 'Harman compliant' when used without EQ.

Remember it is ridiculously simple to make almost any headphone 'Harman compliant' with (free) EQ so.... Harman compliant headphones basically are only important for people not wanting to use EQ for some reason. Funny thing is that it is just these people that will EQ anyway.

Buy what looks nice, is well within the allocated budget, is comfortable, has the features you want and use it with EQ... either to taste or to what someone regards as a standard merely for the sake of 'knowing this must sound good' or 'I only need minimal EQ = better SQ'.

In other words ... a headphone does NOT have to be Harman compliant to sound good ... it just needs to be comfortable and have good sonic properties...

 

[FTB]

The most important factor is probably: fashion statement (looks), price, wanting to be seen with popular gear (Apple, Sony, JBL) and perhaps comfort for the majority of folks.
Must be wireless... they all hate wires.
Must look cool !

That's a bit cynical, no ? I don't think most people are that superficial to care about wanting to be seen with such product.

 

[wilhelm2015]

tbh i like a dip in 1.5-2khz better, like most hifimans and the HE-1

 

[CedarX]

Buy what looks nice, is well within the allocated budget, is comfortable, has the features you want and use it with EQ... either to taste or to what someone regards as a standard merely for the sake of 'knowing this must sound good' or 'I only need minimal EQ = better SQ'.

I would add the “EQ-friendly” criteria, usually boiling down to low-enough distortion.

 

[Keith_W]

That seems to suggest that while people may indeed have a preference for the harman curve for the FR it is not the only or most important criteria for purchasing a headphone.

Nobody ever said that it was. There are other considerations as well - price, brand, build quality, image, noise cancelling, connectivity, etc. Whether it sounds good is often of secondary consideration to most people. They just don't want it to sound bad.

 

[posvibes]

That's a bit cynical, no ? I don't think most people are that superficial to care about wanting to be seen with such product.

Then you have missed the point of the entire history and success of product marketing and advertising.

 

[solderdude]

I would add the “EQ-friendly” criteria, usually boiling down to low-enough distortion.

Well yes, you can't polish a turd .... or can you ?

That's a bit cynical, no ? I don't think most people are that superficial to care about wanting to be seen with such product.

ASR members and the general 'audio lovers' don't but the largest part of consumers are not those... they are kids sporting fashion statements (white sticks out of their ears, Apple Airpod max, Sony's etc. they don't even care if they are fakes).

None of my headphones are truly 'Harman compliant' and am among the ones preferring less bass and less 2-4kHz and actually care about what happens above 6kHz.
Will admit that I am somewhat close to Harman and when it is too far off I generally don't use it, even with EQ.

 

[TTT15]

Thanks for this clear feedback, it is a clear summary of the PDF given previously in this thread.



Yes your are going in circles.

It's simple why people doesn't necessary prefer the Dan Clark Stealth : it's 4k $.
I'm sure I would like it but there is no way I can afford it and I'll may never listen to it.

I’ve absolutely nothing against the harman curve, or measuring against it or purchasing based on it. To the contrary, anything that helps people enjoy music more and helps people with their purchase decision seems positive to me. But in all the issues facing the world I don’t see harman curve compliance high up there. I’m just asking questions because my job is asking questions and I like to understand better which ASR helps with.

The harman curve may also be my preference. I don’t know to be honest. I don’t have EQ available on my main set up at the moment. Previously I was just streaming off a Sonos Connect and I understand bits are bits but that just did not sound good for some reason. I’m currently just streaming Apple Music via USB from iPhone as that is what I have and that sounds fine to me. But I may get a streamer and roon in the future to get away from phone which would also give me EQ possibilities and I would try harman curve. I do have EQ on Mojo 2 though and just prefer neutral. Any thoughts on streamers transports and roon and EQ for a headphone and potentially a speaker set up appreciated.

I just got interested in the harman curve as the Stealth seems to be one flagship headphone that markets itself on compliance and dealer recommended that I try it. It is no doubt a good headphone and the frequency response seemed fine but it didn’t say buy me so I was curious about harman curve relevance. Then I see that manufacturers, retailers and consumers are not particularly hung up on harman curve compliance which suggests that it is not that relevant. If it was wouldn’t producers, retailers and consumers adhere more closely to it?

 

[TTT15]

Thanks for this clear feedback, it is a clear summary of the PDF given previously in this thread.



Yes your are going in circles.

It's simple why people doesn't necessary prefer the Dan Clark Stealth : it's 4k $.
I'm sure I would like it but there is no way I can afford it and I'll may never listen to it.

I was referring at each particular price point. The Stealth certainly has its proponents but dorsnt seem the most popular at that price point.

 

[TTT15]

Why don't you trust people who made reliable research in audio and headphones measurements ?
Sean Olive is the Floyd Toole of headphones and he didn't find the Harman curve already made on his table...

I did not say that at all. It isn’t a scientific study and they don’t claim it is but it is a worthy study and the best we seem to have. I just question the extent of it’s relevance given that it is not particularly correlated with producer, retailers and consumer decisions.

 

[TTT15]

The most important factor is probably: fashion statement (looks), price, wanting to be seen with popular gear (Apple, Sony, JBL) and perhaps comfort for the majority of folks.
Must be wireless... they all hate wires.
Must look cool !

Then there is the smaller market that actually buys based on sound (EQ can do a lot), price and comfort.
A very small portion of those actually care about the headphone being 'Harman compliant' when used without EQ.

Remember it is ridiculously simple to make almost any headphone 'Harman compliant' with (free) EQ so.... Harman compliant headphones basically are only important for people not wanting to use EQ for some reason. Funny thing is that it is just these people that will EQ anyway.

Buy what looks nice, is well within the allocated budget, is comfortable, has the features you want and use it with EQ... either to taste or to what someone regards as a standard merely for the sake of 'knowing this must sound good' or 'I only need minimal EQ = better SQ'.

In other words ... a headphone does NOT have to be Harman compliant to sound good ... it just needs to be comfortable and have good sonic properties...

Thanks that all seems to make good sense to me. My take away is that I shouldn’t get hung up on harman curve compliance when purchasing headphones as can EQ if I want, that I should try EQ and harman curve is a good place to start.

 

[TTT15]

Nobody ever said that it was. There are other considerations as well - price, brand, build quality, image, noise cancelling, connectivity, etc. Whether it sounds good is often of secondary consideration to most people. They just don't want it to sound bad.

Someone did actually say it was the most important for them and I see it used in headphone assessment but I fully agree with you.

 

[CedarX]

I just question the extent of it’s relevance given that it is not particularly correlated with producer, retailers and consumer decisions.

The Harman target maximizes users preference. As said above, there are many other things that make a HP sells well. But when it comes to sound preference, Harman is also what maximizes sales. So, guess why more brands are hovering around the Harman target?
An OEM may choose a very different curve, in effect targeting a different population, that’s also fine. But how do you know that this different curve correlates with the other buying criteria and ensure that the targeted population is not… zero?
Harman has given some clues about “the other populations”—the ones that don’t prefer the Harman target, but much additional work is still needed to characterize these clusters of population.
It’s perfectly fine to claim “I loathe Harman” because… it does not work for me. But how large is the group of people sharing your same preferences? How do you determine the size of that group and what they also like in a HP?
So for an OEM nailing all the others criteria at play in the sale of an HP model, when it comes to SQ, they either have good data (or big enough of an ego) to support doing something different than Harman, or they don’t really know and play it safe: Harman it is…

 

[Robbo99999]

I’m just trying to get to the bottom of the issue. Presumably manufacturers and retailers are in the business of selling headphones and consumers are in the business of buying headphones. The manufacturers and retailers presumably know how many of each product at each price point in each market segment they sell. Ultimately that is the measure that matters. Presumably at a certain price point people try what they are buying and the question is what headphones are people most willing to buy and to what extent does that correlate to the harman curve. The harman curve isn’t a secret to producers so presumably they know how relevant the harman curve is to their most important objective measure: Sales.

You give people too much credit in buying headphones that actually sound good. At higher price points people are probably basing it on looks, marketing, countless bogus reviews that don't use measurements as a backbone. That doesn't make the Harman work null and void, just you have to compare headphones in one listening session with the same varied material to know which you truly prefer and that was done during the Harman work as part of the process, and people at home generally don't do that because it's a lot of hassle, you have to have multiple headphones in front of you & you have to have the time & will to do it. I don't think you can go on pure sales volumes as an indicator of how good a headphone really is. Having said that with ASR gaining popularity in recent years & with people like Oratory & other areas of the internet that measure & review headphones properly then there is some consensus being built on what are good sounding headphones to most people & then that information probably gets out into the mainstream a bit in terms of sales when people are doing internet research on which headphone to buy. So you might find that for recent decently priced (not prohibitively expensive), I don't know say up to £200 you might find that sales figures are being influenced by recent trends in objectively measuring headphones for good sound (ASR, etc) - so I think I'd probably take example of HD560s as the headphone in my mind that has probably benefitted the most by this in terms of sales. I mean I don't know this because I don't have the data, but I think there's a logic to it. I would say the HD560s is an extremely good seller, and yet it's also a good sounding headphone as backed up by measurements. So I think there probably has been some recent trends for moderately priced headphones up to £200 I'd estimate where objectively determined good sounding (close to Harman curve or balanced around it) could have become more popular in recent years and may be a correlation with increased sales. I don't think it affects sales of very expensive headphones though, as people just buy them for "stupid" reasons mostly, however I must say companies like DCA that follow the science on it re Harman or close to similar are very expensive but I'd imagine also very good so it's not "stupid" to buy one of those.

EDIT: and sales volume will also not be an indicator of good sound for low priced products, because it's not an important product to them and they're making quick off the cuff decisions, probably just basing it on the price alone, and looks, & general easy to understand features, and perhaps Amazon customer review stars.

EDIT #2: did some quick research on Amazon just by using search word "headphones" and listing for "bestseller", the HD560s I talked about is listed on page 11 of 20 (see following pic) and by going through earlier pages it's the most expensive product up until that point with the exception of Apple Airpods, some specific noise cancelling headphones, a few bone conduction headphones & well marketed gamer headphones - so to me it looks like a lot of people are buying the HD560s even though it's relatively expensive (for the regular person just happening to buy a headphone) and isn't really an obviously marketed product, so this leads me to believe a lot of people buying this are people doing proper research & finding sites like ASR, Oratory, headphones.com where they measure too - so in this moderate price bracket I think good objectively measured sound through sites like ASR, etc are having an impact.

Note: it's normally more expensively priced than £99

 

[TTT15]

For sure people as I myself have argued don’t just buy on sound quality. But if you go to a HiFi show, a HiFi dealer or an electronics dealer people are trying headphones on and listening to them. They will ask, read and watch around what sounds good so sound quality does matter to some extent.

The Harman curve isn’t patented yet still producers, retailers and consumers don’t strictly adhere to it and I doubt that they are deliberately restricting sales so it seems it’s not that important especially when you can EQ it anyway.

The Stealth has limited popularity in its price range despite its harman curve focus so it seems that producers, retailers and consumers may be focusing on something else other than just harman curve compliance when it comes to sound preferences. So if it isn’t just the harman curve why do people prefer the sound of other headphones which are less harman curve compliant? Otherwise if sound quality was just harman curve then wouldn’t there be greater convergence among producers, retailers and consumers just on the harman curve. If that was it why would you do anything else?

 

[Robbo99999]

For sure people as I myself have argued don’t just buy on sound quality. But if you go to a HiFi show, a HiFi dealer or an electronics dealer people are trying headphones on and listening to them. They will ask, read and watch around what sounds good so sound quality does matter to some extent.

The Harman curve isn’t patented yet still producers, retailers and consumers don’t strictly adhere to it and I doubt that they are deliberately restricting sales so it seems it’s not that important especially when you can EQ it anyway.

The Stealth has limited popularity in its price range despite its harman curve focus so it seems that producers, retailers and consumers may be focusing on something else other than just harman curve compliance when it comes to sound preferences. So if it isn’t just the harman curve why do people prefer the sound of other headphones which are less harman curve compliant? Otherwise if sound quality was just harman curve then wouldn’t there be greater convergence among producers, retailers and consumers just on the harman curve. If that was it why would you do anything else?

You're starting to just say words & going round in circles without really reading what people are replying to you.

 

[FTB]

Then you have missed the point of the entire history and success of product marketing and advertising.

The thing is I don't care about marketing and advertising, that's low considerations.

I did not say that at all. It isn’t a scientific study and they don’t claim it is but it is a worthy study and the best we seem to have. I just question the extent of it’s relevance given that it is not particularly correlated with producer, retailers and consumer decisions.

The Harman curve IS a scientific study. They determined objectively a preference subjective curve. Check again the PDF quoted before or take a look at the X account of Sean Olive. You will see the data and scientific methods.