Hi-Fi-Anatomia

This is interesting, would you say this has had any notable sonic differences or is more of one of those "changed for the sake of changing" things with little impact on sound?

Sorry about getting back here late Here is the mk1 with the small plastic piece that goes over the solder pads.

There is no port because that is an SR 007mk1. I have a modern 007 2.9 and a friend's early serial mk1 and the early serial mk1 is exactly like that. With the little plastic resin piece that goes over the soldering joints. The strain relief is also the same (as in shitty) and you can see its the old brown cable and champagne housing. EDIT: If anyone is curious I can upload photos of the stair solder joint covering on the mk1 tomorrow.

From the sound, I'm fairly certain that this is still a 2.9, My last pads from memory were slightly shallower though. Face contacting leather/pleather/synthetic leather was tensioned more and pulled tight to the foam `smooth`. The surface of this one seems to have the pad material pulled less tightly around the foam. Bass character is what I feel is particularly different. Lacking a slight bit of grunt in the midbass but subbass still intact. And as everyone here can attest to, shallow pads with Estats are your friends. Also note: I'm driving this set with a temporary rig atm which is kinda shit for lack of a better word... Birgir's Transformer and a vintage speaker amp. And I'm sure that this could very well be the difference I'm hearing or quite simply it could be a compound of both.

Hello! I recently got my second pair of SR-007A, about a year apart from each-other. And the serial number is only slightly higher, both in the SZ2-23xx range. And I noticed that the new set had slightly different pads. Thicker, material feels a bit different. I of course did the blutak mod and I threw it on to measure and noticed that the pad resonant frequency is now at 70~hz and smaller than on my initial set. Can anyone else confirm that STAX changed the pads again? Sample 2 is my new 007. Edit Note: Even if I get the seal perfect the bump is in the same spot, and the bass is almost completely flat sans a 2~db bump around 70~80hz rather than a 5~db bump at 50hz. I do not have my first 007 here anymore so this is all based off memory and old measurements.

Also interested to know when these are available ? . Sounds like an Excellent companion to my very much loved 007

This is high class stuff from Fang. He should let his PR department handle this shit storm considering he cannot keep his cool. I feel like we are going to see another Fang public meltdown at this rate. He wouldn't always need to be on the defense if he and his company atleast made an honest attempt to take criticism and improve on it from there. The only thing they figured out was how to not make their headbands break. And they could only do this by yeeting ergonomics to the devil.

@spritzer Interesting. I always hear 'fables' of the original Omega so I was quite curious. The 2.9 is the best Stax phone I have ever owned by a long shot. Is the midrange on the 2.9 more akin to the 007mk1 or the more tilted midrange of the mk2.5? Or are the mid ranges pretty much the same

@spritzer How does the OG SR-Omega compare to the modern Omega II 2.9?

Spritzer may need to barge in on this one but as far as I can tell the SZ2/SZ3 turns out to not mean much. Seems to me that the SZ3 are the modern black international ones while the SZ2 can be any of the Japanese silver ones. Mine is an SZ2 007A (silver japanese) but the serial is 23XX and its brand new so most definitely the 007A 2.9. And it was. I port modded it after one song. The lower mid-bass emphasis and the one note bass tone made it really annoying. I actually was going to leave it unmodded for a bit to become "accustomed" to the stock sound so to speak. But that mid-bass was to shitty for me to leave it stock.

So I had the 009S for a bit but I went and got the modern 007A instead, wow.... Even though in its current state its underdriven (353X) It absolutely smokes every other Stax can I've heard or owned. Way better than the 009S and 009 and a meaningful step up from the L700. I just have to get a proper amp now (haha)

I'm actually surprised you didn't rip these apart even harder. The system was unbearably bad to me, I just don't understand how the hell they ever released this. It was the epitome of bin tier estat for me. I don't think i've personally heard a shittier stat than the Jade II for my taste. Not the Voce, ESP950 ; nothing offended me like this steaming pile of shit that Hifiman calls a headphone.

What are the sonic differences between the 007A 2.9 and the SR-007 mk1 (I know there is multiple versions, one of the better ones please). Sorry to intrude, thanks for help!

May I ask the fine folks here how the 007A compares to the 009S in tonality. I haven't spent any decent amount of time with the 007A where I could really evaluate it. I just have a slight worry that it'll be to dark for me.

@spritzer Yea I've been using the 009S for a few days and I've pretty much decided to return and get an 007A and do the port mod (any other good mods?). 009S while being very nible detailed and airy sounded unnaturally airy to me but not bright which was a weird sensation to be sure. It was like listening to each instrument play individually of each other rather than a whole musical piece per se. I do think to my ears it is better than the OG 009. I have never heard the 007A off a nice amp so I look forward to getting it and a Carbon shortly after.