Sennheiser HD650 - The classic beauty in a grey dress Appreciation thread!

The rain forest is the cheapest I've found. Z reviews, he's a funny dude but personally I don't trust his ears for making big audio decisions he seems to be quite new to reviews and he has trouble finding subtleties that could be a deal breaker for many. I enjoy his reviews though! HD600 has a good driver, it struggles with separation more than the 650 and vocals can sound more shorty unless you do some amp matching. It also has a more notable sub bass roll off. I believe you have the NAD D7050? or 1050? Either way both are quite a smooth balanced sound so it might counteract the HD600's rough patches(It's smoother through the response than the K7XX but there's a peak in the mids that I think is a result of the older, less damped driver that still has some sharpness to it)

Both HD600 + 650 will be an upgrade over the K7XX on your NAD. The 650 will sound more natural, a bit of mid range lushness. Despite being an upgrade it doesn't mean you'd like them though.. but if you enjoy the K7XX sound and want to stick with it then the HD800 would be a closer sound if you want a clearer upgrade path.

The 650 also has cohesion which many headphones are lacking including all the AKG drivers.

Try the 650 on amazing, listen to only them for a few days, adjust and send em back if they are not for you.
 
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Awesome. Look forward to impressions. I'm a fan of smaller cables, I find the 650 cable quite flexible and folds up nicely. If it ends up being too much, there's some nice gator cables and also CustomCans makes some nice ones.

You will know of the HD650 is requiring more as it tends to sound muted, bit compressed when under driven. The 7050 was a beast when I tried it so should be no issues at all.

@Rroff - That's interesting. Maybe another slight change to fix the unrefinements?
 
Psycho Sonny said:
This is where it all goes out the window.

So many conflicting reviews about the HD600 and HD650.

People say the ultimate neutral headphone is the HD600. The HD650 is basically a modded slightly warmer/darker HD600 iirc. So people tend to prefer it as it's slightly more natural even if it's not as neutral as the HD600.

Basically if your working in a studio the HD600 is probably the better option. For enjoying music most likely the HD650. Never listened to the 650 but I own the HD600 and I have to say it's simply sublime.

I would say everyones end game for music should be 600's or 650's after that your throwing money away. It's not worth spending 3-10 times as much for slight improvements. Law of diminishing returns and all.

For gaming nobody should look further than the Q701, K702, etc from AKG or AD700 range from Audio Technica.
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Yup headphones are priced stupid and most of them are not even better than the HD600/650
 
That sucks :( I prefer the sound of the 1950's Mullards. The 1970's and up all pretty much sound the same to me. 4003 is such good value but I've recently seen them going up in price lately.
 
Not really. The HD650 is in a position that is ahead of the rest until the price bits about 1-2k that is actually pretty rare for a product these days!

I don't mean this is a rude of condescending manner at all but if you don't hear a difference between the 598 and K712 maybe you have not trained your ears to tell the difference between gig resolution, distortion, linearity and all that Mumbai that comes with high end gear? Maybe it's your equipment? Low conscentraition? There's some people on headfi that couldn't tell the difference between the Annie and K712 and I thought man, how can you not hear this! But some people are just not sensitive to difference until they gain experience.

If anyone says the HD800 is night and day in terms of quality I would personally question their ears and experience as when you enter that sort of level upgrades are minor and sound signature is the main difference.

What you have to realise is people also exaggerate, they hear something like the 650 which is warm, smooth no forced bumps then hear a K701 which has massive bumps, dry response and think wow look at all this clarity, soooo much cleaner when in reality they are hearing false detail from the exaggerations in the uppers.

I dunno man I'm not saying my word is good, to be honest I find it hard to trust people when it comes to audio, I will say I'll always be honest! Honesty got me banned from headfi a few years ago..

I sometimes hate reviewing things and I'm prob not going to anymorewheb I finish my guide as people always read hype and exaggeration and when I'm honest about something people complain why I'm not being nice to the product when it's got glowing reviews...This hobby is full of hype and the amount of sites that get money form positive reviews is unreal. People always feed of good reviews and it clouds judgment.
 
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With AKG's I get that sense of false detail like I do with most Audio Technicas. With the HD650 I get better micro detail which just sounds like distortion on the AKG line. The AKG has more treble detail for sure as its boosted in those area but I don't think it's detail that you really want to hear although if you preferences lean that way, you will love it! I prefer a more smooth top end that rolls off.

The 650 also scales so things like the Teton and Eddie Current amps or the Bottle Head Crack, Project Ember will bring them to that next level.

I hear my detail on my AD700X when playing games and the K7XX and 712 as they have those peaks that work for creating virtual space in games. I personally just wished the 650 had more sub bass!
 
I just find it to roll off compare to my SE535 and old LCD-2s but I don't find it bad also. Me being greedy probably! If you don't mind a bit of DIY the Bottlehead Crack with speedball makes the 650 breathe fire! I regret selling it but it wasn't universal enough due to the high impedance so it would be HD650 which isn't bad but I want my Audeze's when consistency is better.

The Bottlehead with 650 is the best pairing I've heard without paying loads for an Eddie Current Amp. It's about £300 or a bit less for the kit I think. If you can't be arsed with DIY the Valhalla 2 by Schiit at £290 is also a beast and it should also play nice with your K7XX.
 
Depends on your sound card. My laptop sounds like crap makes the 650's sound hollow with no definition. Higher end computers will prob sound better but I'm not really knowledgable when it comes to PC audio.

They are better than the 515 but are harder to drive. A basic Dragonfly Dac/amp will be an improvement or a Schiit stack for £200 will get you better sound.
 
I spent the last few hours comparing the Nighthawkand HD650 again, it seems these get brought up a lot in convos and comments make me revisit. I've also been taking notes of comparison to finish my headphone guide. There's areas where the Nighthhawk was superior like its treble detail, air and extension, articulation of the Bass and it's extension also went to the Hawks. The if thing for me was how the HD650 presents the music. It just sounds like how I expect the recording to sound without as little interference as possible. The Nighthawk wins in two big areas but when it comes to the smoothness of the frequency response it's mid range Magic and the cohesiveness the 650 just is on another level.

That's the thing about the 650 you go away from it, try something that has exaggerations in the response like bass and treble and then return and it sounds just so correct. It's clear that Audeze wanted to try replicate that sound but with more extension and they came so close but couldn't keep things consistent.

Everything else seems to put you just outside the music, the 650 put you in it!
 
DagsJT said:
There's no way I could swing having two sets of headphones unfortunately, so I'd need one pair of headphones that's good at everything rather than being particularly good with music/gaming/movies.

I've looked at the AD700X before, I think I've seen comments saying that the sound feels quite "airy" and like it's around you rather than in your head. That sounds amazing for games but not sure how well it would work for music.

And then I only ever see the HD650 mentioned for music, Googling for how good they are with games doesn't really bring up results. I'll give the 650's a go tonight but it looks like my X2's might be my best option for an all-in-one set of headphones.
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The 650 has a good soundstage, it's accurate. The actually imaging is better than those headphones but the AD700x has a massive soundstage so it gives that advantage in games making the image appear better.

I think the 650 has equal soundstage to the X2. The more I hear the X2 the crappy it sounds. It's not a bad headphone I f it was half the current price..it has higher distortion, poor driver matching wonky treble. It has a good tone though, I think if they spent more time improving things, even if they made it more expensive with changes it could be a great headphone.
 
Mrk I love how in your sale ad for the 7XX the HD650 look like they are sitting there all smug like I'm being kept.

I knew you'd love the 650 didn't expect the AKGs to go up for sale!
 
For most mobiles I would say no. There's a select few that have decent DAC's but most I've tried have been terrible. The DAC in the iphone 6-6s isn't too bad it just doesn't have enough juice so an amp will benefit but it's not like it compares to to the Fiio Daps like X1 etc.

Most portable amps for phones I think are a waste of money for high end listening. Sadly it seems like Chord is the only one that's made a devices that act as a DAC for phones.
 
Since I've got two HD650's in going to put one of them on the members market. Was going to mod one pair but really can't be bothered with all that. Having two 650's is pretty greedy!
 
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