HD800 - where to go next?

[austinpop]

18 hours ago, Musicophile said:

Anything you'd recommend I should check out in particular?

 

29 minutes ago, Blake said:

I am thinking Empyrean would be a terrific option but it will be a budget buster.

 

Completely agree. I know @Musicophile and I have somewhat similar musical tastes, so I definitely urge you to try the Empyrean and the Abyss Phi TC. The former is $3k yes, but it holds its own with all the other TOTL headphones IMO, and is very easy to drive, so is not so fussy about amps. The only one I've not tried yet is the RAAL (pending), but from all accounts, it is not exactly forgiving.

 

I find the Empyrean to be almost as comfortable than the HD800S, and far more comfortable than any of the others.

[austinpop]

I look forward to reading about both your listening impressions, and what you decided. 🍿

[austinpop]

2 hours ago, Musicophile said:

So, ended up going to my headphone dealer today. The shop used a Hugo 2 that I was feeding from my iPad with Qobuz high-res songs (I could have asked for the Dave, but it wasn't yet connected so I didn't bother). 

 

I started with the Meze Empyrean, indeed, truly great headphones, in many ways (except for transparency) also better than the HD800. But it just didn't "click" for me. Plus, I got really warm ears in a short time from the leather pads.

 

Then came the big mistake. I wanted to try the Focal Stellia, but the dealer convinced me (and he was right) that the open Utopia really is significantly better.

 

What can I say, I fell in love with the Utopia. 

 

I did a final long comparison against the Hifiman 1000SE, another fantastic pair of cans. I could easily live with the Hifiman, but the Utopias are just the perfect "overall package" for me. Extremely comfortable, and a very "musical" sound (if that makes any sense), and it really didn't matter whether I listened to Daft Punk, Mahler's 1st crazy finale, some delicate chamber music, or the Keith Jarrett trio. Everything sounded just wonderful. Plus, they fit me just perfectly. 

 

So, now that I've exceeded my original target budget by more than 2x, I'll need to let this sink in a bit before I pull the trigger, and I should most definitely not try the Susvara that the shop also had on display. 

 

In any case, the quality of all these cans is really fantastic, that said, my good old HD800 still really isn't too shabby compared to the others. 

 

 

It's fascinating how personal headphone preferences can be! Coming from the HD800, I was addicted to the spacious soundstage, and I found the Utopia to be very closed in, especially on a big Mahler symphony.

 

Were all these 'phones well burned in? The Empyrean especially can initially sound rather unresolving, but really open up after 100-200 hours.

[austinpop]

1 minute ago, Musicophile said:

For the Meze I assume yes as it was their regular demo model. Same for the Utopia. The HifiMan was still in a box so that may have been used less. 
 

In any case let’s not forget headphones are even more personal choices than speakers as the fit with your ears and head comes into play. The Utopias were by far the most comfortable for my head. That’s at least 30% of my rating as I love the comfort of my HD800 and can wear them for hours. 

 

Absolutely! And I'm glad you found the ones that worked best for you. Enjoy!

[austinpop]

11 hours ago, Musicophile said:

It seems to me that headphones are an even more personal preference choice than most other hifi components, given how much they need to physically fit you, and I'm pretty sure that your head and ear shape influences the final sound profile. Or maybe I just prefer the sound profile of dynamic drivers over planar ones.

 

This is very true, these days more than ever before. The quality of TOTL headphones has reached a level where it becomes a matter of matching your personal preferences and head geometry to the headphones. 

 

You went about it in a thoughtful manner, and I am sure the Utopia will delight you. They're great headphones.

 

As a teaser, I'm concluding the listening for my upcoming review of electrostatic headphones. All I will say is that these are sublime, but the price of entry is very high, both in terms of the headphones and the necessary amplification.

[austinpop]

I heard the new, "improved," Utopia 2022 at CanJam SoCal, and definitely felt they are an improvement over the original. In particular, they have improved areas of the OG Utopia that I found troublesome. They soundstage is larger, the treble is smoother, but without losing the clarity and transparency that was one of the Utopia's great strengths.