Meridian Unplugged - Powered by MrTechGuy.co.uk Forums Discussion Meridian - Systems Recommended Headphones for Explorer 2?

So a Car Boot Sale buy is a bad thing then...

Not if you are happy with them.

Russ

Chris Car Boot
Not for 10 pounds + a 10 pound repair.

Value will be first in the eyes and hopefully later in the ears of the purchaser.

Hector

Well, it is if the goods fell off the back of a lorry!

Has anyone heard the Oppo 'phones?

My main headphones are ,
akg (Austria) k701 with fat pipe mod , b&o h6 gen2 , and focal spirit professional.

The akg are open-back , and VERY comfortable even with glasses .
The b&o are closed-back , due to the earcups being smaller not as good with glasses .
The focal are bordering on impossible with glasses , but tight enough that the mic will not get head-phone bleed .

Allthough I don't have an explorer , all 3 are great for what I use them for (recording and mixing)
The akg can be worn all day though I wouldn't venture outside with them due to appearance and bulkiness .
The b&o are superb closed-backs and can be worn all day too as long as I'm not in front of a screen as that's when I wear my glasses , and are better for venturing outdoors .
The focal , allthough great for what they're designed to do (recording monitors) and sound great for a closed-back , are just too tight on my head to wear all day every day .

I recommend you audition these 3 sets ( plus sen hd280 + 600 ) and my strongest recommendation for sound comfort price and noise in and out , is the b&o h6 generation 2 .

I have both the PM-1s and PM3s. I like them both very much - both work very well with the Explorer 2 and with my mobile phone. The PM-1s in particular sound great through my headphone amp.

On a visit down south I spent a couple of hours listening to closed back phones at a specialist retailer with the intention of buying one. Some I listened to were very expensive and out of curiosity tried the PM-1s as a comparator - I enjoyed them more than anything else I'd heard. I ended up buying the PM-3s to give me more listening options (equipment is in living room and competes with telly) and picked up a pair of the PM-1s from fleabay at reasonable cost.

Both are worth hearing but as mentioned above, it's essential to hear potential purchases for yourself.

I increased requirements as I went along.

Comfort is really high as I want to listen while I work. Otherwise the just won't get used.
Looks, I don't want to look like I'm mixing an Album at work.
Not excessively hard to drive. Although Explorer 2 is said to handle a wide range it's not exactly a beefy headphone amp.
Prefer elonged cups, they tend too be more compact and less mixing engineer looking.
Light weight, related to comfort. No matter how well built for comfort less weight helps and size increases a lot as weight goes up to maintain comfort. Less than 300 grams was goal.

Good suggestion On the Shure 1840 and ended up ordering these.

I bounced between these. I did not go to a shop because I won't pay parlor prices. It's to easy to trial via Amazon Prime.

Shure 1840, lots of great reviews, much better build than HD600/650. Better comfort than HD600/HD650. Similar to HD600 but not as hard to drive and better build. Might have less bass though. These are easy to try first to even see if open back is doable in the office.

Sens HD650, clamping force made me nervous but these are supposed to be easier to drive than HD600 or 1840. And supposed to have better bass than 1840. This was close. Cheaper too

Sens HD600, all negatives of HD650 plus very hard to drive.

Audio Technical AD2000x, I was VERY tempted to get these. The reviews sound amazing. Not very expensive either. But they fail the looks department. They are HUGE. They are not easy to get in USA and have to be ordered from Japan. If I could have ordered on Amazon Prime I might have still tried them, knowing they violated a bunch of requirements. If listening in private at home I would have tried these. Tough to return if I didn't like. AD1000x is similar, available and wicked cheap.

Focal Elear, heavy and pricey. But look very nice.

HIFIMAN X V2, very pricey and heavy. Very efficient is attractive, looks stand out a bit much for the office. They were tempting. My wife really balked too at the price.

Fiddler , let me know if you want to borrow mine for comparison purposes and I'll get them shipped over to you .

I'm still building my desk , so have no use for headphones at the moment ....

Ps : what you said about not wanting to look like you were mixing an album is what I was hinting at about going outdoors with the akg cans .

Ian, thanks for the offer. It's actually cheaper shipping back and forth with Amazon. They ship to me free 2 Day and I when I ship back they give you pretty deep discount on shipping. Might cost $8.00 for the entire trip to try a pair.

Any way, I went back onto read more on what I ordered, big mistake, maybe. After reading ONE comment on the Shure 1840, I got cold feet and canceled. He basically said they are very Flat, intended for professional use and for casual listening you may not like them.

So I went back digging again and bought a pair of BeyerDynamic T1 2nd Generation

beyerdynamic T1 2nd Generation

I found them on Amazon Prime (Used) for close to half list price. These normally would have been way out of my price range (list price 2.5x of the 1840's).

They are considered Semi-Open, which might help make them work in the office. They are not too heavy. Not too crazy looking. They have high impedance but sensitivity is good. Lot of folks think they are as good or better than HD800.

Have to be careful with weight in that some times they include the weight of a 3 meter cord, and sometimes not. Which could weigh a lot compared to the headphones.

I've been referencing this insane review that someone did on 58 high end headphones.

Huge Review of 58 Headphones

Nice !!!
How much were they if you don't mind me asking ?

$1399 List
$1099 Amazon Prime price.

$650 (Used) Amazon Warehouse Prime

Turns out there is a bunch of deals if you dig deeper on Amazon. From Beech Camera on Amazon Prime. And no tax.

$799 Certified refurb
$899 new with a portable preamp.
$1049 new with a $350 preamp so you get headphones for $700 new (if you need/want the preamp)

Turns out too the Amazon Warehouse deals don't show up until the very end of the 3rd party list. I think these are often open box returns. I've used that a few times and always worked ok. You can return it if not happy.

There are a lot of the used ones and package deals on these headphones which makes me a little concerned.

These headphones never showed up when I searched "headphones open back" on Amazon because they are semi open backed.

I used that mega review to find them going backwards through the list until they got in my price range and criteria.

Who knows I might hate them, but they look promising. 600 ohm impedance makes me nervous.