New LCD-4 vs Utopia shootout from Innerfidelity.

Not my post, you should reply to him in the comments as "Mathematician1" and correct his calculations.

Yup, it's not really subtle at this point. Remember when you are listening to a recording that is bright as f**k that people like Bob Katz get paid to master music and choose cans like LCD-4 as their reference.

 

Haha, yeah, sorry, I should have made it clear I wasn't targeting you. (man, I'm running into the habit of doing this so often lately?)

I'm just being a scaredy cat and refusing to confront him directly on Tyll's website, because I have already tried that once before and nothing good ever came of it. I wrote that more to drive a point home to this site's readers, as I feel like someone else who's new to the site (currently, I'm seeing like 20 guests reading this post, for instance) may take that out of context. (sorry, not insinuating anything, just saying it could happen)

I think LCD-4 is actually harder to drive than it seems. Or in fact, I think most headphones are harder to drive than they seem. Manufacturers like to "play up" their numbers.

And that goes full circle back to Bob Katz, too, because he mentioned Audeze putting everything on a test jig. Maybe they forgot to thoroughly test the LCD-4 that they sent to Tyll?

 

Sometimes I wonder whether there are any hidden agendas or conflicts of interest when a so called 'authority figure' shows so much bias with his poor methodology and of course invalid results.

I heard eight Utopias and two LCD4s. The LCD4 fails at all counts with its dead sound and f**cked up treble that is so far away from reality it is ridiculous for me to even consider.

Utopia OTOH is the best headphone for me personally. It will not fit all tastes but for classical music it simulates live venues like no other headphone I heard.

I am biased of course towards ensuring I DON'T spend a stupid amount of money on transducers that are inaccurate and imprecise at showing the true colours of a recording.

 

I also got to try TheCableCompany's older rental Utopia unit and then ordered a brand new one for myself just recently. I noticed no tonal difference (it was significantly warmer than my SDR modded HD800s still) and sounded just like I remembered. All my other gear was identical still. So if there are units that sound different it must have been like literally the very first ones / review type units, or there is just inconsistency in the manufacturing not an actual sound signature shift. (I suppose I am assuming they got their rental unit early on but I think it was available pretty quickly after launch...)

I still want to hear an LCD-4 though, I may borrow one now that I have Raggy to see what I think. Because I do know plenty of people who genuinely love it that also like Utopia. Maybe they just prefer the signature... I did enjoy ie800 while aware it was horribly unbalanced.

But Utopia pricing is already terrible at MSRP, sounds like LCD-4 should be even lower.

 

I have not lived with an LCD4 on my system and compared it directly with my Utopia. The listening sessions I had with 2 LCD4s showed markedly shelved lower treble that was so audible that any positive attributes these had went straight out the window. My objective is a neutral tonally balanced sound. Other points of view would certainly shed more light on this.

Regarding the Utopias, @Serious and I compared mine with 4 new Utopias at Munich high end. My used Utopia sounded better with mildly less pronounced treble, more neutral flat mids and mildly less pronounced bass. All 4 new Utopias were similar sounding so it is possible it is due to pad wear / burn in of drivers. Serious thought so too. Measurements of my Utopia with another one by @Serious showed subtle more pronounced 500Hz to 3KHz with a flatter 4-5 KHz area. We really need more data from other used Utopia owners who can compare with new stock to ascertain this.

 

Guess they're still working on it.

Last whole bunch of paragraphs.
tl;dr: speakers and systems all sound different, but mine is THE reference [duck! e-peen swinging]

 

I don't have the experience some of you have, and I am willing to admit that my extreme sensitivity to higher frequencies is perhaps out of the normal range.

But I have a feeling there are others like me who very much enjoy the way Audeze headphones sound in general. With a Modi Multibit and Pro iCan, I have all the treble I need in my LCD4s given the money spent on the chain so far. Could there be more detail? Sure. But I'm using a Jitterbug with a USB cable to feed the Modi Multibit...and the Modi Multibit, while great, is certainly an entry-level R2R DAC. So I'm more willing to attribute any current remaining shortcomings in the sound to things other than my LCD4s. And I'm hardly wanting for detail as it is.

For what it's worth, seems that the LCD4 seems to retain more value on the second-hand market. And it does seem to be a polarizing headphone...people either love it or hate it. I haven't heard a Utopia but given all the descriptions I've read, I have no desire own a pair, although I'd like to audition them just to see how they sound. Seems that the Utopia and LCD4 have very disctinct sound signatures, and people who love the one will likely not love the other.

As far as reliability goes, I haven't heard of a confirmed instance of a 200 ohm pair of LCD4s going bad, a handful of the early 100 ohm models had problems but they took care of that pretty quickly and no one was out any money for that.

Finally, we can debate the "value" of 4k headphones all day...but what other choice do you have if you want the best? Of course it's laughable to assume that one $4k headphone is a bargain because you prefer its sound signature and the other is "overpriced junk" because you don't like the way it sounds. I think it's more reasonable to accept that we're all getting gouged, but we don't mind because we'd rather have the sound than the money. Things are worth what people are willing to pay for them, in high-end audio more than anything we should be well-acquainted with that fact by now. None of the prices we pay are "rational" to 99% of people.

That post above re: power requirements reminds me of an argument I had on HF where someone was convinced I had hearing problems because I was of the opinion that the Mojo can't drive the LCD4s properly.....only on HF....