First time going to CanJam, this has been a fantastic experience! So many headphones at one place? Surely that only exists on this sub, right? But, alas, I got to experience so many headphones (to the point that I can’t really tell anymore). So, let me summarize my experience a bit.
What this post is: My (inexperienced) experiences and rants.
What this posy is not: Definitive answers to anything, really.
TLDR: STAX SR009S good; HD820 bad. Bass and vocals good; sibilance bad. Also, I just don’t understand Meze Empyrean.
Test tracks:
- Soothing by Laura Marling
- Smooth Criminal by Michael Jackson
- Starboy by Weeknd (ft. Daft Punk)
- Titanium by David Guetta ft. Sia
- And other ones I came upon but not familiar with.
Caveats:
I haven’t tried many headphones at CanJam yet. Also, I’m no way near experienced in audio or gear. I daily drive a pair of 58X and that’s about it. I also can’t really say much about DACs and AMPs since I don’t have much experience with them.
Awards
My favorite: STAX SR009S. Man, these drivers are fast! This is perhaps the only time that my jaw dropped when I heard a pair of headphones. I couldn’t properly gauge the details given the short time period and noisy environment, but I will say this is easily one of the most impressive presentation I heard today. For fast tracks, each note hits so quickly. Maybe the only downside is the lack of intimate and thick vocals, but I will reserve my judgement on that. I have yet to try all the other STAXs, and I really need to.
Best Bass: TH900 MKII. For bass heads, this is a dream. I mean the sub bass is intense. I daily drive a 58X, and I heard sub bass that I never heard before. This headphone has its flaws of course: the sibilance is bad at times, and the treble is just too much. I can stand a few minutes of rumbling fun, but I don’t think they will work for some songs. I need to give LCD5 another listen and see if I stand corrected on this category.
Best Display: ZMF. A whole room of beautiful headphones? Yes please. I only got to hear the Caldera today, and I liked it a lot. I think it is one of the only ones that left an impression of good vocals combined with all the planar goodness. It somewhat reminds of the Sennheiser sound, but just better.
Worst pads: Grado pads. I tried one of their flat pats, and they are just uncomfortable. They feel like hugging industrial carpet with your ears. Really, Reddit is correct: get alternative new pads.
What I don’t Like: HD820. They don’t have a chance next to the 800S. Pass.
What I don’t understand: Meze Empyrean. I’m a little baffled. I heard this headphones three times today (if I’m not mistaken). One time was an unfamiliar track but properly driven (it was just meh?). I literally wrote “Not much an impression on me”. Another time I thought they were not properly drive. Finally, I was at the Meze booth and tried them on the Ferrum stack. Now we are talking, but I still vastly prefer the Meze 109 (which is very good). To me, the Empyrean is a bit too warm, almost claustrophobic at times. Maybe I need more time.
What I want to try: Hifimans, Focals, many more ZMF and STAXs. Maybe some IEMs as well?
Statistics
Let’s get this out of the way! To keep track of what I heard and what my thoughts are, I had a form in my phone for every headphone I listened to! At the end, I gave each experience a score from 0 to 10. Obviously no headphone got 0s (only reserved for awkward silence) and one particular headphone did get a 10. There are a few headphones that I heard multiple times (possibly with different sources), and each time I gave a separately. Also, there is obvious bias, especially those I heard early on. So bear with me, and I really need to get some another go. Now, let’s look at the scores each headphone get:
Averaged scores of each headphone.
Caveats: I don’t think I have a good handle on LCD headphones, evident by their all-over-the-place scores. Also, I didn’t spend much time on the LCD5, which I listened to on an unfamiliar track.
Here is an overall distribution of all the scores:
Conclusions
This post is getting long, and I hope people enjoyed the useless statistics and rants! Obviously I have a long way to go on this journey, but at least, this is a good start! Chime in if you too have impressions from CanJam!!
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