Acer XB270HU I think its called. Its basically the ROG swift but more expensive and is IPS rather than awful TN. I don't mint giving 3ms difference for better viewing angles and colours.Do you think pascal will have much of an improvement over the titan x?
It's ur money, your call. Ignore those tell you what to do... giving no evidence. Watercooling will not deliver price/performance ratio. You will not notice any difference if you plan on gaming. The FPS boost from stock to high overclocking GPUs will result less than 15fps... And this is assuming your overclocking is stable.
For the CPU part, on gaming... forget abt it. No game requires high-end cpu to run smooth or better fps. Even highly cpu based games such as minecraft... don't utilize all 4 cores. X99 with 6-8cores... pointless.
At this moment, AMD does not offer any performance on their GPU/CPU. What they have is price. So speaking of high performance you should intel+nVidia. Or maybe wait for AMD300series.
If you opt to go Intel+nVidia. From my experience is that gtx980 SLI at TDP 165w*2. Even you overclock it, watercooling is unnecessary. You can take the heat to other location or direction depending on the radiator. And also let it run quieter. But speaking of performance, not so much of improvement if you want it stable.
If you take something like R9-295X2. tdp at 500. Watercooling makes much more sense, but less performance+spending more. I really don't think there's a reason to choose this config. Besides, it already come with AIO.
CPU overclocking is much more noticeable from my experience. Especially when you unzip files, or even in basic modeling/rendering. But I really doubt there's any reason to spend all that $$ "just" for the performance.
Go for a silent build with a custom loop and nice looking tubing etc... I think that will suit you best
So I've been using the AD700, which I love for the clarity and wideness, but I still feel there's something missing. Can't quite put my finger on it though. So I began browsing around some more, reading reviews after reviews, and decided to get my hands on the Hifiman HE-400.
The HE-400 is actually getting ready to retire (discontinued). My speculation is to give way for the new HE-400i, but that's just my personal opinion though. Even the authorized Hifiman distributor in my country don't stock them anymore. After searching around a bit, I decided to buy the demo unit from a store that still have the HE-400 demo unit. in my country. I got a special discount from the last retail price (which is around $350 in my country), because it's a demo unit.
So let's start from the outside, the physical attributes.
The packaging itself is very minimalist. Perhaps TOO minimalist, compared to its competitors. But somehow it makes sense. It's like they want to make a statement, 'our products are not the kind where you're strolling on a shopping center, see our packaging, and buy one on an impulsive drive. You look for our products because either you already have our products and are satisfied by it, or you heard good things about it and decided to buy one for yourself' Of course that was me talking, but I imagine that's what they're thinking
Its standard accessories that's included in the package are:
- Detachable cable (because it won't work without a cable ). Mine came with a Canare cable. I don't know if the Canare is their standard cable or not, though. - 3,5mm to 6mm adapter - Black velvet pouch
So let's take a look at the unit itself.
Just like the packaging, the unit itself is very minimalistic and utilitarian style. It doesn't implement blings, bells and whistles. No sexy curves, no harmonic colors, no nothing. Just plain cups attached to the metal headband. Again, I'd imagine they're making a statement, 'Its job is to produce good sounds, not giving out good looks. You buy it because you expect good sounds, not good looks'. I do love the dark blue with piano finish. The assembling is also very simple. It got screws in all of the moving joints, so we can tighten or loosen the joints easily.
Another thing to note is, this thing is heavy, compared to other headphones. It weighs at 440g without cord, almost half a kilogram. For reference, my AD700 only weighs 280g. For first few minutes, you'd feel the weight on your head, but after a while, you head adjusts to the weight. The trick is to keep the headband tight to the top of your skull. If there are some slacks between your skull and the headband, you'd feel it weighing your head down. The clamping force is also kind of tight, but again, you'd get used to it after a few minutes.
The cup's material is plastic, covered with metal (maybe aluminum) mesh. It's not cheap plastic though, it's thick, dense, and durable plastic. You can knock it with your fingernail to feel the density of the plastic. The standard pad that came with the packaging is the pleather (blend of plastic and leather) pad, or I use to call it synthetic leather. The pleather pads are very comfortable and cushy. Too bad, because of its material, it's hot and sweaty on the skin, especially for people living in tropical climate (like myself). Of course you can always order a pair of velour pads.
They use their own unique/custom connector for the detachable cable (not the usual 3,5mm plugs normally used by other brands). It's supposed to be bright gold, but again, because mine was originally a demo unit, so the gold layer has peeled off. The connector uses a unique coupling screw to secure the cable's connection. It's a fine touch, especially for clumsy people like me. I found myself stepping on the cable on the floor a few times. The cable should have yanked out, but it didn't, because of the coupling screws. For the first times, you'd find attaching-detaching the cable a bit awkward, but you'll get used to it. The bad news is, this is not the type of connector you'd easily find on radioshack or electronic components' stores. The good news is, they sell the connector (by pair, of course) online for $11. So you can just buy the connectors, and build your own custom cable. Or alternatively, they also have custom cables complete with the connectors on their online store.
The headband is also covered with pleather. Although the overall unit is kinda heavy, the headband really helps controlling the pressure on your skull. For the metal frames, they use thick metals with brushed surface. The metals are very strong. You can't bend it even just a little bit, with your bare hands (except the headband, of course). I also like the brushed metal style, as it looks good and elegant.
The minus point is the markings though. It's kinda cheap and rubs away over time, as you can see from the picture above. Just avoid touching the markings directly with your hands, because sweats and oils from our hands can speed up the process.
OK, enough with the exterior, what about the interior/sound itself?
First, you must understand that the HE-400 is a planar or orthodynamic (same thing, different name) headphone, meaning it uses planar drivers. Planar driver is not the same type as the dynamic driver commonly found on most headphones. Basically, dynamic drivers are like miniature cone speakers with a small magnetic disc to drive the membrane. Planar drivers use an array of magnetic chunks, or a big perforated magnetic plate to drive the membrane. If you wanna get more technical, read on here
We can see the difference visually:
Why am I even writing about this? The reason is, I found out that the 2 of them have very different behavior, and yield very different sound characteristic. I found the sound characteristic of the HE-400 somewhat similar to the Audeze LCD series, which also uses planar drivers with open backs. Of course the LCD series have better sounds than the HE-400 though, as they're on a different tier altogether. It's a bit different compared to the Fostex T50RP which also uses planar drivers, but with closed/semi-closed back, though. The sound signature of the HE-400 is EXACTLY what I found missing on my AD700. The sound is very warm and dense, while still maintaining good clarity. The AD700 sounds good, but too thin for me.
I'd say the HE-400 is a neutral headphone, leaning a bit to dark sounds, while still maintaining good high clarity. It's a bit sibilant, but good ones, not bad ones. I'll explain below. You can see the frequency response graph here:
You know when somebody talks or sings close to your ears, and you can hear a bit of density and sibilance, but as he/she moves further away, the density and sibilance vanished (become inaudible)? Well, the HE-400 does a great job at reproducing those densities and sibilances (the familiar sibilances, not the annoying ones )The result? Vocals on songs become more natural and intimate, as though he/she is really singing 3 feet away from you. I just realized, why a lot of good headphone I've tried, albeit having good clarity, still don't sound natural enough for me, still sound like a recording. It's the familiar densities and sibilances that were missing all this time.
So what else is different on the HE-400, compared to dynamic driver headphones?
I found that the HE-400 (and I imagine other planar driver headphones) is power hungry.
Hifiman claims that the HE-400 is so efficient that even small phones/media player have enough juice to drive it. I'd say, true and false. True, even my small crappy Nokia (you got me, I hate smartphones ) can drive it to decent volume, just a tad under normal enjoyable volume. My ipad 3 can drive it a little louder, reaching normal enjoyable volume. I don't have a smartphone, so I don't know how it will perform, plugged into a smartphone. But in order to reach its optimal performance, my phone and my ipad 3's amps seem to be not adequate.
When you turn the volume/power up, dynamic driver headphones usually just become louder. That's not the case with planar headphones. They become louder and BETTER sounding. Seriously, the bass, the clarity, the separation, they actually got better with higher volume. I feel like there's a threshold of volume for quality sounding. Meaning, to get the optimal sound, I have to turn the volume up to a certain level (above that certain level, it just got louder only). I'm using a xonar DG that's supposedly have quite decent headphone amp power. Set to the highest gain (>64ohms), I can only set the volume to around 50%. Above 50% volume, the sound started to 'sway'. The bass would get smaller, then normal, then smaller again. I'd imagine the xonar is struggling to keep up. Unfortunately, below 50% is just isn't enough to push the HE-400 to its potential. I ended up getting the Fiio E07k Andes as a headphone amp to drive the HE-400. Well, I ended up using the Andes as an external DAC and amp, because it sounds better than my xonar anyway
To put things into perspective, lets take a look at the spec comparison between the HE-400 and the AD700:
Looks close enough, right? In reality they behave very differently. Tested by playing a song in foobar, with the Andes as the DAC and amp, set to the highest gain (+12dB). With my AD700, 25 volume (on the Andes) is good enough. Any louder, and it started to hurt my ears. Switched to the HE-400, I need 45-50 volume on the Andes to reach the same loudness as with my AD700. From the specs comparison above, they shouldn't behave so differently in energy consumption, right? Well, that's what I meant, although the HE-400 could run on low power, it needs a lot of juice to sound good. That's why in audio community, planar headphones are renowned as 'performance dependent to what amp you're using', meaning to unlock their true potential, you'll need a good and powerful amp to feed them.
Back to the sound then, how is it?
Like I said earlier, it's warm, got great density, and familiar sibilant. Celine Dion's voice is one example where the sibilant actually make her voice better. Good separation between frequencies. The warmness and density makes instruments with natural low frequencies sound so much better. I found myself enjoying The Piano Guys, for the cello sounds. The cello they play sounds beautiful and hair-raisingly eerie at the same time. The highs are clear and nice, but not hurting at all. The warmness and clarity make the sounds more familiar and realistic.
What about the bass then? Now this is the interesting part. I'm not a basshead, and coming from AD700, I got used to low bass sounds. I didn't expect much from the HE-400 too, seeing that it's open backed. That's where I got a surprise waiting for me. The bass on the HE-400 is DELICIOUS!! I even set the Andes' EQ to bass boost, just to get that extra deliciousness. Seriously, it's the kind of bass you'd get from thousand dollars SQL car audio setup. It's punchy but smooth, it kicks but doesn't put pressures to the ears. It's so good, I can't get enough of it. Lindsey Stirling's Transcendence (trance version) sounds exceptional on the HE-400.
Soundstage?
Being open back, the HE-400 have quite decent wideness, although it still doesn't compare to the AD700 (which is very wide. I only found the HD800 that's actually wider than the AD700). I use the HE-400 for gaming, and I still got good 3D positional audio in the game. Like I've said above, the warmness and clarity make the sounds more realistic, and this also apply to games. In-game characters' dialogue and remarks sounds so much better. Even sound effects like footsteps, gunshots, etc sound more realistic. So don't worry about using the HE-400 for games, as it does its job in games as well.
1 More point that I find particularly interesting: when you're using an open back headphone, you're not supposed to cup/cover the back mesh with your hands (or anything for that matter), right?
PS: As I stated at the top of this post, the HE-400 is retiring. You can still find it on Amazon.com and head-direct.com (official Hifiman store) on discount price ($299, from $399). Amazon should be in the western regions, head-direct ships from China. So just pick which one is closer to you. That is if you wanna get one, of course Better hurry though, before they vanish altogether, like the E10 or the AD700...
PSS: Sorry for the oh-so-long post. I was just excited talking (or writing) about this magnificent headphone....
Donnyboy98 got a reaction from Aphala in The ultimate set up for gaming...
