Sennheiser HD650 Review (Headphone)

[solderdude]

Age could make them sound a tiny bit 'darker' due to the foam degrading and the drivers being closer to the ear.
Its the same reason why Amir's measurements of the HD600 are very similar to his HD650 measurements as the HD600 with older and worn pads sounds closer to a HD650 with newer pads. More 'warmth' with thinner pads.

Old (black screen HD650) and the exact same HD650 but with new pads.

On top of that the new pads you can buy now, again, have changed a little yet again and are a hair 'brighter'

So buy some new (original Sennheiser, not alternatives) and put them on there. No need to buy the new version.
You can also replace the headband foam at the same time, this too tends to soften too much after that many years.

 

[Jimbob54]

I bought my HD650's in 2004. Used an Asus Xonar Essence ST at first, then later Schiit Modi+Mini. When I started using them again after a several years hiatus, I upgraded to a Geshelli J2 and Monoprice THX AAA 887. This was a big improvement over the Schiit, but I feel like they don't have the same magic they had back in the day. Tried various profiles in Equalizer APO and that helps some, but there still seems to be something lacking. This may be due to the fact that my home theater is so good, I'm now spoiled and its all in my head. My question is, could age have decreased their quality? Are the new HD650's any better? Is it worth blowing several hundred dollars purchasing the same thing I already have?

I doubt mechanically they would have any ageing issues but the pads may well need replacing (the foam deforms with age and wear). But I bet most of it is as you say, being used to your HT experience.

I think you would know if they were broken so I'd say maybe other than a pad refresh, no point spending money. If you haven't already try oratory1990 eq preset on his reddit site as an eq starting point.

Edit beaten by solderdude again.

 

[mjnichol]

I bought my HD650's in 2004. Used an Asus Xonar Essence ST at first, then later Schiit Modi+Mini. When I started using them again after a several years hiatus, I upgraded to a Geshelli J2 and Monoprice THX AAA 887. This was a big improvement over the Schiit, but I feel like they don't have the same magic they had back in the day. Tried various profiles in Equalizer APO and that helps some, but there still seems to be something lacking. This may be due to the fact that my home theater is so good, I'm now spoiled and its all in my head. My question is, could age have decreased their quality? Are the new HD650's any better? Is it worth blowing several hundred dollars purchasing the same thing I already have?

Could be the pads, as others said (try that first). Could it also just be that your hearing has changed over several years, and what you remember hearing was with "younger" ears?

 

[Robbo99999]

Could be the pads, as others said (try that first). Could it also just be that your hearing has changed over several years, and what you remember hearing was with "younger" ears?

I'm sure it's likely to be the pads if anything, as we can't remember detail in audio beyond a number of seconds, so you're not gonna remember how it sounded from years ago in terms of any kind of detailed comparisons. The ability to guage "preference" will stay with you for all time though, and something like the balanced sound of Harman Curve for speakers will always sound pretty good to most people through most of their years - so you can still judge tonal balance properly through your life.

 

[IAtaman]

View attachment 101567

View attachment 101746

Hi Amir.

As you know very well, one characteristic that is not particularly preferred by listeners is high energy in 100-500Hz range according to Harman research.

"The headphones in the “fair category” have too much energy between 100 Hz and 500 Hz, which made vocals sound too muddy and colored."

"Finally, the headphones in the “poor” category also have too much energy between 100 to 500 Hz but also too much below 100 Hz."

For this headphone, you are recommending to EQ the sub base as high as +6dB which will surely create a lot of distortion at normal listening levels, and all of that will be perceived as more mid bass as you pointed out. Given the HD650 already has a bit of excess mid bass around 200Hz, I think the EQ you recommended might be taking this headphone which is normally rated as Good tonality wise and bring it down to Fair or Poor - the opposite of the effect you intended I presume.

Here is EQ settings recommended by Oratory1990 for reference, which bring the bass of the headphone inline with research, does not boost the bass as much and introduces two negative gain filters to control mid-bass, which the EQ you recommended does not have.

These are all estimates of course. Given this is one of your daily headphones, maybe you happened to measure its FR after EQ and see how that aligns with Harman target?

 

[solderdude]

Some of the filters used by Oratory are tweaked by listening to it.
The filters also might be based on average response of more than 1 HD650 (production spread and pad-wear included).
The fixtures used aren't exactly the same either.
Oratory himself seems to prefer the 'optimum hifi' target (which has less bass boost).

Amir eyeballs where 'general deficiencies' are opposite the Harman target, creates a simple EQ, listens, often adjusts the filters a bit and posts the filters.
I actually think this makes more sense than 'exact EQ based on a single fixture' because the 'general deficiencies' are present but the 'exact' ones may not be.

 

[IAtaman]

Some of the filters used by Oratory are tweaked by listening to it.
The filters also might be based on average response of more than 1 HD650 (production spread and pad-wear included).
The fixtures used aren't exactly the same either.
Oratory himself seems to prefer the 'optimum hifi' target (which has less bass boost).

Amir eyeballs where 'general deficiencies' are opposite the Harman target, creates a simple EQ, listens, often adjusts the filters a bit and posts the filters.
I actually think this makes more sense than 'exact EQ based on a single fixture' because the 'general deficiencies' are present but the 'exact' ones may not be.

You might be right about that. But my point is not about what is the best way to come up with EQ settings in general or what is the correct level of bass boost. My point is that the EQ recommended for this headphone might actually make it less preferred according to the research its evaluation is based on, according to my understanding of it pre-EQ FR and distortion characteristics.

 

[solderdude]

The thing about the research is:
The bass boost filter people could play with (to adjust to their taste) was determined up front (frequency and slope depended on the amplitude)
So there is wiggle room in practice.
People could play with the bass boost in amplitude.
This was done at a specific SPL in an area where amplitude is important. At a different SPL the amount of boost could well have been different.
Then they found there was a range of preference and some outliers.
I am quite certain they found a sliding scale as the controls were not stepped (afaik) so in a science way they found a tolerance band where the amount of bass boost was not too big and a majority of people could find themselves in it.
This means the average bass boost (which was changed more than once) is just an average and there were outliers. Those were actual people that did not fall in the set tolerance band. There is also a tolerance band around that average.

Of course it is handy to set a target where future headphones could be made to. In practice there is tolerance + seal issues.

This means that while the theory stands based on the research and a LOT of averaging a target curve has been set and think by now Harman is settled on the OE curve for headphones.

I think most people do not fully understand the science behind it and see it as gospel. It isn't. It is a good starting point for the majority of people. Even Dr. Olive says this and he was in charge of that research.

 

[Thomas_A]

Even the open HD650 has variations among individuals, both in bass and above 2 kHz. Not so much in bass as with closed cans. Between 200 Hz-2000 Hz I find quite similar response between the individuals (in-concha mic in this case, calibrated against stereo speakers in-room).

Average (+/- 10 dB scale):

 

[campermate]

Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum and hope that my question is in the right place in the product-specific thread. It's about EQ on the HD650. I mainly use the Oratory preset (like shown by @IAtaman) and a second one with leicht reduzierte Bassbetonung with my Qudelix 5k, which is known to be one of the best/flexible mobile DACs with PEQ. Unfortunately, this does not work with my second dongle, which is used at work, a Fiio BTR15: PEQ works there, but unfortunately without "shelf" Type. So I can define ten filters with frequency, gain and Q-factor, but unfortunately only "peaks".
Is there a converter/tool online somewhere that will build me a "PEAK"-only preset? Or can I alternatively use a graphical tool with the raw measurement data from Oratory1990 and build my preset purely based on PEAK by manually tweaking? Thanks a ton for any suggestion!

Cheers
Eddie

 

[ZolaIII]

Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum and hope that my question is in the right place in the product-specific thread. It's about EQ on the HD650. I mainly use the Oratory preset (like shown by @IAtaman) and a second one with slightly reduced base with my Qudelix 5k, which is known to be one of the best/flexible mobile DACs with PEQ. Unfortunately, this does not work with my second dongle, which is used at work, a Fiio BTR15: PEQ works there, but unfortunately without "shelf" Type. So I can define ten filters with frequency, gain and Q-factor, but unfortunately only "peaks".
Is there a converter/tool online somewhere that will build me a "PEAK"-only preset? Or can I alternatively use a graphical tool with the raw measurement data from Oratory1990 and build my preset purely based on PEAK by manually tweaking? Thanks a ton for any suggestion!

Cheers
Eddie

Try out Hiby Music instead and if you are on Android give a shot to the Wavelet for Android system level stock driver where you are import Oratory from git repo.

 

[staticV3]

Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum and hope that my question is in the right place in the product-specific thread. It's about EQ on the HD650. I mainly use the Oratory preset (like shown by @IAtaman) and a second one with slightly reduced base with my Qudelix 5k, which is known to be one of the best/flexible mobile DACs with PEQ. Unfortunately, this does not work with my second dongle, which is used at work, a Fiio BTR15: PEQ works there, but unfortunately without "shelf" Type. So I can define ten filters with frequency, gain and Q-factor, but unfortunately only "peaks".
Is there a converter/tool online somewhere that will build me a "PEAK"-only preset? Or can I alternatively use a graphical tool with the raw measurement data from Oratory1990 and build my preset purely based on PEAK by manually tweaking? Thanks a ton for any suggestion!

Cheers
Eddie

The https://autoeq.app/ Web App allows you to load oratory's headphone measurements and generate PEQ presets with custom parameters.

 

[campermate]

Thanks @ZolaIII. I would love to have the same PEQ Preset "globally" for PC, Phone and BT.

The https://autoeq.app/ Web

Cool, thx, will give it a try!

 

[ZolaIII]

Thanks @ZolaIII. I would love to have the same PEQ Preset "globally" for PC, Phone and BT.

Cool, thx, will give it a try!

Well for input independent processing on device you will have to step back to Qudelix 5k. Eventually some DAP powered with Hiby software but I don't have any recommendations for such as it is.
Edit: Wavelet and Auto-EQ (EQ-APO based) use same presets and it will stick and with BT from phone (and all free apps).

 

[IAtaman]

Hello everyone,

I am new to this forum and hope that my question is in the right place in the product-specific thread. It's about EQ on the HD650. I mainly use the Oratory preset (like shown by @IAtaman) and a second one with slightly reduced base with my Qudelix 5k, which is known to be one of the best/flexible mobile DACs with PEQ. Unfortunately, this does not work with my second dongle, which is used at work, a Fiio BTR15: PEQ works there, but unfortunately without "shelf" Type. So I can define ten filters with frequency, gain and Q-factor, but unfortunately only "peaks".
Is there a converter/tool online somewhere that will build me a "PEAK"-only preset? Or can I alternatively use a graphical tool with the raw measurement data from Oratory1990 and build my preset purely based on PEAK by manually tweaking? Thanks a ton for any suggestion!

Cheers
Eddie

Hello! If you don't have access to low-shelf filter type, a peak filter with low Q and lower frequency should do the same trick, especially given that HD650 does struggle to produce the sub-bass anyway based on my closed ear canal measurements. Something like below should produce the same sonic outcome.

Preamp: -7.9 dB
Filter 1: ON PK Fc 30 Hz Gain 8.0 dB Q 0.500
Filter 2: ON PK Fc 180 Hz Gain -2.5 dB Q 0.800

I have eyeballed this to create more or less the same result with the shelf filter. You can play around with the frequency and gain of Filter 1 to see what gives you best results.

 

[HoJ76]

I have problems with hd650 when I use amirs eq on this song, can anyone else test it?

 

[Jimbob54]

I have problems with hd650 when I use amirs eq on this song, can anyone else test it?
View attachment 344630

What kind of problem ?

 

[HoJ76]

What kind of problem ?

Did you try? Very buzzy bass.

 

[L5730]

@HoJ76

The bass sounds a little bit fuzzy with the 7Hz Salnotes Zero:2, but I wouldn't say it was very buzzy. Sounds like a real electric bass through an amp rather than the typical synth-reinforced filtered electric bass that I hear in a lot of pop tracks.

Did you drop the pre-amp volume when making the EQ gain boost? You might be clipping the Software/DAC/Amp.
Does the same or similar sound happen with other listening equipment? Probably a daft question as you would have likely tried if you had the opportunity .

 

[HoJ76]

No problems with other headphones, even with more gain. I have reduced bass in amirs eq.