Sennheiser HD 800

[XiiXii808]

I was thinking of upgrading from my HD 598's i love them so much had them for 3-4 years and still working amazing but i was eyeing the HD 800's for a while and was wondering if the price tag is worth it for the headphones?

[Guest]

You should listen to them first, I think they are worth every penny and I will buy them eventually but wow are they expensive. I wouldn't advise buying a ~$1000 headphones without giving them a test first.

[GamerDude]

2 hours ago, XiiXii808 said:

I was thinking of upgrading from my HD 598's i love them so much had them for 3-4 years and still working amazing but i was eyeing the HD 800's for a while and was wondering if the price tag is worth it for the headphones?

I'm not gonna advise against it, but for HD600/650/6XX, HD700 and HD899/800S to shine, you must have good source and audio gear. The HD800 is so resolving that, if you have crap source, it'd highlight such a weakness. Make sure you have a good DAC stack/combo so that the HD800 would shine, also check out the SDR Mod for the HD800, it makes it sound closer to the HD800S w/o sacrificing soundstage.

[Max_Settings]

11 minutes ago, GamerDude said:

I'm not gonna advise against it, but for HD600/650/6XX, HD700 and HD899/800S to shine, you must have good source and audio gear. The HD800 is so resolving that, if you have crap source, it'd highlight such a weakness. Make sure you have a good DAC stack/combo so that the HD800 would shine, also check out the SDR Mod for the HD800, it makes it sound closer to the HD800S w/o sacrificing soundstage.

^^^^ Yep, you will require good music sources as well as a good Amp and DAC for HD800s. I didn't like the HD800 stock. I liked the HD800S, so if you get the HD800 you must do the SDR mod to them.

[xtroria]

Focal clear seems to have high remark in innerfidelity and is currently in their wall of fame. I'd check that out

[Guest]

9 hours ago, XiiXii808 said:

I was thinking of upgrading from my HD 598's i love them so much had them for 3-4 years and still working amazing but i was eyeing the HD 800's for a while and was wondering if the price tag is worth it for the headphones?

My vote’s for the HD6... series; however, if you have the cash and a good (FLAC, or highly-sampled ACC file), I think the HD800 would be fantastic.  I still enjoy the 2014 tour of their (high-end) assembly site. Let us know how it goes...

[GamerDude]

3 hours ago, PrometheanCat2 said:

My vote’s for the HD6... series; however, if you have the cash and a good (FLAC, or highly-sampled ACC file), I think the HD800 would be fantastic.  I still enjoy the 2014 tour of their (high-end) assembly site. Let us know how it goes...

That's why I'd mentioned good source, the HD800 likes good source. I myself have a library of about 2-3 TB of WAV and FLAC and about 3-4 TB of DSD tracks.....

[Guest]

16 minutes ago, GamerDude said:

That's why I'd mentioned good source, the HD800 likes good source. I myself have a library of about 2-3 TB of WAV and FLAC and about 3-4 TB of DSD tracks.....

2-3 TB of FLAC ... ... ... good god. Were you ripping from CD via EAC? That’s a slowwwwwwwww process. And WAV.... entire songs!? Wow.

[GamerDude]

29 minutes ago, PrometheanCat2 said:

2-3 TB of FLAC ... ... ... good god. Were you ripping from CD via EAC? That’s a slowwwwwwwww process. And WAV.... entire songs!? Wow.

Entire albums, I have a friend who rips entire albums into WAV or FLAC, he has a good ripping program which he'd bought online, apparently, that program is relatively fast so he'd ripped both our entire CD collection. All this was in the course of quite a few months......now, getting DSD tracks is another level of difficulty and cost. Oh yeah, I do have some songs in 320kbps MP3's......but these are tracks that I can't get anymore so I've kept them. I would prefer to have only WAV, FLAC and DSD, but oh well.....

[Cookybiscuit]

15 hours ago, XiiXii808 said:

and was wondering if the price tag is worth it for the headphones?

Absolutely not, they certainly are not 5x better than a HD650, for example. They also have a type of sound that not everyone will like, having quite a gentle bass and somewhat over-pronounced highs. They also have their annoyances from a usability perspective. They are enormous, heavier than most headphones and have almost no clamping force. I pretty much can't look down without them slipping out of place when wearing them, and wearing them at the same time as a VR headset is out of the question. They also aren't amazingly well built/designed despite the cost. I treat mine well, but the shitty velour lined plastic thing on the headband has already started to crack after only a year or so, and the headband adjustment doesn't snap into place as firmly as I like, meaning they often move from where you adjust them. A lot of the replacement parts for it cost more than a good pair of headphones, which is also annoying. 

 

Pretty much unless you value clarity and sound-stage above all else, don't buy them. Those are its two stand-out features, and it does those amazingly, brilliantly well. It's best to try them before you buy, but if you can't, luckily they are probably the most wrote-about headphones on the planet, so if you want a pair you have no shortage of shit to read to help you decide if they are something you'd want. If you get them and decide they are shit, they hold their value really well, so you wont lose out too much. Just don't buy from a Sennheiser certified shop, there's no reason to pay MSRP when you can get them for 75% the cost grey-market.

[SeraphicWings]

The HD800 has extremely good clarity and sound-stage, probably the best one out there. But the highs tends to be harsh to some ears. So please try to listen one before thinking about buying

 

Another thing to mention is that these cans requires a very good dac/amp and audio sources to shine and we're not talking about those little Modi and Magni stacks here.

 

Long story short, invest on HD800 only if you have lots of money. Look for used HD800 on head-fi, they are around $700 ~ $800, then look for a higher-end dac/amp like an HDVD800, for example

[Dackzy]

They are absolutely brilliant headphones. They have amazing separation, while also having probably the biggest soundstage I have ever heard from a headphone. Though there is one thing they should be better at, and that is the upper mids, they are a bit recessed, like a 2-3dB boost would really help out a ton. I guess that it is a good thing that they EQ so well, so you can add the extra upper mids, though I am personally not the biggest fan of EQs.

The comfort is also pretty amazing, I can easily use them for 7 hours straight, which is something I have done.

When you look at other headphones in its price range, then the HD800 really is the best in both value and in technicality, nothing really comes that close to them. Like Focal Clear are less detailed and on the technical side not up to par with hd800, but they cost 500$ more than a new set of hd800, though their signature is also quite different. Though the Clear are also good headphones.

 

As others have said they will show you if your source is bad. If you pair them with something like the O2/ODAC, then you are going to have a bad time, while if you pair them with like a valh2 and a soekris DAC1421or just the 1421, then you are going to have a pretty good time. Also badly mastered music will sound incredible bad, you will be able to pick up on every little flaw the song has.

I personally think it is amazing to hear all of the small details in songs, but the downside is that you will also notice how poorly most of the popular music is produced. I was personally about to buy a set of HD800 not too long ago, but I went with a set of studio monitors instead, since I am trying to move a bit away from headphones, but who knows I might get my own pair in the future, instead of loaning a set.

 

But remember to try them before you buy them. They might not fit your taste.