Sony MDR-7506 Review (Headphone)

[YSC]

I don't know about any rating from Harmen research, but by comparing these headphone's FR to the Amir's target curve one can predict it will be perceived as harsh due to the massive boost right smack dab in the presence region. That is ice pick to the ear category there. So this looks like more evidence that Amir's target curve works.

but I think when Amirm EQed the FR to the target it just sounded so in the head or so, maybe there's more thing to the FR than it seems

 

[pavuol]

As we are not here for criticism only, these seem to be the lightest tested so far:

Sony MDR-7506 - 230 / 298 (grams without/with cord)
Sennheiser HD-650 - 269 / 346
Sennheiser HD 800 S - 330 (without cord)
Hifiman HE400i - 370 (without c. [?])
Focal Clear - 450 (without c. [?])
HEDDphone - 718 (without c. [?])

(question mark when it is not explicitly mentionted but I believe manufacturers tend to go for lower value for detachable cord models..)

 

[StevenEleven]

I have a ton of experience with the V6s. They have a Wikipedia entry! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_MDR-V6

When I got my first pair of MDR-V6s as a youngster in the mid-1980s, hi-fi headphones seemed like a bit of a novelty, and the V6s were a minor miracle. When I tried them for the first time I was just totally blown away. My step-father had a pair of gigantic Stantons and I asked him to try the Sonys out and he tried them on and he said “these are better” and just kept listening.

The 7506s are a later offshoot of the original V6s designed for “pro” use, if I remember correctly.

So my take on these is that they were near-miraculous for when they came out and at the price they were sold ($60-$100 if I remember right).

I still have two pair of quite old V6s. On one I use the Beyer DT-250 velour replacement pads. Those are sooo much more comfortable. The stock V6 pads get way more comfortable over the course of several months of regular use.

Nowadays, most headphones are worse, IMHO, but in this age of so much headphone listening, it’s very likely an individual can find something they like better. Just sitting here thinking, I can think of eight pairs of headphones over the last 35 years or so that I liked better, but many more that I did not like as much.

 

[milosz]

Finding excess treble objectionable or even painful is a fairly common hearing issue. Some people have greater sensitivity to peaky highs than others. In extreme cases this is a hearing disorder known as hyperacusis. In milder cases it results in people being unable to listen to Sennheiser HD800's for any length of time. see https://www.webmd.com/brain/sound-sensitivity-hyperacusis#1 or https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC539655/

 

[preload]

Please keep in mind that the Harman paper that reported very high pref ratings for the 7506 response curve didnt actually test the 7506 directly. Instead they took measurements of the 7506 and then eq'd an AKG test headphone so that it mostly matched the 7506 curve.

I can confirm that the actual 7506 sounds just as terrible as Amir describes.

 

[Francis Vaughan]

I just pulled out my old pair (well over 20 years old) again. I must say I didn’t remember them being quite so B grade as they sound now. Very coloured. Not something I would want to recommend to anyone. It perhaps confirms why I never used them that much.

 

[earlevel]

I had the MDR-V6 many years ago. I either lost them or they just wore out, not sure, but replaced them with MDR-7506. As I recall, they were very close to being the same thing. These were, still are, popular headphones for home studios. I replaced them a few years ago with MDR-7520 for the same purpose (primarily monitoring while recording vocals). I wanted something functionally similar but less overpoweringly bright—the MDR-7520 is less peaky in the mid/highs and more extended bass, full circumaural. They were a big improvement for me in hearing my vocal sound, but considering they are more than three times as much, it's easy to see why people who need several pair would opt for the 7506—while not perfect, they get the job done as a studio headphone while being somewhat flattering at it. No one is likely to complain about them.

They are so notorious for the purpose that you can even see Andrea Bocelli sporting a pair in his home, as is Ed Sheeran, while recording with a $7k Italian microphone

 

[compucat]

The first 'real' headphone for me as well. It is now my yard work headphone and is fine for working outside, sometimes with power equipment, sometimes without. I replaced the cord with a mini-xlr connector, I use an old phone with FLACs with either a USB Dongle (DTC 100 or HIDIZS) or a portable amp (BTR3 or BTR5), whatever I happen to grab each time. The sound is find for that type of listening, I used them today while shoveling the driveway.

Since then I have a Sennheiser Linear 250, 2 Sennheiser HD 540 Reference, a AKG K240 Sextett MP and today my xmas present to myself, Aeon 2 Closed, shipped.

Curious, any specific details on how you installed the mini-XLR? I'm about to perform that mod myself; the dimensions look like they just *barely* fit if you get rid of the washer/nut on the connector (Neutrik/Switchcraft) and instead just tap threads into the chassis.

 

[Robbo99999]

This is a review and measurements of the Sony MDR-7506. I purchased this headphone last year due to reputation of getting some of the highest scores relative to Harman preference curve. It costs US $89 on Amazon including Prime shipping.

I like the look and feel of the MDR-7506:

View attachment 103798

The headphone itself is very light and compact. Alas the coiled cord is rather heavy and has a habit of falling to the floor because of it.

While this headphone is new to me, its original -- the MDR-V6 is not. When I was visiting the major music labels back in early 2000s, the MDR-V6 was one of the top three or so respected headphones (Sennheiser and Stax being the other two). So I purchased a V6 but hardly used it and unfortunately have little memory of it. I thin I gave it to one of my sons years ago.

I was surprised how uncomfortable the MDR-7506 is. It would pinch the outer areas of my ears to a point where I could not wear then for more than a few minutes. I realized then that taking my glasses off helped but I still could not tolerate them for than 15 to 20 minutes. There is a lot of headband pressure and due to the small cups, it lands on the other part of ear. Strangely, I don't remember this about the MDR-V6? Is it possible my ears have grown in ensuing years and no longer fit inside these cups? The thought is too scary to consider!

Sony MDR-7506 Measurements
Let's get right into it with the MDR-7506 frequency response and comparison to our target preference:
View attachment 103799

As you can see, there is good bit of variation between the two cups. Being a small headphone, I had a lot more trouble getting consistent fit between the two channels. Still, I think the results are pretty correct as they correlate quite well with other measurements. The one area of deviation is that peak around 11 kHz. Other measurements including that of Harman's show that shooting way up. The older couplers tended to exaggerate the response in that region which my new GRAS 45C coupler avoid. Still, hard to know what the truth is there.

Back to the measurements and just looking at the green calibrated channel, we see excellent agreement with our target curve (dashed blue) from about 100 Hz to 2 kHz. Past that we overshoot the curve and stay above up to 8 kHz or so. This naturally will make the headphone sound bright and potentially with wider soundstage.

Bass department has the usual droop but much less than some others.

Overall one can see how this headphone that can higher agreement with Harman preference curve than many other. You can see this clearly in the deviation from our target:

View attachment 103800

Notice the broad area at or around 0 dB deviation.

So far there was good news. What wasn't good news is what followed, namely distortion measurements:

View attachment 103801

Oh wow! This headphone has more distortion at 94 dB than many do at 114 dB in bass! We are also usually spoiled by headphones having very little distortion above 1 kHz or so. Not here. We have distortion where our hearing is sensitive as well. Distortion in bass was so high that it overshot the graph so I changes scales:

View attachment 103802

Nearly 20% distortion at around 55 Hz at 114 dB. Here is another view of the 94 dBSPL and its breakdown:

View attachment 103803

This will be a good test of how important distortion is relative to frequency response -- a battle we constantly have here and in context of speakers.

Group delay is rather calm as this graph goes:

View attachment 103804

We don't see the large spikes in high frequencies. Maybe smaller cups create less of these against the body of the measurement fixture?

Impedance is variable so take care in using any amplifier that has high impedance:


View attachment 103805

Sensitivity is very good so you don't need much power to drive them.

Sony MDR-7506 Listening Tests
I remember being quite disappointed when I listened to the MDR-7506 last year when I purchased it. I neither liked the sound, nor the comfort. It quickly sat on my desk collecting dust. With much more careful testing now I can tell why. You all know that I am a fan of sub-bass performance and evaluating such at higher levels. Not so here. I initially boosted the sub-bass and it became ugly. It became boomy (harmonics travel to upper bass and cause that) with the notes not being clean and sharp at all.

Then there were the highs. Oh man these are ugly highs. Sharp and uncomfortable. Yes, the mid-range tonality was good but I just could not focus on it. Every bass note sounded ugly, and every high note was a punch in the face. Overall there was this poor quality and grittiness I could not get past.

Took out the EQ tool and made some improvements:

View attachment 103806

As I said, I boosted the lows but immediately took that out and focused on the peaking between 2 and 8 kHz. That resulted in the two filters that you see. That provided good relief from the sharp highs but I still did not like the sound. Per above, it just didn't sound clean to me. Remembering a trick from my speaker optimizations, I actually filtered out some of the sub-bass and that made a nice improvement in clarity and fidelity. Ironically, even though I was cutting out the lows, the overall tonality is much warmer with better bass than no EQ at all because the highs were taken down.

Usually once I EQ a speaker or headphone, I get much better sound and am happy with it. Not here. Taking down the highs collapsed the little soundstage that was there, leaving me with a dull, middle of the head image. I am extremely sensitive to the harshness of the highs so this was the proper compromise for me but even I could not tolerate the boring spatial effect.

The loss of deep bass was a miss too. I could no longer enjoy any of my tracks with such content.

Mind you, on some tracks I thought the fidelity was better than many speakers but in the context of all music played and comparing to other headphones, the results was simply not competitive.

Conclusions
Boy, talking about getting myself in a pickle giving such low scores subjectively to a headphone that has done so well in research. There are two possibilities:

1. Something is wrong with me and my hearing and I would not feel this way in controlled testing.

2. I am far more bothered by the listeners in research by a) too much energy in treble region and b) distortion. A related factor to this is content used for testing. Without the right content a lot of the issues I found would not be audible or as bothersome.

Then there is the issue of comfort. I see there are a lot of aftermarket pads for these so maybe that can be solved. But then the cost goes up.

Overall I can't see a good reason to recommend the Sony MDR-7506. It gets some important things right (mid-range tonality) but so many things wrong that I just can't tell anyone to go and get one. If you have it, please give the above EQ a test and report what you think.

So there, we have another massively popular headphone covered so that we have a reference for other headphone reviews to come.

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As always, questions, comments, recommendations, etc. are welcome.

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Nice explanations of listening tests and EQ journey along with final recommendations, in my experience too there is indeed differences between headphones that "measure well" re adherence to Harman Curve after EQ, so I certainly can see how you noticed the differences that you explained. These headphone reviews are interesting, it's certainly more of a journey than the more tried & tested speaker reviews/assessments.

These look like a disappointing headphone for most people, a bit harsh (although I'm guessing some people might get along with the peaking in 2-8kHz better than others due to their own personal HRTF differences) and with that distortion in the bass combined with some lack of soundstage.

 

[samwell7]

Your listening notes align with mine, I bought a set around 10 years ago as they were frequently recommended as cheap headphones that could be used to mix with.

All I remember about them is a congested sound, hot uncomfortable ears and treble that actually hurt my ears.

Mixes translated very poorly, I remember it sounding perfect on the headphones and then very weird on speakers.

I ended up selling the MDR-7506s and getting MDR-7520s which are excellent and translate fairly well, they're also good for general listening.

Edit: just went back through my HeadFi post history, I actually had a set of MDR-V6s instead of MDR-7506s, will be interesting to see how differently/similarly they measure if you do end up measuring a set of V6's @amirm

 

[Blumlein 88]

Your listening notes align with mine, I bought a set around 10 years ago as they were frequently recommended as cheap headphones that could be used to mix with.

All I remember about them is a congested sound, hot uncomfortable ears and treble that actually hurt my ears.

Mixes translated very poorly, I remember it sounding perfect on the headphones and then very weird on speakers.

I ended up selling the MDR-7506s and getting MDR-7520s which are excellent and translate fairly well, they're also good for general listening.

With so many liking the 7510 and 7520 why did they get discontinued? The 7510 wasn't much more money than the 7506.

 

[samwell7]

With so many liking the 7510 and 7520 why did they get discontinued? The 7510 wasn't much more money than the 7506.

I posted in another thread with this link
They were apparently discontinued because they were too sensitive and didn't meet the European Regs around loudness!

 

[solderdude]

7506 are often used as monitors, not for mixing.
Their tonal balance is quite good but have elevated treble (especially the 10kHz part)
This makes them loved in studios for monitoring as it 'enhances' details and are said to be 'laser like' in sound.
For hifi listening they have a sharp 'edge'.
When you want to get rid of that and make it more 'hifi' EQ the 10kHz about 6-8dB down.

For similar reasons you also find many DT770's in a studio. The elevated treble helps with monitoring.
That doesn't mean musicians also use them at home for hifi listening.
In fact a lot of musicians don't have 'super hifi' at home. They listen to the music and performance and care less about sound quality.

Of course there are exceptions to that 'rule'.

 

[Robin L]

I probably purchased my MDR-V6 around 2000 to 2002 so about 28 years ago. So that seems right.

I got my first MDR-V6 in the early 1990's. My second was from a thrift store, 2010 or so. Probably more bass and less treble than the 7506, but not much.

 

[YSC]

7506 are often used as monitors, not for mixing.
Their tonal balance is quite good but have elevated treble (especially the 10kHz part)
This makes them loved in studios for monitoring as it 'enhances' details and are said to be 'laser like' in sound.
For hifi listening they have a sharp 'edge'.
When you want to get rid of that and make it more 'hifi' EQ the 10kHz about 6-8dB down.

For similar reasons you also find many DT770's in a studio. The elevated treble helps with monitoring.
That doesn't mean musicians also use them at home for hifi listening.
In fact a lot of musicians don't have 'super hifi' at home. They listen to the music and performance and care less about sound quality.

Of course there are exceptions to that 'rule'.

similar reason to the Yamaha NS10, kind of like to amplify any annoyance possible in the mix for fine tuning or "if it don't sound harsh here, it won't sound hard anywhere" kind of character.

What interest me more is that this is the first headphone follows the Harman Target the best among all measured yet don't sound right to Amirm even after EQ, which is different from what other headphones EQ to similar response, I was thinking what might be the reason for that.

 

[voodooless]

T
Boy, talking about getting myself in a pickle giving such low scores subjectively to a headphone that has done so well in research. There are two possibilities:

1. Something is wrong with me and my hearing and I would not feel this way in controlled testing.

2. I am far more bothered by the listeners in research by a) too much energy in treble region and b) distortion. A related factor to this is content used for testing. Without the right content a lot of the issues I found would not be audible or as bothersome.

Actually what I'm missing in the measurements (also regarding speaker testing) is a waterfall plot. It will show resonances and stored energy much better than an impedance or group delay plot. You can have a perfectly flat frequency response, but have a massive amount of decay somewhere, and still have it sound like shit.

 

[F1308]

Is it possible my ears have grown in ensuing years and no longer fit inside these cups? The thought is too scary to consider!

For sure...
"Lobular height significantly increased with age for both men and women and lobular width significantly decreased with age for women only."

https://www.drsullivan.com/scientif...external-ear-age-and-sex-related-differences/

 

[Feelas]

Please keep in mind that the Harman paper that reported very high pref ratings for the 7506 response curve didnt actually test the 7506 directly. Instead they took measurements of the 7506 and then eq'd an AKG test headphone so that it mostly matched the 7506 curve.

I can confirm that the actual 7506 sounds just as terrible as Amir describes.

Which could be explained away by lack of 7506's THD on K702 (preference testrig). No reason to simulate THD if you intend to research FR and can design it away in own products. We'll see whether it contributes after @amirm tests more commodity headphones. I'm really interested to see K371s assessed, due to their THD peak in upper midrange/lower treble.

 

[F1308]

Finding excess treble objectionable or even painful is a fairly common hearing issue. Some people have greater sensitivity to peaky highs than others. In extreme cases this is a hearing disorder known as hyperacusis. In milder cases it results in people being unable to listen to Sennheiser HD800's for any length of time. see https://www.webmd.com/brain/sound-sensitivity-hyperacusis#1 or https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC539655/

Please, do me a favour and change your portrait as quickly as possible. Thank you.

 

[quimbo]

Curious, any specific details on how you installed the mini-XLR? I'm about to perform that mod myself; the dimensions look like they just *barely* fit if you get rid of the washer/nut on the connector (Neutrik/Switchcraft) and instead just tap threads into the chassis.

I sent it out to be done, company is now out of business