Focal Clear

What's the risk if you buy from a place that has a good return policy? I'm not saying abuse the return policy just to try a headphone you can't afford but the policy is in place to give people like you, who live in remote places, the option to return a product if it doesn't work for you.

 

May not necessarily be the case. I know someone who pretty much put himself in credit card debt and sold off a lot of crud to buy the Focal Utopias when they'd just landed here in the Philippines. Scary thing is that the guy wasn't that much older than me. I know one's 20s are supposed to be for regrets, but damn bro.

Then again, he demoed the same extensively at a local dealer and seemed to like it. Wonder how he feels about them now, though I'm certain there has to be an element of "I spent $4,000 on this so I'm determined to like it!" to it. Happens all the time, but it's unfortunate nonetheless.

Having said all that, I did like the Elear under demo conditions out of certain sources that helped mitigate the effects of the suckout. As the Clear seems to have improved tonality quite a bit (HD650 spiritual successor is a huge pair of shoes to fill, but measurements seem to back it up) I can understand the massive hype, but buying anything based solely on someone else's impressions is a good way to burn through money. Try before you buy if possible (as I plan to), but if unavailable, see if anyone can help give a general idea of how something performs relative to something you're familiar with. Isn't that the point of the forums? Second-best is still pretty damn good.

 

Not a lot of meets in New Zealand...

 

Agree, the Utopia only very slightly edges out a stock 800 in a bit more resolve only which I feel mainly because of the stock HD800 slight soundstage exaggeration and resonance...

Yes but who today uses a stock unmodded 800?
I believe the HD650 is a good size soundstage most open cans need to at least have.

I was rather hoping for Focal to make a larger soundstage than current, but it is not bad, just seems to be on the minimum scale for an open can.

If so, then the Clear would be a slight notch down from an hd800,
Which means the determining factor here will be signature and focus preference...

Agreed...ridiculous situation with these cans.
Power/realism/control without finesse in signature (FR)..
Course Unrefined Brutes in upper range ...

Its really curious and could be that it's hard to get both optimal.

 

Correct.

Sometimes surprises me that some folks who have little idea of how the world works outside of the USA project their own experiences onto others.

 

For about 2k can buy you a pretty epic vacation from Auckland to NYC. You can stay in a nice hotel for a week, enjoy some of the greatest meals in the world, meet some very friendly people, hear a myriad of equipment at meets, and visit some of the highest end audio stores in the world.

At the end of it, you'll have a great life experience, awesome memories, and about 2k left over in your pocket. Seems worth it to me, instead of continually making 4k dollar mistakes based on internet hype trains.

 

This is true, but of no consequence. Even after taking this epic trip, you'd still be left spending coin on whatever it was that you demoed; and the benefit being that you have the ability to try before you buy is null unless the demo gear is the same/similar as your home system*.

I wouldn't see the purchase as a mistake, especially so when the ability to demo is next to zero. I would just say it's part of the process for a person who has less access to gear. The upside is that you now know that the Utopia didn't work, and for specific subjective reasons. With this experience, you can make a more informed buying decision on your next headphone. It's unfortunate that the "upside" at times comes at a cost.

*Admittedly, this argument could be less valid based off experience.

 

Ed Zachary. Store demos are of some value, but are not a panacea or a substitute for spending some hours with the piece of gear in your system.

I have been to New York before (lived and worked in the USA for 3 years and travelled widely). Again, folks are making assumptions about my circumstances that don't apply.

 

Agreed...ridiculous situation with these cans.
Power/realism/control without finesse in signature (FR)..
Course Unrefined Brutes in upper range ...

Its really curious and could be that it's hard to get both optimal.[/QUOTE]



I´m going to jump in and defend the Utopias here for entertainment purposes only. Please feel free to ignore

So at the summit fi level, let´s say $1500 and over we have the following options (only stock cans without EQ discussed)

1. Audeze LCD-4 : High chance of significant product to product variation, channel imbalance, driver failures. You just don´t know what you´re getting.Other than Tyll´s faulty Utopia seven others measured pretty much the same.


2. Hifiman HE-1000: Overly soft sounding and cheaply built. Will be obsolete fairly quickly as higher priced revisions have been launched in quick succession. Once the warranty expires good luck with Hifiman customer service and shipping to China at a declared value of $50

3. HD800/HD800S - Thin and uninvolving to most people who have heard other TOTLs. Bob Katz and his panel found the Utopia to be unrealistically bright and bass light, I bet they would throw the HD800 or HD800S out of the window. So if the Utopia has a messed up tonal balance the Senns are worse

4. MrSpeakers Ether Flow: I doubt anybody considers these the ´best headphones in the world´

5. Abyss: Do you really want that thing on your head for long listening sessions?

So going after the Focal is all well and good but seeing the state of the market I think they brought something good to the table.

The price is crazy which is why I waited nearly 18 months and bought a new unit for $2400 shipped with a 5 year warranty. As Marvey has said before these mega priced cans can be obtained for 30% to 40% off with patience and then the loss on resale if you don´t wish to keep them is a few hundred dollars instead of a couple of thousand.

 

I want to be very clear that I am not making any assumptions about anyone's life situation. I am only doing what anyone can possibly do, which is relate advice based on my own experiences.

Lord knows I've wasted a lot of time and a lot of money burying my nose in online information related to audio equipment, pouring over the latest flavor of the month, trying to triangulate information from a variety of sources in the hopes of reaching a eureka moment whereby I achieve the correct keys to open a portal into another dimension of sonic bliss. In my own experience, this has more often than not been a silly fruitless waste. Time is money and certainly money is money, and personally, in my experience, I've had much better, fuller, richer, and more fulfilling journeys once I turned off my computer and opened my front door. There is a whole world out there, and thousands of dollars buys you access to great deals of it to experience yourself. While equipment demos are certainly not a panacea, they are certainly quite a bit of a step up from simply reading words online, at least in my experience. Especially when you can work an audio pilgrimage into an otherwise fulfilling, noteworthy, and memorable vacation.

Again, I am making no assumptions regarding anyone's life situation, only meagerly attempting to relate my own learned wisdom. At the end of the day, sometimes you just can't read things online to gain that wisdom. More often than not it takes experience, whether that means travelling, going out there into the world, or indeed spending money on a regrettable purchase and learning your lesson that way.

It's all gravy.

 

@Rthomas, how could you forget the SUSVARARARARA!! I would like to hear your synopsis...

So, why get an overpriced Utopia? Because up until very recently there was nothing with proper tonality and presentation above a HD650 worth getting unless you were willing to mod and eq, and even then things were limited in various ways. Though now it looks like the new bar may become the Clear and Auteur, they’re reportedly still not on the performance level of a HD800 or Utopia.

If someone feels a modded or EQ’d HD800 does the trick then more power to them. To the rest of us that find it utterly unengaging with mouse-fart level slam, then the lesser evil amongst the remaining options is the Utopia. Due to price, build, service, and performance.

I was never quite happy with the stock Utopia, but after spending some time experimenting what lead to my eventual contentment was placing a circular piece of open cell foam over the drivers, with some minor EQ adjustments. The foam in particular helped with bringing it’s vocals a little forward and compensating for the treble colouration others have attributed to the Be driver. Which EQ was much less helpful with. Others may have achieved similar results with a synergistic tube amplifier.

Given the options the Utopia was for me the most pragmatic route to achieving a top level of performance without any major drawbacks, except for image size, unless I were willing and able to go two channel...

EDIT: Perhaps things should soon swing back to discussion of the Clear itself.

 

I would not throw 6K at a HiFiMan product. Never. Don't care if naked angels of delight hand deliver the music to my eardrums - not going to happen.

I think the situation is getting noticeable better with balanced tonality. I would rate both the HD800S and Aeon as having decent tonal balance. I might throw the HEKv2 in there as well - mine seems pretty even handed to me. Well driven + modded HE6 also.

The Focal Clear just might join the club too. That's something. Interesting thing is that most of these cans are under 2K, while the 4K uber cans have noticeably shitty tonal balance. If you are going to charge 4K for a headphone at least get the basics right, for f**k's sake.

 

@TonyNewman Alright we get it... let's move on from the Utopia's pricepoint and tonal balance. I'm sure it has already been discussed to death already in previous threads.

 

There might just be a reason that 99.9% of all headphones, at any price, have a totally jacked frequency response. Perhaps the minority that previously did not have this trait could only achieve it at the expense of other areas of performance.

Steering things back to the Clear. This to me is what makes the Clear potentialy the most important headphone since the HD580. There appears to be little to no trade off in it’s design that negatively impacts performance to achieve what seems to be very close to accurate tonality. i.e. it’s a super open design with minimal damping.

 

I get that, but it does not explain why this should make the sound on headphones artificial and odd enough that it is distracting. I attribute part of this to the distance of the driver to my ears, and to crossover, as well as room effect. Even so, its odd to me that this should be so obvious. Crossover alone can't seem to correct this. It's too bad.

Anyway, perhaps this is for a different thread.

 

Why did you assume i am in the US?

Not a lot in Portugal either but that didn't stop me from preferring to travel to a meet in the UK (would that be equivalent to New Zeland - Singapore?) instead of blindly buying gear and believe me I didn't have even have a forth of the budget of the Utopia and even then I perfected to try (even without my gear) and save the amount needed for the future.

Yes, it's true it's still a risk because of gear differences but I found that worked better for me, even regarding taking others opinions into consideration.

But that's just me, i know others prefer to save that money, that they can't "return" and get refunded and just risking it. Maybe the postage price and trouble to return them (unfortunately I am "forced" to buy outside of the country) makes it even less worthwhile to risk it.

Different strokes for different folks.

That is just insane imo.

 

Stream of consciousness impressions of the Focal Clear I have in to demo. I've had them for a couple of days.

Quick note for those who aren't familiar with my preferences: I love bass, and treble causes me fatigue very easily.

These are just going to be bullet points as I use the Clears. I'll only edit the bullet points if I answer one of my own questions.

• These were opened the day that I walked into the store, a few hours before I arrived. Not at all burned in.
• Earpads begin structurally stiff. Does it change over time? Answer: Yes, they've already become less stiff.
• Headband sleek but might not be padded or distributed well for the long haul. It contacts right at the crown. You know where the Sennheiser HD650 has an intentional gap in the headband padding so even the pad doesn't touch you? That's exactly where the Clear rests.
• Visually beautiful with excellent build quality. Some of the sexiest looking headphones I've seen.
• Much better bass/extension than HD650. Still an open headphone though. They don't rumble like closed cans.
• If you've tuned your system to the HD650, these are going to hurt your ears with the same setup. This is the type of headphone you build your system around. It's like the HD650 in that it's vaguely what we've all been trying to make our HD650s sound like. I can't use the same tube in the Liquid Crimson for both headphones (Clear demands something warmer). The Bifrost Multibit seems too bright with the Clear as well.
• Not as smooth as HD650. A more engaging listen, but doesn't let you lean back and forget about it with most music.
• They'd be ultra comfortable if my ears weren't as tall as they are. As it is, my ears touch the top and bottom of the opening to the earpads.
• Headstage is nothing special. I've seen people claiming outstanding soundstage, but they're novices. It's condensed, which is not the same thing as intimate. I can generally place instruments (imaging) and discern depth disparity, but it doesn't go very far in any direction. A few EQ notches actually make the depth pretty decent. Never had that happen before.
• Some treble roughness, some hotter areas in frequency response that are apparent in certain music. Upper registers of female vocals. Piano keys ~D6-F6 and associated harmonics.
• Some songs sound a little more tinny than I'm used to (U2 - New Year's Day).
• Tommy Emmanuel and most well-recorded acoustic guitar is sublime. I hate that word, but it's so effin' good with these. I listened to an entire album before trying a second genre and was convinced I needed these in my life.
• Symphonies... I'm not sure yet. It does a good job of extension, but certain chimes, cymbals, and some higher pitched horns bring some heat. Piano D6-F6 is hotter to my ear than the measurements are saying. Too much violin and my ears start to hurt.
• Electronic. Nope. Look, it does it better than most open headphones, but just because I can hear the full extension of Daft Punk - Doin' It Right doesn't mean it's doing it right. I need rumble, slam, primal impact. Listening to Andrew Luce - Yours Truly should start to make me feel sick to my stomach if I turn the volume up. That requires speakers, closed headphones, IEMs, or an external force (e.g. Taction Kannon, SubPac, subwoofer).
• Fast, not lush. Not exactly thin, but definitely not thick. These need a tube in the chain somewhere (to be fair, I say that about most headphones).
• Some have said they heard honky, but I'm not getting that. Forward, a bit tinny perhaps, but I've heard honky, and these aren't honky.
• Because these are so good overall, I decided to perform a super simple reversible mod. I grabbed the foam from an old pair of HD650 pads and popped it between the driver and pads on the Clear. Definitely tamed some of the heat, but also put a little haze on them. Possibly enough that I could go back to my HD650 setup with them? Not really.
• Anyone who thinks these have significant clamp has never used a Sennheiser HD6x0 when it was new. I can feel it at the jaw line, but I know the pads will soften up and reduce clamp, so it's a good thing.
• I'm still dubious about the timbre of these headphones. Bowed string instruments don't quite sound as natural to me as I want them to.
• The death knell of the stock frequency response for me is that I find myself turning the volume down below my normal levels. That means I would need to EQ or a perform mods to make them long term listenable.
• Burn-in: I'm still not sure if they're fully burned in. I haven't noted any significant changes in ~20 hours of music going through them.

Why I would buy the Focal Clears:

• They're the first $1000+ obtainable headphone I've actually liked.
• Tons of potential. A few mods should clear up the little problem spots for me.
• Much better bass extension than my HD650s.
• They are really exceptional for acoustic guitar / fingerstyle, and I listen to a lot of that.

Why I wouldn't buy the Focal Clears:

• Mild discomfort: I have very tall ears. They touch the top and bottom of the earpads. That won't impact most people. What will impact more folks is that the headband primarily rests right on the crown of your head, which makes it so they never quite disappear when worn. With the earpads, @dontfeedphils made a nice 3d template to put other pads on Elears and I assume it'll work for these. That would be a definite experiment for me. I would also likely grab a replacement HD650 headband and velcro it up top for additional comfort (velcro facing out to prevent any damage).
• I assume they'll go down in price like the other Focal offerings. It might be smarter to wait for a sweet deal closer to the $1000 mark since that will almost certainly happen.
• If I want to upgrade my Sennheiser HD650s--which I've spend considerable time and money building a system around--I now have to think about system synergy once again. That said, I have tubes, and tubes can tune the sound.

Before I forget, here are the EQ settings I used that made the soundstage push itself forward (caution: it makes the headphones less engaging, but it's fun to try anyway): 5922 Hz, Q 6.4, Gain -4; 8873 Hz, Q 8.9, Gain -3.1; 12082 Hz, Q 7.2, Gain -2.9