Sennheiser HD600 Review (Headphone)

[bobbooo]

Vested interest? Seem just like valid criticism to me. So you cant take criticism. You ban people when they disagree.

https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...sr-slow-or-times-out.23178/page-3#post-776520

My first post. I have been reading this forum for a while but had to join up when I saw this review.
I agree. This review is so far from my experience having owned both these headphones that it makes me question the accuracy of other reviews. As many have said the 650 is warmer and bassier than the 600. The difference is obvious. How Amir cant tell the difference amazes me. Also where is this bass boost coming from the reference line? No headphones do this

Agree except for the last line - the bass 'boost' comes from Harman's Dr. Sean Olive et al's research which showed that target reference line is the frequency response most preferred by the majority of listeners in double-blind listening tests for which possible cognitive biases have been eliminated. Due to this I would go as far as to say bass 'boost' is a misleading misnomer, because the target actually represents what most people hear as the correct amount of bass for them (and the same goes for the rest of the frequency range), with nothing either boosted or lacking subjectively. A visually flat bass extension on the frequency response graph will not be perceived as 'flat' (correct/neutral) for the majority of listeners in blind tests; they will in fact perceive this as a lack of bass. It's true that a lot of headphones don't follow the Harman target in the bass (often lacking). In some cases this may be by design (possibly due to the very misunderstanding of 'flat' bass I just mentioned), or simply because it's difficult to achieve engineering-wise (probably moreso for open-backs). But there are some headphones that do follow the target in the bass, notably for example (Harman's) AKG K371.

 

[amirm]

Your test result not representative of the headphones. Proven by much data shown by others in this thread. Proven by my own experience. Proven by all the listening buy others on the internet. I am not ranting. Your test misleading to readers and unfair to Sennheiser.

Proven by your experience? But not mine? Proven by all buyers on the Internet too? You have such broad understanding of the market.

As for Sennheiser, this is what I said in my review: "As with HD650, I was yet again impressed by how good this headphone sounds. Equalization made an improvement but the headphone was very listenable without it. "

So no, I don't think they will be upset about this review. Fend for yourself with something other than you know better. You don't. You don't have a single piece of data I used to write this review.

 

[ultralite2021]

Proven by your experience? But not mine? Proven by all buyers on the Internet too? You have such broad understanding of the market.

As for Sennheiser, this is what I said in my review: "As with HD650, I was yet again impressed by how good this headphone sounds. Equalization made an improvement but the headphone was very listenable without it. "

So no, I don't think they will be upset about this review. Fend for yourself with something other than you know better. You don't. You don't have a single piece of data I used to write this review.

I read all the information reviews and tests on internet about these headphones. Much data. Yours is not representative. No one thinks they sound the same.

You said

Conclusions
I don't know what is supposed to be different between HD600 and HD650. Based on both objective and subjective testing, these two headphones perform the same.

This is not true. It mislead readers. Sennheiser wont like it.

 

[imagidominc]

Sennheiser wont like it.

You dare speak for the mighty Sennheiser?

 

[the_brunx]

Sennheiser probably don’t care. They just sold their consumer branch. The new owner wants to concentrate on Bluetooth. I won’t be surprised if all these audiophile headphones get dropped from production soon.

 

[Robbo99999]

My first post. I have been reading this forum for a while but had to join up when I saw this review.
I agree. This review is so far from my experience having owned both these headphones that it makes me question the accuracy of other reviews. As many have said the 650 is warmer and bassier than the 600. The difference is obvious. How Amir cant tell the difference amazes me. Also where is this bass boost coming from the reference line? No headphones do this

It's been said before, but Amir's particular HD600 he measured didn't differ that much (not as much as other measurments out there) from his HD650, so it's not surprising he found they sounded the same given the relatively long time between switching headphones over when comparing them. And like it's been said before, that doesn't mean there aren't differences between HD600 & HD650, I assess that there are based on measurements out there and fact that the driver part number is different between HD600 & HD650. Pad wear is the main theory for Amir's HD600 not differing much from his HD650. It's not controversial, you just gotta get it into perspective.

 

[xarkkon]

It's a long thread, If you followed it from the start you would know that no one criticized Amirs subjective evaluation. The only point of disagreement was the conlusion that all HD600 and HD650 sound alike. Let's not invent arguments based on things that didn't take place.

Hello, you might want to check that again.

Don't become too married to your listening conclusions Amir, they're only subjective after all and the measurements are telling a different story

Sorry, @WickedInsignia , not trying to pick on you. Just wanting to show the prior arguments in the thread that I'm responding to.

 

[Limopard]

I say just get the cheapest HD6series you can find and EQ it.

At least for me, the cheapest works well without EQ, but still benefits a bit from slight corrections. So does the 650. The 660 benefits greatly from a reduction around 5.5 k, 3 db suffice for me (ymmv). Still it's not worth additional 100 - 120 €.
Availability is another point. You can get the 660s nearly anywhere, (Amazon, Thomann, Sennheiser shop), the 650 aren't that hard to get either but the 600 are sold out in many places including Sennheiser. I was lucky to get a b-stock item (you can only tell it by the packaging) for 280 €.

 

[bracko]

a poor source/amp won't let you hear what 650 is capable of, while a decent DAC/amp combination will, so I think you just don't agree with the wording.

How poor combination of DAC/amp are we talking about? If you connect a HD650 to a malfunctioning equipment it will of course sound bad.

I have had my HD650 since 2006. I have used it with all kinds of sources, CD-players, DACs, cassette players, turntables etc. I have used it with solid state amps, tube amps, hybrids, simple headphone outputs on Marantz SA-KI Pearl Lite or Denon DRM-800. No matter what, HD650 always sound like HD650. They are very easy to drive and sound excellent.

 

[jhaider]

a poor source/amp won't let you hear what 650 is capable of, while a decent DAC/amp combination will, so I think you just don't agree with the wording.

I’m pretty sure we’re in disagreement here, but before simply calling “bullshit” as one often needs to do when presented with cult mythology asserted as fact, some clarifying questions.

1) what is a “poor source”?
2) what is a “poor amp”?

I can fire up Tidal on a browser and plug my HD650 into whatever electronics Thinkpad deigned to put inside their business laptops - and stil get better sound than from most headphones. There are loudness limits, and obviously you don’t have crossfeed or PEQ. But given the choice between HD580 or HD650 on a bad laptop and, e.g., Grados on a trillion dollar amp, I'd pick the former every time.

Is this any better? To wit:
I find it ridiculous that Sennheiser’s engineers produced the great sounding HD600 and HD650, but then developed the horrible sounding HD800, which is so bad that purchasers have resorted to “homebrew” adapters and modifications to make them listenable.

I see your point - your point was my gut reaction to Amir's HD800S review, tbh. However, as I thought about it, it dawned on me that headphones are generally filterless single driver speakers - and the one common thing all such devices have is, in some key aspect, they suck. What's special about the HD580/600/650 family of headphones is their tonal balance is surprisingly good for an unfiltered single driver, even if they're not necessarily class leaders in other aspects of reproduction. HD800(S) doesn't have that. However, that's also the one thing that's easy to correct if you have a processor and enough headroom in amp and drive-unit. What HD800 (and presumably -S) does offer is a spatial scale and depth that HD580/600/650 do not. With tonal balance corrected - well, I enjoy them at least. I guess you could argue (and I wouldn't disagree) that at the price for HD800 Sennheiser should've equipped it with active equalization and amplification out of the box. The sad reality of hidebound audiophiles addled by hype and moronic word salad jargon such as "scaling" is that such a headphone would never have sold.

 

[ultralite2021]

It's been said before, but Amir's particular HD600 he measured didn't differ that much (not as much as other measurments out there) from his HD650, so it's not surprising he found they sounded the same given the relatively long time between switching headphones over when comparing them. And like it's been said before, that doesn't mean there aren't differences between HD600 & HD650, I assess that there are based on measurements out there and fact that the driver part number is different between HD600 & HD650. Pad wear is the main theory for Amir's HD600 not differing much from his HD650. It's not controversial, you just gotta get it into perspective.

Hi. That not the issue. His test may be what he found but its not representative of the product. So many other tests show this, so many peoplke hear this.
Amir wont change his misleading conclusion even when all evidence tells it is wrong. Much arrogance.

 

[Robbo99999]

Hi. That not the issue. His test may be what he found but its not representative of the product. So many other tests show this, so many peoplke hear this.
Amir wont change his misleading conclusion even when all evidence tells it is wrong. Much arrogance.

It doesn't matter, there's still value in the measurements (also not just the frequency response measurements) and review when viewed that it's done with older pads, most people already know from measurements out there that new pads on both will mean some small wide noticeable differences between the HD600 & HD650. It doesn't matter, it's interesting to see that as they age there's not much difference between HD600 & HD650 unless you change your pads when they get worn. I think people were right to point out the differences between HD600 & HD650, so if visitors read the review & some of the thread they'll be able to see. But we should put these discussions into perspective, it's not a big hoohaa.

 

[xarkkon]

Hi. That not the issue. His test may be what he found but its not representative of the product. So many other tests show this, so many peoplke hear this.
Amir wont change his misleading conclusion even when all evidence tells it is wrong. Much arrogance.

So..... are you saying that (1) his test was conducted wrongly resulting in a wrong measurement, or (2) his sample was problematic resulting in a non-representative measurement?

If it's (1), no one has any evidence that that is the case. Given his track record across a multitude of products without anyone being able to dispute his methodology, it would be difficult to assume that this is the case. It would be incumbent on any one accusing him of wrong testing methodology to prove it as such. This can only be proved with the exact same sample that he used.

If it's (2), it's not the reviewer's job to ensure that his sample is "representative", plain and simple. He can only give us the measurements that he gets out of that sample.

 

[antdroid]

I think Amir's conclusions are correct based on his sample(s). Pad wear is definitely going to change the FR and make subtle to drastic sound changes over time as the foam wears down. You'll get possibly different dampening plus driver to ear depth, which both can affect sound.

I think people skip to the conclusions and miss the fine details. I am guilty of this from time to time. The problem here is his conclusions don't normally summarize the stuff in the main body of the content, and therefore people just see "HD600 sounds the same as HD650" and go up in arms. That's why earlier in this thread, I recommended re-stating the limitations in the conclusion. This is pretty standard practice for scientific papers, and general completeness.

 

[ultralite2021]

So..... are you saying that (1) his test was conducted wrongly resulting in a wrong measurement, or (2) his sample was problematic resulting in a non-representative measurement?

If it's (1), no one has any evidence that that is the case. Given his track record across a multitude of products without anyone being able to dispute his methodology, it would be difficult to assume that this is the case. It would be incumbent on any one accusing him of wrong testing methodology to prove it as such. This can only be proved with the exact same sample that he used.

If it's (2), it's not the reviewer's job to ensure that his sample is "representative", plain and simple. He can only give us the measurements that he gets out of that sample.

I do not know if he conducted test correctly. He has done other tests badly. It does not tally with the much data found elsewhere, some shown by others in this thread. So there is plenty of evidence. I have never seen anyone else say they sound the same in any reviews. My own experience is same as many others in this thread. 650 is bassier.

It is the job of the reviewer to check what he is saying is correct. People may read and think they are the same. All other evidence says otherwise.
It OK for him to say his test showed them to be the same but add this is not consistent with other data from elsewhere. Otherwise Amir misleads people.

From this I wonder how many other tests are the same problem. I cannot trust his tests.

 

[Limopard]

I think Amir's conclusions are correct based on his sample(s). Pad wear is definitely going to change the FR and make subtle to drastic sound changes over time as the foam wears down. You'll get possibly different dampening plus driver to ear depth, which both can affect sound.

I think people skip to the conclusions and miss the fine details. I am guilty of this from time to time. The problem here is his conclusions don't normally summarize the stuff in the main body of the content, and therefore people just see "HD600 sounds the same as HD650" and go up in arms. That's why earlier in this thread, I recommended re-stating the limitations in the conclusion. This is pretty standard practice for scientific papers, and general completeness.

I think you got it, but I still don't get why this leads to such a fight. It's just headphones. Headphones I like. According to my impression there is a difference between my (new) 600 and my (ca. 2011, new pads, 600 grilles) 650. I can't prove it since I neither have a measurement rig nor a possibility to perform a decent a/b comparision. It seems possible to me, that the difference between two HD 600 may be bigger than between a 600 and. a 650.

 

[Grotti]

I do not know if he conducted test correctly. He has done other tests badly. It does not tally with the much data found elsewhere, some shown by others in this thread. So there is plenty of evidence. I have never seen anyone else say they sound the same in any reviews. My own experience is same as many others in this thread. 650 is bassier.

It is the job of the reviewer to check what he is saying is correct. People may read and think they are the same. All other evidence says otherwise.
It OK for him to say his test showed them to be the same but add this is not consistent with other data from elsewhere. Otherwise Amir misleads people.

From this I wonder how many other tests are the same problem. I cannot trust his tests.

So I really don't understand why you are here? If you doubt Amirs tests (without showing any evidence of course) it all comes down to the conclusion, that you are in the wrong place. And please mind: this is not meant offensive at all.

 

[imagidominc]

Guys, it’s just a damn headphone.

Chill.

 

[raif71]

Sennheiser probably don’t care. They just sold thier consumer branch. The new owner wants to concentrate on Bluetooth. I won’t be surprised if all these audiophile headphones get dropped from production soon.

, all my 6 series are 2nd hand except for 660s. I'd better get another 600 before they are dropped

 

[ultralite2021]

So I really don't understand why you are here? If you doubt Amirs tests (without showing any evidence of course) it all comes down to the conclusion, that you are in the wrong place. And please mind: this is not meant offensive at all.

I am here because I want proper information about hifi. This is not proper information. Its misleading. Amir presents this site as difinative and scientific. It is not if he ignores and bans peopl;e who show what he has said is wrong.