Focal Clear

Truth is, the HD650 have that 3D soundscape magic.

The Clear have it too, but HD650 can match or exceed the Clear in at least this regard.

Despite being outclassed in a variety of ways the HD650 is still a strong contender. It is about as detailed as the Clear.

Clear is more suitable for listening at low volume. HD650 loves to be loud!

Edit: Gotta add one more thing about Clear, the pads get gnarly, gross after a while. Gentle cleaning solution, sponge, and water, air-dry. Works. I am wearing these cans for hours everyday.

 

I think red bottoms on high healed shoes is (or was) a fashion statement for women. Perhaps Focal is working that angle. After all, there are a lot of women in pro music, and fashion and pop music are close cousins. At least the Clear Pro is a good headphone, as opposed to the Pryma or other crappy "fashion headphones". It's quite possible Focal might start a trend away from Beats for the glitterati.

 

Being a big fan of HD650, all this talk of Clear being a super HD650 does interest me. And I do have a feeling the Clear would outperform the HD650 in many aspects, for most people with average gears.

My question is, if the Clear is indeed the super HD650, does the Clear scale as high, or even higher than, HD650? I never truly appreciated the HD650 until I heard it with the EC Studio, the pairing was insane and it utterly slaughtered almost everyhing else I heard. When driven by a truly TOTL amp like Studio or something of that caliber, does the Clear still scale as high as HD650 or would it hit its ceiling before that happens?

Honestly, I don’t give a damn if the Clear sounds better than HD650 when using amps that don’t do HD650 justice (which IMO are the majority of amps). The ZDT Jr which I recently favorably reviewed is decent for the price, but still nowhere as close to revealing the HD650’s true potential. If the Clear has the potential to sound better than something like Studio/HD650 (of course, given a TOTL amp is also thrown at Clear), then I’ll gladly accept Clear as the super HD650 we’ve all been waiting for.

 

Songmic

How would you compare Liquid Glass+HD650 vs Studio+HD650? Would you say the LG able to max HD650 potential too, like the studio?

 

Nope, not by a long shot. The LG is made for HD800 or moderately efficient orthos like Code-X. The LG/HD650 delivers technicalities but it’s not an optimal pairing in terms of tonal balance.

 

Now this is still mostly speculation as there just isn't that much hands on subjective pairing experience data available, but I would prepare for a disappointment. The Clear impedance/phase/sensitivity is just the polar opposite. It's a new synergy search and what sounds best on HD 650 will likely be nothing special or downright poor on the Clears. Especially all the highish output impedance OTL tube amps (transformer coupled with low output impedance should be fine) will be a horrible matches due to a compromised damping factor and way too much frequency response alteration in the bass range. The good news is that synergy with the Clears should be fairly cheap to find as there's no real need for the huge voltage swing capability etc.

Also since it's closer to the Elear in technicalities I wouldn't expect spectacular scaling ability, it's no Utopia in this regard. Unless a miracle happens the HD 650 will continue to scale much better. The Clear follows the contemporary "spend less on source, most on headphone" trend just like the HD 660 S. It's bad news for many high end amp manufacturers that's for sure. If you ask me this pairing issue will be a major reason a significant amount of HD 650 users with high end sources for that particular headphone will opt out of "upgrading" to the Clears in the end.

 

This is what I fear exactly. I've had firsthand experience with how endlessly the HD650 scales with better gear and know how tough it would be to beat the HD650 in that regard. I'm concerned whether people who praise that Clear is the super HD650 have actually heard what the HD650 is truly capable of and are saying that. Heck, I might've said the same thing had I not been lucky enough to listen to HD650 through the EC Studio. That's why I feel declaring any headphone a "super HD650" is a really bold claim.

Though there are some exceptions, my general experience with headphones is that those with high impedance (e.g. 300-ohm HD600/650/800 vs HD660S/700, or 600-ohm DT880 vs 32 or 250-ohm DT880) or low sensitivity (e.g. HE-6 vs HE-500) tends to scale higher and thus have the potential to sound better, but when poorly amped they won't sound as good as the easier-to-drive ones. Take TH-X00 vs HD650 for example. Both are decent phones, but if they're driven from the 3.5mm out of a phone without an amp, I'm sure most people would believe that TH-X00 is the superior sounding one. Then you bring out a high-end amp like EC ZDS, and the tide is reversed; the HD650 is undoubtedly the better headphone.

Again, this is all purely speculation. I've never heard the Clear so it might scale surprisingly well despite its low impedance/high sensitivity specs. I'm saying, what if people are deluded into believing the Clear is super HD650 in the same reason they would be deluded into thinking TH-X00 is superior? Because if that's really the case, perhaps the Clear is a "poor man's HD650" (I know it's ironic since Clear is more expensive than HD650) who have yet to bear witness to the HD650's scalability with $$$ uber amps.

 

I liked it out of the low gain of the Zana Deux. The ZDS has such a thick and rich sound that it helps.

Yesterday heard Chet Baker out of some amazing full range speakers and it was beautiful. Then I listened to the same through the Clears and Aficionado and the voice just sounded so off. The HD650 just does tonality so well in comparison.

 

I personally feel like the scaling stuff is described in a disproportionate way.

Yes the hd6x0 old and new drivers scale quite significantly with better gear, but they never sound bad off a phone or something and they never really compete with summit-fi headphones off a mediocre source.
They're just a well tuned headphone with really good timbre and mid tone which is revealing enough of source to scale with it.

I don't think you can say the thx00 is just subjectively better. The driver has better technicalities and can resolve more than the hd6x0, the 6x0 is just a really well tuned driver so it will sound less coloured in mid tone and general timbre.
Also from my experience biodynamics are quite revealing of source despite whatever impedance they might have.

I can't do multiqoute well on mobile.

Synergy aside I still don't think an hd650 on a great setup will outresolve the clear on a decent mid tier setup. Things like tone and timbre will need work but this infinite scaling concept seems to be spread without any sense of proportionality.

Just because the 660s doesn't scale as significantly it doesn't mean the 650 will suddenly outresolve it due to synergy.

 

TBH, i was a bit underwhelmed with the 650 after having read its praises for years here. I finally got to hear the 650 out of @thegunner100 's chain of the Eitr->Yggdrasil->ZDT->650modded at the recent NY meet. It did sound good, but really wasn't something I got excited about. Heard the same chain with the clears, and they did have better technicalities, bass, dynamics and didn't sound veiled in comparison. The opening guitar solo from the opening of Hotel California(live) sounded much better on the clears compared to the 650s. The soundstaging was also better, as the 650 sounded 3 blobish to me when listening to the Rite of Spring....I just couldn't get into it with the 650s after hearing the Clear. Sure you can argue the ZDT is not a studio, but I don't have an interest in paying 7k for an amp to maximize a HD650. If I had that money, I would rather spend that to get a Utopia from our sponsors here along with a EC AF. Realistically speaking I feel the diminishing returns are already strong from the ZDT/ZDS on and even before that point. Regardless of the hd800 scaling....I don't think I'll ever like that headphone.

I actually likethe Utopia more than the Clear, though with my current funds, I would rather have an ok amp like the T3 and a clear compared to having a Utopia with the built in amp of the soekris. Might change my mind about the Senns if I ever hear them out of a DNA stellaris....but then again I would not consider buying a 6k amp.

Only way is to have a listen, and see what you prefer. 650's probably sounded amazing and its a marvel at scaling but at the meet, I clearly preferred the Utopia and Clear.

 

Agreed. Lets draw a mental graph. Imagine performance on y-axis and amp ballerness on x-axis. Scalability could be the slope of a line (steep slope means tons of scalability) and peak performance might be the relative position of the line. So hd650 may have a steeper slope and sit lower down than the clear (or whatever) with a flatter slope but higher relative position along values of y. Ok well that sucked. But it helps to explain why the utopia even on a Vali2 sounds f'ing boss probably even compared to a 650 on a EC amp.

 

Here you go:

 

Nailed it @Boops

Well except that in this case the clear may always outperform the 650 regardless of the ballerness of amp dimension. It's an empirical question LOL

 

Yeah, the crossing point — and whether the lines ever cross — is debatable.

 

Umm, what is "ballerness"?

 

Read our amazingly technical discussion above. Ballerness is the qualify of amp, of course...

 

Thanks. I did read it. I thought there might be more to it or some history to the term.

update: ok, I had to look up "baller". Clearly I am not one

kids today. grumble grumble.

 

How do I interpret this graph if I thought the HD650 was better than Utopia on the EC Studio?

EDIT: I guess all I’m saying is I like the original graph and concept. It helps explain the differences to people like me (non-ballers)

EDIT 2: I think I’m being misunderstood -see later post by @aufmerksam. The EC Studio is the most baller amp I can think of
and that line f’s the whole graph. I will acknowledge, though, my above remarks are douche-like, I apologize.