Legend has it that one guy reached perfection once. I'm yet to be convinced.

I've been in this hobby for 6 years and my path was: ATH M50x, then 2 years later HD 6XX plus Schiit modi and magni. I have no desire to buy new gear (yet), but also have two sets of speakers I use often

[deleted]

You'll probably get different advice but IME the HD600s are fairly hard to drive and benefits from a more powerful source. s

Could try some different amps but frankly, you might be better off trying different headphones.

The shop background noise could've hurt the performance. Rule of thumb is try the headphones with a cheapo Apple dongle, if you dont hear a difference then its not time for upgrading. I keep a Fiio KA1 for demoing headphones if my clients with to

[removed]

[deleted]

[deleted]

[deleted]

Bought the focal clears. Now I want a focal audio system for my car 😫

me but with weed instead of whiskey. oh well, also whiskey. lol

Nope because then you develop hearing damage like me and you have to start learning how to eq your stereo information a bit 😂

I've found my personal favorite (ZMF Auteur), but I will still buy headphones for different experiences. (My next goal will be Fostex Th909 for EDM, HD800s for orchestral music)

TL;DR: It is possible… but not really.

There is a few reasons. The first is the variance that occurs between products of the same model. Basically even headphones of the sane model still don’t sound exactly the same. Secondly, auto EQing to a target is fairly inaccurate in the treble frequencies (I don’t know why. It’s just something that I and others have noticed). Lastly, drivers have limitations. Not all drivers are capable of delivering specific FR without audibly distorting. I’m also sure that there is some limitations to how headphones are currently measured in terms if datapoints as well. There is a lot.

[deleted]

Guessing that "sharpness" you hear is probably the upper mids. I find it to be a bit shouty/obnoxious and fatiguing.

I also thought that the HD6x0 series can sound a little boring, but certain source gear does seem to add a lot of life.

Did you mention what you were using to drive those headphones?

I second the IE600, one of the most natural sounding IEM and possibly one of the few affordable endgames. It's good for pretty much any genre so you don't need to carry complementary IEM.

if you're not using an amp, I'd recommend the FiiO K3 as a cheap solution for this too. I got one for $49 shipped on eBay and its bass boost gives me juuuust enough on my 660S. I've had sound distortion trying to use integrated EQs in Spotify or Apple Music listening to mostly bass-heavy hip hop.

:(

I have been using my current gears for quite a while now and probably won't be getting another one since upgrading will cost thousands of dollars. I'm thinking of getting a speaker now, probably starting with entry level Sonus Faber lumina or Whaferdale evos.

Here's my list of ownership, prior to settling. For a few years now I've been completely happy with my hd6xx's and a fostex hp-a3 amp (but any SS amp is fine really). Of note, I had owned and sold them previously, and after cycling through much nicer gear, I went back and bought another pair and sold everything else. The ROI curve is real.

​

Headphone ownership history:

Dan Clark Audio Ether Flow

Sennheiser HD800

Sennheiser IE800 (IEM)

Sennheiser HD6XX

Beyerdynamic T1 gen 2

Audeze LCD-X

Audeze LCD-3

Audeze EL-8T

Audeze Isine-20 (IEM)

Campfire Audio Vega (IEM)

Technics EAH-TZ700 (IEM)

Audio technica ATH-M50

Koss Porta Pro

TIn Audio T2 (IEM)

Etymotic HP3 (IEM)

Etymotic ER3se (IEM)

Yamaha EPH-100 (IEM)

Philips Fidelio X2

I did. Very happy now.

Stopped at:

ATH-M50s with Dekoni Sheepskin pads EQ'd to Oratory 1990 preset. Pads make it much more comfortable and EQ fixes tonality. Have it modified with a 3.5mm jack with a v moda boom mic plugged in. Now it's a great headset for working from home. Although arguably a noise cancelling headset would be better.

Galaxy Buds 2 pro for when I am out and about. I love the well resolved bass of this 2 dynamic driver wireless IEM. Technicalities are surprisingly decent for this pair.

7Hz Salnotes Zero with Gizaudio 'Perfect' EQ - a nice little set to experiment with and good to take on planes with to plugin to their in seat entertainment.

SHP9500 with Oratory EQ and some small personal adjustments. Great for movies and gaming. Slightly too low resolution for really good music enjoyment but the immersive soundstage and imaging is nice for music listening.

Qudelix 5k as amp/dac with PEQ functionality.

I got into this sorta recently in early 2020 about a few years ago now. I just wanted something a bit more than the lower/mid-tier Bluetooth Sony headphones (WH-CH700N) I got for Christmas. So that piqued my interest in getting into this stuff (I was previously really into car audio). I got a few pieces of gear after lurking around here and YouTube. The pandemic happened, then oddly, I just stopped buying anything (due to income loss).

It was easy to hit the brakes on that. I already learned from other money pit hobbies on my spending habits. I was fortunate to have lower standards than your typical audiophile and felt "this is good enough" after a few purchases in the past 2 years, LOL. Library means everything and that pretty much determined whether or not it's worth it to "upgrade".

Because you can't add (with EQ) what's not there. Remember, a FR plot is not the entirety of a sound signal, it's just one way to measure some of a sound signal.

(can't I EQ a tweeter to sound like a sub? I mean it's just frequency right?)

I love how disliked this take is, especially by people who don't do things with sound for a living. Talk to any acoustician, audio engineer, mixer, etc and they all understand my point as if it's common knowledge.