My first thoughts about Beyer T90 vs DT990

[mkrzych]

Hello,

I purchased the Beyerdynamic DT990 Edition 250 ohm just recently. For that just quick evaluation I like them, even on same audio chain they do sound lower than T90. But, they to me are more calm and less forward, with to my ear better sub bass extension. They have more depth, possibly thanks to less forward treble like T90. Less harsh too. T90 I have for years and like them one time, while on other time hate them. They have more details etc, sounds louder, but they aren’t so smooth for long listening I think. Your thoughts Beyer maniacs? Both were powered by Lake People G103 head amp.

[Samuel T Cogley]

I have a pair of DT990 600 ohm and a pair of DT1990s.  I also have a Lake People G109-A ("anniversary", a great score from Massdrop!) amp.

 

My experience with the DT990s is that they are rather bright.  If you think they're more laid back than the T90, I'm glad I never got one of those.  I never found a pair of Beyerdynamic cans I really liked until the DT1990s.  I sold my DT990s as they were always too bright for me.

[John Dyson]

Wanted to chime-in about bright headphones -- I use the DT770 Pro/80, and actually benefit from the brightness.  If I was listening for enjoyment or recreational purposes, I might choose more subdued headphones.  With my current hearing, instead of my really good hearing from 30-35 yrs ago, the brigtness is beneficial for my technical purposes.  If I had my younger hearing where I was very disturbed by ultrasonic security systems, and could probably hear clearly above 20kHz, the brightness of the DT770s might have been disturbing to me.  I wish I currently had my hearing from younger years!!!  I need to be able to detect as much of the frequency range as I can -- and hear distortion and other weird artifacts.  When listening for enjoyment, maybe not a good idea to make 'artifacts' more obvious than they naturally are.

 

Different response balance can benefit different purposes.  I am NOT trying to justify my own choice, but trying to support the idea that being able to choose from different headphone models is a good thing..

 

(BTW --  now talking about what I really like about the DT770 Pro80 -- almost as much as the true bass & brightness to the sound -- I like straight cables, dont like coiled cables).

 

John

 

[mkrzych]

9 hours ago, Samuel T Cogley said:

I have a pair of DT990 600 ohm and a pair of DT1990s.  I also have a Lake People G109-A ("anniversary", a great score from Massdrop!) amp.

 

My experience with the DT990s is that they are rather bright.  If you think they're more laid back than the T90, I'm glad I never got one of those.  I never found a pair of Beyerdynamic cans I really liked until the DT1990s.  I sold my DT990s as they were always too bright for me.

 

Well, too bright, I found them less bright than T90 and indeed, more laid back. T90s are slightly bright, but not harsh, just more in-your-face with lots of highs in my opinion. I have been living with T90 so long, that I liked them actually, but wanted something more laid back, where the DT990 I think might match, but I have them only just 2 days so far...

 

DT1990 I have not heard yet, but it's not my price tag now :-/

[Blake]

I once had the T90's and liked them quite a bit.  I did find the overall balance to be more tilted to high frequencies but I never found them to be bright/hard/glaring.  If so, I would have sold them immediately.  It is possible my Bottlehead Crack amp had synergy with them, but I was a happy camper.  I liked the T90 enough that I decided to move up to the T1's.  T1's and the Bottlehead Crack were a superb pairing for me.  

[mkrzych]

7 hours ago, Blake said:

I once had the T90's and liked them quite a bit.  I did find the overall balance to be more tilted to high frequencies but I never found them to be bright/hard/glaring.  If so, I would have sold them immediately.  It is possible my Bottlehead Crack amp had synergy with them, but I was a happy camper.  I liked the T90 enough that I decided to move up to the T1's.  T1's and the Bottlehead Crack were a superb pairing for me.  

 

Tubes in your amp may tamper them a bit IMHO.

[mkrzych]

I have changed gain jumber setting in my G103S headamp and DT990 become more vivid, faster and spacious. In the default setting which was 0dB relative or +8dB absolute they were sorta too laid back and muddy. Now with +6dB relative or +14dB absolute they started singing IMHO. Could it be the case?

[Samuel T Cogley]

4 hours ago, mkrzych said:

I have changed gain jumber setting in my G103S headamp and DT990 become more vivid, faster and spacious. In the default setting which was 0dB relative or +8dB absolute they were sorta too laid back and muddy. Now with +6dB relative or +14dB absolute they started singing IMHO. Could it be the case?

 

Gain and available overhead is a big part of a quality headphone amp.  I believe what you're saying here.

[89reksal]

I hope this isn't too off topic but this seemed like a good topic to post this in, so apologies in advance. I've owned Beyerdynamic DT 1770 headphones for about 4 months now. I'm using a Little Labs Monotor headphone amp. These are my first headphones, coming from 2 channel speaker setup. The first month or so I was very happy listening to them. From reading, I got on the idea of trying to eq them. I'd also recently started using Roon which has what I think is pretty good built in eq functionality. To make a long story short (or a short story long), I eventually came across eq presets put out by someone called "oratory1990". If you're interested you can find more background information on him and what he's doing. He provides eq presets based on measurements he's done for quite a wide variety of headphones, including the DT990. I've briefly tried other settings published or suggested by others, as well as my own and these are on a completely different level. I'm actually surprised they're free. The full list is available here:

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/oratory1990/wiki/index/list_of_presets

 

Using his presets, entered in Roon's PEQ settings, has transformed my DT1770's completely. To try and describe in detail I believe would be pretty pointless but suffice to say there's no way I would want to listen without that eq enabled. Roon allows you to enable/disable very easily the PEQ filter so anyone should be able to try and make a decision for themselves if interested. The change is not subtle and for me took some adjusting to. Initially I felt it was too thin sounding, especially compared to DT1770 with no eq.

 

The final step for me was enabling the Roon Crossfeed filter. There's three different settings provided as well as a custom setting. I've tried all three of the pre-loaded settings and found all three, although all are subtle to me, to be the icing on the cake for me as far as listening enjoyment. I'm currently using "Chu Moy's" settings with the oratory1990 eq preset for my DT1770. Before trying Roon crossfeed I found I would get sleepy and sometimes even fall asleep while listening for any length of time. With crossfeed enabled, I have no problems listening for hours. The only problem now is life interferes with my listening.

 

I'd be very interested in hearing any experiences from others if they decide to try any of this. If you think there's something about the sound of your headphones you may not quite be satisfied with, you may be pleasantly surprise what you can end up with by using eq and/or crossfeed. I guess I should add that the DT1770's are closed headphones which has made me wonder how much that has to do with the success I'm having with crossfeed. Also be very aware of possible clipping being introduced by using any dsp like eq. Even with Roon's "Headroom Management" enabled, which defaults to -3 dB, I still noticed some clipping with Roon's clipping indicator. It wasn't noticeable to me during listening but I did fine tune the Headroom setting to eliminate the flashing red clipping indication just to avoid any potential problems.

 

Bill

 

 

[copy_of_a]

On 12/17/2019 at 7:53 PM, lasker98 said:

I'd be very interested in hearing any experiences from others if they decide to try any of this.

well, at least a similar approach here.

 

I listen through Audirvana on Mac, therefore I use AU plugins.

 

I‘ve made my own EQ curve based on the data for the DT1990 pro (analytical pads) provided by the guy you‘ve been referencing and the correction curve for the DT1990 pro that the software „Sonarworks Headphone“ provides. But I‘ve basically only halfway corrected the 4.5k dip and the 8k peak of the DT1990... the rest of my EQ is actually by personal preferences/taste.
I also can‘t imagine listening to music through headphones without crossfeed. I use the „Goodhertz Can Opener“ plugin for this.

Without such tools I couldn‘t really enjoy listening through headphones... this goes especially for crossfeed.
 

[Digi&Analog Fan]

On a state of the art or close to it system the Beyer DT990's are not bright. They are not the cleanest headphones in the highs and with so so equipment, the highs can be sizzly from distortion components and the sizzle can stand out and make them sound bright. With clean accurate equipment they are the exact opposite; warm, open and inviting and are known for their pleasant quality on vocals. The 990's date back to the mid 1980s and there are cleaner headphones with more transient speed, but for openness of sound their open backed design made them a top choice back then and there are those that still like them. Still have mine but do not use them anymore.