Tony

Put a pro bias heart inside them.

Agreed, its issues are less prominent with Jazz (actually it helps jazz to sound good). Classical... I don't know, I heave heard it sound more involving and less sedated. The other genres just don't sound good to me. What it does well is the midrange, but bass and treble have way more issues.

I have heard (and currently have at home for loan) the HD580, which is described to be almost equal as the HD600, so keep this in mind when reading my impressions. I don't like it. Granted, I am used to stuff like modded 404, SR-X Pro, Omega 2, but the HD580 don't even give me the same enjoyment as certain IEMs. My amplifier is a CKKIII, just to put it in perspective. On the good, the bass is pretty deep, the soundstage is big, the midrange is on the full, lush side. On the bad, the midbass/upper bass is painfully, irritatingly slow and prominent. In fact, it's so slow that it manages to make the pacing in the music wrong, and superimpose it's own "rhytm" to everything else. Treble is not exciting enough. Although I hate sibilance and crap like that, and the HD580 doesn't suffer from that, I feel the headphone is not exciting, not involving and sleep inducing... or at least, it would be, if the wrong timing of the bass didn't annoy me.

Happy Birthday!!!

Happy birthday!!!

Edge gives it a great review here: Review: Demon's Souls | Edge Online

Give me your address and I will ship(t) you the cable in question

It's also much more spacious: I was really listening through a piece of shit, earlier.

Hahahaha, quite so. Now I have reached the perfect sound. *cries*

I have just replaced the crappy cables with the new Morays. It's like listening to another headphone. Before, the sound gave a foggy and dark feeling. Right now it's like being at lake in a sunny day It's exactly the tonality I was after.

Damn posts have to hurry. In fact, the analogue cables I am temporarily using are cheap in their build quality and material, let alone cost. They blurred the sound with the 404 itself, so right now they are crippling the overall performance of the system.

There is something I have noticed with the Omega 2: unlike the Martin Logan Summit speakers I had auditioned, which dissect sound into separated parts although having a flat response, the O2 is very coherent, and the music always sounds like a cohesive whole. This is much more apparent than with the former Stax I have owned (SR-003, SR-X MkIII Pro and Spritzer-modded 404), although those were still more coherent than that Martin Logan-based setup too. I think this aspect of the Omega 2 is their best quality. There are some shortcomings in my system, though, mostly due to the SRM-717 amp, prolly, if not to the electrostatic principle itself. Percussions don't sound good. They are too softened, attenuated, and lack resolution. Metal doesn't sound "solid". It's not a matter of energy alone, but rather an attenuation related to a frequency range (12-14 kHz). I discovered the audible effects of that range months ago, when evaluating an old, slightly overdamped pair of Yamaha HP-3. Those HP-3 had a slight bump in that zone rendered percussions with a precision that reminded to breaking ice, although they had many tonal shortcomings. The cymbals rendering there was even too attention calling, but on the O2 right now they sound way too confused. I have new Moray interconnects incoming, since I am using cheap unknown cables at the moment, so those might change things considerably.

Talking Heads - Fear of Music

Wow, awesome.

Yep. It's super easy to make the 717 clip (basically anywhere after 8/10 of the volume knob). But I don't listen nowhere near there (I turn the knob at around 4-5). The main problem with me acquiring something like the Blue Hawaii SE, apart from money, would be the heat developed by such amps, which would prevent me from using the setup during the hot season.

Some quick impressions from the train. I have noticed that the fit is crucial, to the point that, depending on earpads orientation, the bass can go from overwhelming to balanced. Different L/R earpads orientations can bring bass imbalances as well. There is a general sense of fluidity, effortlessness, but also some lack to impact, apparently. I don't know the reason, but the SRX Pro to me had more vibrating deep bass although being overall leaner. The deep bass is there with the O2 though, Amon Tobin's Stoney Street proves it... The deep notes, as said, tend to be very fluid rather than vibrating, but enveloping to the lowest tones. Treble, on first impression, seems right and not peaky. I don't think they are dark either, nor have suppressed treble. It's very electrostatic in its feeling of smoothness. Anyway I'll have to listen to certain music to evaluate the degree of resolution in percussions. It's too early to provide impressions about the midrange but I am not detecting any shoutiness in any regions. Resolution is extreme, still, as many have commented, there is a "relaxed" attitude to the sound. If anything, I think the O2 has in fact a personality in its being "unimpressive", as Birgir says: certain passages sound "indifferent", like not conveying emotions, but I'll have to see how this is going to grow on me, and in general to get used to them before making a reasonably insightful statement in this regard. The lack of impact seems to have a role, though. Imaging is well defined and extremely lively, but not tridimensional as I had come to expect, at least with the first tracks. I have just listened to Younger Brother, Massive Attack, Franco Battiato and the said Amon Tobin. About the fart: I have really heard worse, at least until now. It's far from exteme and in fact very manageable, and not as annoying as other Stax were. Comfort is great in general. The looks are much better in person than on pics. Isolation is good, much better than Lambdas. With the 404, I could hear dogs barking from outside my house and they were very intrusive, while the O2's shape shields me more from unwanted distractions.

They don't. I'll post some decent impressions later (I am rushing to the station now)

They are here! I listening for the first time to the Omega 2 MkI.

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday!

Hahaha! Thanks! That has been the goal for quite some time now, and I hope it gets here within two weeks.

Happy Birthday. I'll have to find one to play Skies of Arcadia sooner or later

Stax SR-007 MkI.

Cheers guys. The day was very good. Boris, try to find Achel Trappiste since it's awesome. It's just perfectly balanced, and one of the best double malt beers I have ever tried.

As Cat, I would suggest the Triple.fi 10 Pro. Other possibilities are Apuresound ER4S/ER4P which raise the bass a bit and cover some sibilance in the highs. If you are using a portable amp and don't mind bringing extra weight in your listening environment, you could pair your ER4S with this Linkwitz notch filter: Reference earphones