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Stax SR-009S Electrostatic Headphone Review

Rate this headphone:

  • 1. Poor (headless panther)

    Votes: 49 20.3%
  • 2. Not terrible (postman panther)

    Votes: 62 25.7%
  • 3. Fine (happy panther)

    Votes: 79 32.8%
  • 4. Great (golfing panther)

    Votes: 51 21.2%

  • Total voters
    241
SR-007mk2 is the no brainer. Not the most detailed but the heaviest sounding of all.
The X9000 was a nice hybrid of both the 7 and 9 in terms of sound signature.
I have owned various Lambda's, 404, 407, 202, 307 but the X9000 cannot be compared, different league. :)

Have you heard the ESlabs ES-1 Alpha? I have heard it described over and over as the perfect combo of the 007 and 009 with better bass.
 
While technically, to get Harman type bass, your proposed EQ in the bass seems logical I would not recommend it.
The Stax headphone will not sound quite good with this kind of EQ in the bass.
Amir's EQ is about the max. it should be given.
This EQ will eat up 9dB of headroom giving about 100dB SPL peaks for bass notes. In such case you could only use it at moderate volumes.
Electrostat's Achilles heel is large excursions in the bass due to the high mechanical tension of the membrane to prevent 'sticking'.
For what is worth - I have never manged to overdrive my 009s in the bass, with harman curve applied.

On the contrary - very often it takes me a while to realise how loud I'm listening, since there is no audible distortion of any kind to remind me of actual SPL.

They are unlike Audiostatic speakers I had 20 years ago - those were super easy to overdrive in the bass. You literally had to be careful what are you listening to and how loud.
 
@amirm Would love to see how the SR-009S stacks (excuse the pun) up to the SR-007. I saw that you have an S007 mk1 that you have used to measure a couple of amps and also some test equipment. Could we see a detailed measurement of the 007? It would be very interesting to see how these compare.
 
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