What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

Post by Lost to the Void »

Plyphon wrote:Can anyone comment around needing an amplifier with a Focusrite 2i2? Specific, I know.

My current headphones, K250 MKII are 55ohms and are driven fine. The K702's are 62omh. Should be good?
The focusrite scarlett xix range have ok headphone amps (I have a 6i6 and 18i20). Personally I would get a separate amp with a loop like Pro-ject headbox or better, you will get a better performance out of the 702`s, I have done so for my headphones.
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Barfunkel wrote:How comfy are the AKG 701's? I've used my friend's 240's a couple of times and they're impossible to use for prolonged periods.
I find them very comfy, they don`t touch your ears, they sit around them against your skull unless you have massive wingnuts on your head., and the velvet surrounds stop any sweatyness.
I have a large head too, but I can work with them for hours
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

Post by msl »

Barfunkel wrote:How comfy are the AKG 701's? I've used my friend's 240's a couple of times and they're impossible to use for prolonged periods.
The most comfortable of any headphones I've used. You hardly notice them even after 6-8 hours.


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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Lost to the Void wrote:
Plyphon wrote:Can anyone comment around needing an amplifier with a Focusrite 2i2? Specific, I know.

My current headphones, K250 MKII are 55ohms and are driven fine. The K702's are 62omh. Should be good?
The focusrite scarlett xix range have ok headphone amps (I have a 6i6 and 18i20). Personally I would get a separate amp with a loop like Pro-ject headbox or better, you will get a better performance out of the 702`s, I have done so for my headphones.
Thanks, so I should be okay for now -

I'm new to the headphone amp world - is it something like this that I'm after?

https://www.audiodestination.co.uk/ampl ... oCbEfw_wcB

How do I connect that to my interface? Just from the headphone out - split to RCA - into the input?

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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So reading into it the above wouldn't be the solution - I would need a Amp DAC combo, to act as the headphones own interface basically.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/FiiO-Olympus-H ... B00LP3AMC2

This seems to be winning some reviews for under £100.

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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msl wrote:Much prefer my K702s to my old DT880s, so much better imo.

ATH M50 are not suitable for mixing, way too much bass, but fun to listen to music and vibe on though, I use them as my dj phones.


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Interested to hear more about your experience. I've been using a pair of dt880 250 ohm for around 2-3 years, the only set of monitoring headphones I've owned and really like them a lot. In what ways would you say the akg are better? If they are that good I might have to try a pair and compare them, I've always trusted my beyers, if I can get more for £140 that would be great. Just to let you know as well ice just been using the dt 880 with my focusrite 8i6, and more recently just my laptop output because all my stuffs in storage. What were you amping with these two?

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Plyphon wrote:So reading into it the above wouldn't be the solution - I would need a Amp DAC combo, to act as the headphones own interface basically.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/FiiO-Olympus-H ... B00LP3AMC2

This seems to be winning some reviews for under £100.
I have the headbox, it workes great, I run it from the aux out on my soundcard, it has a loop in it, so you can also run it from your main outs and then run through it in to your monitors.
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

Post by Plyphon »

ah i see, that makes sense. Cheers

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

Post by msl »

Pretty much in every way, bigger soundstage, more 3d, better extension, way more comfortable, way lighter. The DT880's seemed to have a kinda "fizzy" hi-end.

I was always an AKG guy had the old studio standard 240's for all of the 90's, workhorse they lasted 10+ years, finally bit the dust in early 2000 I bought some midrange Sennheisers the 280's I think, they broke pretty quick was DJing with them too, then moved on to AKG 271's for a few years they were alright, then got ATH M50's nice but not for mixing really, then bought DT880's kept them for a year, good but not what I wanted sound wise. Got the 702's last year, thats me done.

I've used Senn 550's also they were very nice for the price.

I would like to the try the Focal Pros everyone raves about them... but I'm happy for now.

I run them direct out of my Duet, it has a very good headphone amp.

CRDM wrote:Interested to hear more about your experience. I've been using a pair of dt880 250 ohm for around 2-3 years, the only set of monitoring headphones I've owned and really like them a lot. In what ways would you say the akg are better? If they are that good I might have to try a pair and compare them, I've always trusted my beyers, if I can get more for £140 that would be great. Just to let you know as well ice just been using the dt 880 with my focusrite 8i6, and more recently just my laptop output because all my stuffs in storage. What were you amping with these two?
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

Post by CRDM »

Thanks for the reply, I'm definetely tempted after reading this, I've just moved and monitors aren't going to happen in my current place so I'm going to stick with headphones for a while and want the best set up for my money, I just called my local store to try a pair but they don't have any so I'm considering ordering some online and sell my beyers if I like them more. As you mentioned fizzy high end on the beyers it's peaked my interest as that's the main area I tend to not get on with so much with them; only sometimes though on some material. It's down to taste but if people on here are singing the akg702 praises on here I'm definitely going to listen, cheers!

If anyone else has tried these both and has anything to add or thinks this is a good or bad idea let me know!

msl wrote:Pretty much in every way, bigger soundstage, more 3d, better extension, way more comfortable, way lighter. The DT880's seemed to have a kinda "fizzy" hi-end.

I was always an AKG guy had the old studio standard 240's for all of the 90's, workhorse they lasted 10+ years, finally bit the dust in early 2000 I bought some midrange Sennheisers the 280's I think, they broke pretty quick was DJing with them too, then moved on to AKG 271's for a few years they were alright, then got ATH M50's nice but not for mixing really, then bought DT880's kept them for a year, good but not what I wanted sound wise. Got the 702's last year, thats me done.

I've used Senn 550's also they were very nice for the price.

I would like to the try the Focal Pros everyone raves about them... but I'm happy for now.

I run them direct out of my Duet, it has a very good headphone amp.

CRDM wrote:Interested to hear more about your experience. I've been using a pair of dt880 250 ohm for around 2-3 years, the only set of monitoring headphones I've owned and really like them a lot. In what ways would you say the akg are better? If they are that good I might have to try a pair and compare them, I've always trusted my beyers, if I can get more for £140 that would be great. Just to let you know as well ice just been using the dt 880 with my focusrite 8i6, and more recently just my laptop output because all my stuffs in storage. What were you amping with these two?

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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I just came across this article about the differences between the 701 and 702, it seems like there are defenitely some differences between the two! http://homestudiobasics.com/akg-k701-vs ... ifference/. Also, I would imagine that the lack of bass that the 701's have can sometimes have an influence on your decisions while mixing. Food for thought and mabye the best decision for me would be to keep my ATM's and use both.

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Ignore that article, it is complete ass, audiophool nonsense full of subjective bullshit.

701s and 702`s use all the same components, the main difference being the cable being detatchable on the 702`s. they effectively are the same headphones, as evidenced by the rather excellent frequency charts generated by the guys at headphone.com who do proper objective tests of headphones on their specially set up, human head analog that actually records the frequency response. Sadly their build a graph section of the website is currently not working.

Firstly the 701`s/2`s do not have a lack of bass. What they have is tight, correctly controlled, and accurate bass, and not the woolly, whoomphing bass you get from a lot of headphones (I`ve read this lack of bass things on loads of hi-fi sites, but most of these guys wouldn`t know transparency and accuracy if it were raping them with a broom handle, they always expect overblown "showy" bass). They are very accurate in the low end, are really good at translating transient weight in the lows, and they translate to my mastering monitors extremely reliably (Goldenear Tritons, full range 16hz - 48khz running on a QUAD QSP elite in a fully treated purpose built room), I actually have a set sitting in the mastering room which I put on occasionally just to check for low end distortion, and I can take them on and off and not get too jarred by differences.
When I went through testing a bunch of cans I went through everything, and to get similar performance to the 701`s (and two`s) in terms of studio accuracy, you need to be spending over £500 on other brands. They really are kingslayers. They are currently so affordable because AKG brought out a new range of cans, but previously these were sort of AKG flagship cans.
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Ok, so this is the reason why I got the ATM's in the first place :). It is really suprising to me that in an industry such as this people are misinforming others (I would think it would ruine the sources reputation!). I am reading more articles from that website now and it does seem like they HEAVILY favor the Sennheisers HD 600 which is a red flag for me.

I am gonna get a pair of 702's + a headphone amp when I get back from my trip to Indonesia!

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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The HD600 are pretty good, the low end is very similar to the K701`s/2`s, but they have this bump up in the 3-5K area that sends it in the wrong direction. 5K is such a special area, especially in terms of vinyl (mastering) that having that push there, I think, can screw with your mixes too much.
It does conform to the slight smile curve joy that hi-fi people like though, so it is understandable why it is there.
Still a good set of headphones, but I couldn`t live with em.
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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TimBuys wrote:I am reading more articles from that website now and it does seem like they HEAVILY favor the Sennheisers HD 600 which is a red flag for me.
I used the 650 first and changed to the 600. The 650 is more bass heavy which is initially seducing. Possible EQ correction is needed if you
wish to dampen the top bumps and make a smooth gentle +3dB shelf in the low end.
Tons of people use these including mastering engineers. for good reason.
Once you get to know them they translate very well to pretty much everything. You'll probably need a great amp for them though...
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Mattias wrote:
TimBuys wrote:I am reading more articles from that website now and it does seem like they HEAVILY favor the Sennheisers HD 600 which is a red flag for me.
I used the 650 first and changed to the 600. The 650 is more bass heavy which is initially seducing. Possible EQ correction is needed if you
wish to dampen the top bumps and make a smooth gentle +3dB shelf in the low end.
Tons of people use these including mastering engineers. for good reason.
Once you get to know them they translate very well to pretty much everything. You'll probably need a great amp for them though...
Thanks for the response ! I did know the Sennheisers are quite popular (which doesn't always have to say something). Do you think the Sennheiser is worth the 140 euro it costs more than the AKG-702's though, or did you never get the chance to try these out?

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Yeah you definitely need a good headphone amp for them, sennheisers are fussy as shit.
So add another 120 quid or so to the price.
If you are going for that price range then you could also go with the Psb M4u 1. They are similar to the HD 600 without the wonky top end, are actually a little cheaper too. They were in the selection I tested.

The HD600 just aren't worth it when you compare price to the K701 702. Similar (I would argue worse because of that 3-5k bump) performance for twice the price.
They should be the same price as the k701/2 as they too have been "superceded" within their own range. But Sennheiser are cunts like that.

3 or 4 years ago they were worth the 250ish quid. These days it's just a piss take when compared to the competition.

Get more for your money.
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Yeah I have pretty much made up my mind about getting the K702 I wast just curious why Mattias opted to get the Sennheisers instead but my guess is when he got them the prices weren't that different!

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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

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Sennheisers were just "studio standards" for a while.
Everyone had them as they were one of the best options in the original price range at the time.
I had some for a while.

There`s stuff in the 300-500 price range that is better but the improvement is not significant over the AKG`s, PSB`s and Senns.
It`s that ever diminishing returns thing, same as monitor speakers (once adams were best in price, not so much now, for example, but they survive on that 8 year old hype)
You could really go hard and get Grado`s, or Stax or something, but for most home studios there`s not a huge reason to.
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Re: What headphones would you buy for £100-200ish ?

Post by CubiK Mass »

I've got the 712pro's and must say they are superb, but they definitely took time to burn in, sounded very sterile to start but after a month they were noticeably different and more detailed.

I don't think you can really test headphones in a shop because of this, just read plenty of user reviews and make your choice.


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