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Simthaniel
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merrick97
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Fabulous
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Hello! I'm looking for recommendations on audio setups. I'd be planning on using it mostly for gaming. Preferably I'd like a pair of large closed back headphones since I have a big head and jaw. I'd also like to hear myself through my mic with mic monitoring. As far as budget goes, I don't really have one. But under 600$ would be nice. I can go higher if needed. The audio setup would be connected to a high performance PC. Thank you in advance for any recommendations!
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NMPacella
New here
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Mar 18, 2024
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To get a super detailed comparison, where one can is compered to another, and each individually, you would be better served to go over to Headfi.org where everything is dissected almost surgically by some members, and exhaustively by many. The Headfi group tends to be very well regarded in the audiophile community.
For the nutshell comparisons, it may just be better to toss a brief description of each sound signature of each headphone on your list here, hoping that it's helpful. I'm gonna give it a whirl here, as I have a bit of free time**.... and try TRY to keep it as short-winded as I can. Not going to try, not even a little bit, to tell you which is BETTER.
Okay. Let me answer your list in order; Preference; wow, these are pretty diverse headphones and I prefer different ones for different musics and with different rigs. This is SO SO a question of subjectivity. For instance; for classical and acoustic musics, where I want detail and clarity and a fairly neutral presentation, (yet with warmth), I love me some Sennheiser 600's, (which, btw, are more neutral than the hd6xx because they are really a MD version of the 650 which have a more bass-y presentation), and, for even more depth,(and a bit more V), with lovely stage and clarity, I like the HE4xx's. I use tube amps for these most of the time. A lot of the source is going to be vinyl.
For digitally produced music that wants fast and clear and VERY neutral/clinical/analytical reproduction, I prefer the entire Beyerdynamic range,(always go highest imps!), run on a solid state amp, like the JDS Labs gear range. Especially The Element. This sort of music would be output,(lossless), from my computer or SACD player.
I'm not really a fan of the AKG house sound, but I would reserve using them for popular musics. My set of AKG's spend most of their time on the shelf. If I'm gonna use them, it will be with a semi-portable source in a more "don't need to focus on your listening right now" kind of situation where maybe jazz is playing on them, as they do that pretty well. I just prefer other cans' sound sigs over AKG pretty much all the time. I don't really have an opinion about AKG, except to acknowledge that they aren't to my taste, but that they are well built and highly regarded by many, so I will just make a couple of very OBJECTIVE remarks about their sound and style.
Not EVEN gonna try to tackle comfort and fit. Because that's SUPER subjective and these all have quite different builds.
The Comparison, sort of: (more of a sound sig list, really) NOTE:::: these are all built very differently and all have drivers unique to their manufacture!
AKG; The house sound here is described,(by others and even myself), as being --"smooth with an even response and a lot of "inner" detail without being particularly analytical." The better ones have a powerful bass with decent detail and an good midrange and excellent highs...certainly not a flat SS by any stretch.--- They sound their very best when used with an amplifier. Many people rave over them, I personally don't, and you can find detailed discussion and warfare about them here and on other sites. ;)
Sennheiser,(and most directly, the 600 and 650); The Sennheiser line is often described as being an excellent all-rounder with a tendency toward, what many TERM as the Sennheiser "dark veil", they can be used very widely and even for gaming. The baseline sound sig varies rather widely across the Sennheiser range as they've upgraded or created offerings for differing consumer tastes, so it's a bit harder to identify a narrowly typical "house sound" for Senns, unless it's to mention the "dark veil". Plenty of drive and THUMP inside most of these cans, but with excellent detail and a well crafted sound. The 600's have an almost CULT of followers, with hundreds of HD600-lovers threads all over the audio-centric internet, mostly because their SS is considered to be the most neutral-yet-warm-with-excellent-stage offering from Sennheiser, the highest impedance version considered by this crowd to be nearly Grail-class. It's the least "thumpy" of the line, least likely to be on the heads of your dub-steppers, for instance. The 650,(and thus, the HD6XX here), is very very similar, but with the bass increased a tad, without being muddy. Some say the high range is more extended- I'm not sure I hear that, myself. I love my 600's quite a lot BECAUSE of their fairly neutral, yet sweet, presentation, and I love them on nearly all of my amplifiers. Live. classical, acoustic, jazz...... these are never disappointing for me. They are INCREDIBLE when listening to live opera recordings.
Beyerdynamic line; The BeyerD sound is, overall, a most clinical, analytical, crisp and "fast" sound and, when appropriately amplified,(yes. AMPLIFY THEM. EVERY TIME.), offer a marvelously detailed and almost sparkling production. The sense of stage provided by the open backs can be very good, and my experience of the closed backs,(770), is a not-deadened or muddied/muffled detail-centric performance that got me through many nights doing homework amidst snoring roommates in my college dorm. The 880's are one of my favourite sets of headphones, I like them so much that I purchased the special high imp Black version when it came out. I listen to much digital music on BeyerDs, but they can be very very wonderful for classical and vocal music when driven by a tube amp to warm up the often super-analytical sound. I like these a LOT for Foo Fighters on vinyl...but ONLY out of a tubie, as the sound becomes almost too hard and brittle at higher volumes, out of a solid state amp.
HiFiMan; Now we are getting into the raspberry patch. These are Magnaplanars, and, as such, they have a distinctly different driver build from all of the others on the list. Which means they will sound even more markedly different from all the others than do all the others vs. each other.(jeezus!) (Otherotherother#lol) ANYWAY. The HE4XX is pretty much the same as the 400i, so I am not going to parse them. What you can expect from almost any magnaplanar is a very clear and very very responsive sound production due very much to how that build works to create sound. These are no exception, they are pretty easily driven,(you still want an amplifier to justify them), and they have a beautiful clarity with a fairly warm V to them-when run on a tube amp they achieve a kind of liquidy happy goodness that has me picking them up again and again when I want to jam with some live vinyl like Clapton Unplugged. With excellent amplification, I have experienced that often-sought-but-never-achieved sense of headspace and instrument placement during listens on these, especially, again, with live performance. It's keen to feel like you are hearing someone applaud off to your left, or to feel like you are sitting 3 rows away from a singer. These offer excellent detail/clarity...like the squeak of a finger on a string, or the en-mass deep breath as a choral group inhales for the next line in an oratorio...
SO. That kind of covers the basics of the "fruit orchard" you have going up there in your enquiry. It's not a super dissection for you, but I've tried to give a somewhat short-form description and opinion on each sort of SS that you've asked for, and even an example of the kind of music for which I might use each of them. You'll never really be able to get an answer to the "Which is Better" portion of your enquiry.... that's all opinion based, always and forever, it's even fought over in heaven and hell and Valhalla. If you want electronics and performance graphing....well, I will leave that to manufacturer's sites and to other people here who are brave enough to tackle and post that up for you, as I don't care as much about that sort of schtuff as I do about what my own ears are telling me. Graphs really only get you so far in the experience, they just,(for me), tend to give me a performance reference to what I can expect to hear from them, like what part is emphasized, how much roll-off, etc. etc. Which kind of all goes kah-plutt! as soon as you put anything between those headphones and the literal source of the music. Then you get into WHATAMP? and WHICHCARTRIDGE? into eternity from here discussions.
so long and thanks for all the fish.
* THANK GOD GRADO WASN'T ON THIS LIST OR WE'D BE HERE ALL MONTH!
**although I cant type for beans, so this may take three-to-five hours
I am going to be ABSOLUTELY HONEST here and admit to not being much of a gamester. Any gameyness that I be doing is without headphones, I just use my large room speakers while doodling around on my PS4 on the TV. I can say this; MANY peeps seem to like the Sennheiser range for gaming because they can be very bass happy,(without crushing detail), and Snnheiser even offers a set of cans that are specifically built for gaming, complete with microphone and all. Knowing something about headphone builds, I CAN say that you might want to stay away from magnaplanars, as they tend to run heavy and might be awkward for gaming. I guess, if it were me.....I would probably go with the Sennheisers, like the HD6XX dropped here, which gives you a very nice set of headphones at a decent price point, and which will also serve your music listening needs very handily. (But it won't have a mic.) The extended bass on this set of headphones will be very amenable to gaming, IMO.
best of luck!
thanks for the compliment. :)