GM3
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- Nov 26, 2022
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Own the Senn 599, super light, comfortable, decent sound, etc. The 560s do sound interesting, but I'd be really surprised if indeed they sounded better than the Hifiman Edition XS, Ollo S5X, etc., But yeah, I mean, my uneducated, biased, etc., opinion, not fact based (haven't heard them). The only 6XX line I've heard was the 650, and disappointment would be putting it lightly... I liked the Senn Orpheus though, just tiny bit above budget...That's a really good question, but my advice everytime now is HD560s with EQ. To me it's the most reliable headphone that I keep coming back to, it's reliable in so many ways - unit to unit variation, bass response when seal is broken, you can set the headband in notches so you're always wearing it the same way, plenty of room for your ears (& comfortable & light), the stock frequency response is good before even doing EQ, the distortion is low, the channel matching is good, the imaging & soundstage are good, it's only £139 here in the UK at the moment, etc! The bass is really impressive in the HD560s for an open backed dynamic headphone, really very good and also when EQ'd, lots of detail & definition in the bass which is one of the reasons why it's my most often favourite vs my other open backs.
In my experience, cheaper products; (ex; senn 599) where they don't sound wrong per se, seem to miss that 'natural sound' or 'refinement' (don't want to get into audiophile jargon); they sound ok; but not as life-like as they should; missing critical detail/information. Like a blurry image vs sharp image, or 640x480 image vs 1024x768 resolution. Not offensively bad in any stretch; but missing probably low distortion/transients/I don't know what. And they just sound kinda bland and boring listening to because they're missing that detail / transparency.. (sorry lol) Something not be super easily noticed just by measurements. (hard to directly correlate measurements to real sound)
But case in point for forming opinion by looking at measurements vs listening... From someone owning both 560 & S5X... There's a clear disconnect between recommendation based on measurements, vs owning and listening to both owned products...
I have done so already, also listened to the S5X at loud levels and plays fine. I have no explanation for the distortion and cannot re-create it here either nor measure it.
I can tell you that it does not sound better than HD800 but it is a lot better than K702, NAD VISO and even dare to say better than my HD560S, even at higher SPL.
The HD660S2 is slightly better in some aspects (but not bass extension) but both HD660S2 and HD800 are more expensive but lack the clarity and bass extension of the S5X.
I find the explanation from Rok a bit 'weird' too b.t.w.
Maybe it is because the video was done a bit 'on the fly' too much.