Sennheiser HD569 Headphone Review

[solderdude]

 

[Steve Dallas]

That's useful to know your conclusions on that - so the product came new like that then. It's possible the wrinkles are still responsible for the inconsistencies Amir saw between channels though. I haven't really seen such wrinkles in Sennheiser headphones before, but they don't normally use memory foam I don't think. Actually, that's an idea, are those for sure the stock pads that came with the headphone, they're not aftermarket pads are they?

They are the stock pads. I purchased the headphones about 3 months before sending to Amir, and he had them about 6 months, so the cans are currently about 9 months old.

I can push the wrinkles around with my fingers as if the fabric is not taut enough, but I don't know how it could be any tighter over memory foam. You can see the same behavior on the headband padding.

I can't say I have ever noticed any issues with them in use. I listened to them most of the day yesterday and did not hear any channel imbalance or other problem. They sound exactly like I remember: good bass impact, but dull overall. I have EQ APO on my work laptop and use it to improve them.

 

[Robbo99999]

Good, well it sounds like the pads are not at fault then, at least not beyond their design purpose.

 

[Blake]

I can't say I like these headphones much, but I plan to keep them indefinitely because they turned out to illustrate an audio concept for me that I hadn't really understood before: soundstage (or headstage if you prefer)... and not because they have a lot.

Two of the closed back headphones I own are the HD 569 and DCA Aeon RT (my daily drivers). I use EQ, and I got curious how close I could get them sounding with Oratory's EQ applied to each. Keeping in mind the rather large cost difference between them, the result was fascinating in a way I hadn't expected. In terms of tonality, I think I got them reasonably similar. (Disclaimer: There's plenty of room for human error on my part, unit variability, unreliability of high frequency measurements, etc., and this was far from a controlled test, so feel free to take this observation with a grain of salt.)

That said... when I went from the Aeon RT to the HD 569 with an orchestral track I was listening to, I thought the latter were defective, or had become so since I last used them. There was a clear channel imbalance, or so I thought. I started trying other tracks and noticed the imbalance shifted to the opposite side or disappeared depending on the track. I then went back to the original track I started with using the Aeon RT, and I realized that what I was hearing as a channel imbalance was actually just louder instruments in one side of the stereo mix. In the Aeon RT, that's what it sounds like, but in the HD 569, it just sounds like a louder transducer (at least to me).

So why the difference? I assume that differences in ear cup shape and seal could be factor, as could any remaining differences in frequency response after EQ was applied. Either way, I now have some understanding of what people mean by "soundstage" in headphones. And that's why I plan to keep them. Well, that and the fact that I have a set of headphones I'm always willing to let family members borrow.

 

[ehabheikal]

Amazing distortion for a can of this price.

 

[taisho]

The copy I tested did not have this much channel imbalance and showed similarish response up to 1kHz as the measured left channel. This was 4 years ago though.
The biggest differences are in the 2-6kHz range where unexpectedly 5kHz is reported at a much higher level.

.

I returned these headphones a couple of months ago. I tried Oratory's EQ - it both improved and broke the sound in some aspects. Then I tried out each individual EQ filter on a few songs and it came out that I discarded all the filters above 2kHz. Then the improvement was really there.

Still far from perfect, especially female vocals. The cups compress a lot from the very start - as a result, my ears touched the rough material inside. There was also this feeling of "sound from inside your head". I couldn't even focus on the content. So obnoxious when watching YouTube videos. Compared not only to the speakers but also to the closed DT770 that after this discovery no longer had an "intimate" feel, rather "not so much inside your head".

However, these headphones were quite important to me, as they made it clear that I need good open headphones and now I'm perfectly happy with the Sennheiser 660s.