Neumann NDH 20

Neumann brand, Sennheiser tech, high impedance driver.

Build quality is excellent far exceeding the price tag, hefty weight, lots of metal, gorgeous finish and probably scratch prone so I take care how and where they're placed, incredibly sturdy gimbals taken straight from the HD630VB. I enjoy the precise click feel on adjustment as opposed to say a 4000$ LCD4 where it lacks any finesse.
Somewhat small headband padding, with large super comfy removable earpads made from a sort of memory foam having a gel feeling. I wanted something deeper yet comfort has been excellent with some soreness after 6-8+ hours of constant use.

As expected above level of clamping force for my above average head without any pressure points and overall giving a solid sensation of isolation. Glasses friendly. My ears do touch the padding but somehow it's not bothersome

Two cables provided, one coiled and useless, the other straight and pure annoyance. It retains its shape from the packaging so always in a tangle and never actually straight. Extremely microphonic, 3.5mm with 6.3mm screw on adaptor, no balance option as the HP is SE only. Bespoke 2.5mm locking type connector with the HD8 ones being compatible or worst case a bit of sanding will be needed. Overall it's a quality rubber unergonomic cable.

Isolation is very good, low frequency noise will still get in and sound muffled, with music playing even low level I can't hear the TV at moderate volume 2 feet from me. Leakage is virtually nonexistent even at moderate to high levels.

Sound quality:
Impressions are all over the place, more so that usual going into extremes. From my experience it's the most amp/gear sensitive headphone I've owned.

Stock I find it bass bloated and rolled off. Astonishingly it takes EQ very, very well and IMO it's a must unless using a lean bright amp. Basic adjustment:


Now the low end is more balanced with the rest getting rid of all bloat. Capable of fine treble shimmer if pushed just two dB, usually it's near impossible to make a rolled off HP level with just EQ.

The 150ohm 114dB driver sounds capable and willing even considering the closed back nature.

Linear, clean and punchy low end reaching as low as needs to. Lacks texture depth but making up for it in impact/sustain in the sub bass, an extreme rare sighting done well for open headphones even planar type. No bleed into mids I can identify. They're not bass monsters, TH900 fans will be disappointed.

Mids are chameleon like and as good as the coloration the amp can inject. A neutral amp will sound neutral, grain free, a bit boring. They remind me of HD58X mids, good but in the shadow of the 650. For a cheap closed can however I can't complain. BH Crack has an unusual high synergy here, mid tone is almost great, a touch grey that can almost be fixed with EQ depending on tube flavour.

Exceptionally smooth high end, sibilance free à la Audeze. No artefacting even if aggressively pushing EQ .g. +4dB and detail is preserved. Treble doesn't extend particularly high, wouldn't call it airy yet I can't fault it for what it does do and mostly gets out of the way. Can sound choppy by comparisons to open HPs

Suspiciously open sounding, similar to the HD250 without any of its flaws or massive spike. There's actual headstage and at no point does it feel congested. Each instrument, voice has plenty of space to breath, some semblance of layering.

Super dap friendly, my new go around the house, bedtime and general hard worker along the Sony WM1A. The same EQ needs to be applied, never exceeding 85% volume on low gain. A neutral with sprinkled richness sound, retaining the character of desktop powered just tone down 90% of the technicalities and weaker bass. Still much more engaging IMO than Andromeda or any other IEM.

If I had to nitpick to fault it:
-wish the pads were deeper
-better out of box cable including a short 1m.
-can't be balanced
-doesn't come in black
-isn't the HD650 with this bass in closed form
-mostly appeals for the church of Sennheiser adept

Sound wise I can't, it takes EQ so well, can be portable and does what it does so well it's unrealistic to want more if and it's a big if the amp is synergistic. The BH Crack gets my vote.

I've owned the NDH20 for a week, burn in was real, after two days it opened up and has been my daily driver and will be going forward for a while. I didn't like any of the current closed cans, always too many trade offs, didn't expect Sennheiser to fill the gap but they finally released the HD250 successor IMO.

 

The NDH 20 has been my daily driver since I reviewed it.

I'd limit the upper mid boost to 5Khz.

And it's high sensitivity/impedance load is a very compelling option to be used with tube amps. Unusual for a closed headphone.

 

It’s been my daily driver too. I’ve been working remotely and NDH20 + sonarworks individual calibration + can opener studio has been great for critical mixing of orchestral, opera and musical theater material AND listening to Spotify. I wouldn’t want to use it without EQ and I worried I’d made a mistake when I first ordered it. But it takes the EQ amazingly and is so competent underneath.

 

I wrote a review of these elsewhere, but I’ll say that I was supremely unimpressed with their sound, though the build quality is great.

Here’s the NDH20 versus the HD6XX (red) using a version of Marv’s EARs compensation.



I thought the much cheaper NAD HP50 sounded better than the NDH20 in stock form. But the NDH20 has low distortion and takes EQ well.

 

Intrigued by what I saw in this thread, I ordered a pair of NDH 20s a few days ago. The perhaps stupid reason that I did so was to learn about EQing HPs. I'm challenging myself to explore this aspect of listening, by making a significant (but affordable) investment in that direction. Once tamed, such an analytical headphone might be a good tool for evaluating gear and music when I'm in the mood to do so.

Part of the learning process is comparing experiences. I might well be interested in either loaning out my NDH 20s for extended times or donating a pair to the loaner program to encourage fruitful comparisons. Extended loan or donation kind of depends on my initial impressions of the NDH 20 and in how much interest there is on the part of others to seriously evaluate these HPs. If I kind of like the NDH 20s when I get theme and there is a lot of interest in the community to try them out, I might buy a pair to contribute as a full time loaner. If I'm disappointed and there is at least some interest in a loaner, I might make mine available for loan to reputable members.

 

I've used it for more than a year now. I bought it in Canjam Singapore 2019. It has been my go to mix headphone, replacing my Sony MDR-CD900ST and HD600. I find that the sound opens up with an external headphone amp.

 

@DEATHxMACHINE sent me his NDH20 for modding experimentation. Just thought I'd share some measurements as-is before I start tweaking.

Overall I like these headphones in their stock configuration but find them overdamped-sounding, slightly hollow in that 1.5k area, and generally sparkly and a bit colored in the top half compared to the Senns. I expected them to sound very V-shaped from the other graphs I've seen. Either there's unit variation or I need to re-evaluate my comp curve (though it hasn't steered me wrong yet). I'd consider these a strong contender for a 'balanced' tuning in a closed back. Hopefully mods can even them out and help with the soft sense of dynamics.

Stock pads (had to apply a good amount of pressure to get the bass to show linear-ish on the EARS coupler, and it still wobbled quite a bit while i was measuring) -


Without applying pressure (which is kind of more like it sounds on the head unless your ears/head shape is perfectly suited to the pads) -


With Alpha pads -


The Alpha pads seal better, which improves the tactility of the bass. 1-2k area is better, but we also get that 3k push (which isn't too bad compared to stock senns anyway so goes mostly unnoticed). I was actually pretty impressed with the bass out of these pads. Nice tactility and rumble (hence the graph showing down to 10hz)

Modded HD600 for reference -


I'll post a changelog after I open them up and start making tweaks. Looks like there's quite a bit of stock front damping, and taking it off might be irreversible if the foam tears. I'll be careful! Should be fun, I can tell these drivers are very capable (and I'm surprised learning they're only 38mm). I feel like these should go on a loaner tour??? Near-reference closed-backs at $499 is fair. I like these much better than Elegia at least.

EDIT - took off the pads and front damping on the right channel. There's no way that felt was acoustically transparent. Also... eerily similar driver to the 6xx driver (pictured). Wouldn't be surprised if they were identical. Could this be why @m17xr2b loves them so much?



Those baffles are super cool! I love the vaguely nautilus-like asymmetric flow.

EDIT #2 -

Rear of baffle and inside of cups (TOTALLY EMPTY?!) -



Unfortunately the rear of the baffle is totally glued over by a piece of plastic so tuning-wise we're already quite limited in terms of mods. That small black dot in the middle of the plastic piece is the rear driver vent, with a silk-screen filter. And on the front close to the cable entry there does appear to be a front vent as well. Will investigate these first. I'll also mass load everywhere I can and deaden the cups a bit, which will hopefully yield a clean and balanced result with removal of the front damping and a pad swap.

Edit 3 -

Removed stock damping. Stock pads, with a bit of pressure to maintain seal -


This is a huge difference vs stock particularly in the 1k-5k area. Microdynamics are clearly improved with the removal of the foam/felt, but we get a more jagged and 'hot' response. That stock front filter is nowhere near transparent despite the smoothing effect on the FR. seems like they skimped on designing the cups and baffle and just slapped that on there to get 'close enough'. Much work to be done, and I have a sense pad rolling will be a huge factor on these, especially since the driver sits closer to the top of the baffle. First point of reflection is very close to pad earhole perimeter. That'll be tough to deal with.

 

I have recently acquired the Neumann NDH20 but am finding them really quite uncomfortable to wear.

My head is quite narrow and I have very little hair! Most of the headband padding does not even touch my head and the center of the headband (where there is virtually no padding) sits on the top of my head making it sore. I am considering some dekoni nuggets to remedy this.

The ear cups are also too shallow. The orange felt and the plastic underneath press on the inner ridge of my ears making them sore. I am finding this worse than the headband. I could maybe try a pad swap to make the cups deeper, but this would change the sound. I am using EQ (AutoEq) and the pad change would invalidate this. I am not very confident about creating my own EQ.

@E_Schaaf Are the Alpha pads easy to fit to the Neumanns? Do you recommend them? Thanks.

 

As the prophet said, he who has many headphones will have even more. Having noticed my pair of HD600's, a coworker went out of his way to dig up and drop off his best pair of headphones at my desk so I could listen to them. I was suddenly filled with empathy for Timothy Dalton's complaint that after playing Bond he couldn't walk into a bar without someone buying him a vodka martini.

My coworker reportedly had no use for the Neumann's and they were advertised to me as an infinite loan. If there was interest, he just might be willing to let me put them into the SBAF loaner pool.



Amp: Jotunheim 2 / Mjolnir 2 (EH 6922) / DarkVoice 336SE (Psvane CV181)
DAC: Yggdrasil GS
Source: Tidal

General comments
The NDH 20's are an odd bird. They're the first and only headphones by a nearly century-old German company primarily known for studio microphones. However, unlike their legendary U 87 condenser, the headphones are not made in Germany, instead coming from China. But as someone else pointed out, the drivers appear to be sourced from Sennheiser, so what nationality you want to consider them is entirely up to you.

What they certainly are is closed back, which I haven't listened to a lot of. My last pair of closed backs were the puketastic Ultrasone PRO 750's. Thankfully, the Neumanns are a lot better, but so are two empty cans of Chicken Noodle duct taped to your head.

Honestly, the NDH 20's are good headphones. They're just not my style. They are dry and bright, and I don't like dry and bright. That's OK though. They have excellent clarity, resolve, and no catastrophic errors for the price.

They're lively, similar to how the Focal Clear Mg's are lively, which of course implies there's some dips and scoops in the FR, but none of them are fatal. Listening to Max Roach's "U-Jaa-Ma," trumpets and the mid-range can feel a hair dull, the treble is *just* on the edge of sharp metallic, the bass is detailed and tight but lacking in volume, extension and slam. That's OK though. None of this pisses me off too much because it's really clean sounding. Not that cohesion is great, it isn't, but again, it's all within a reasonable tolerance for a $500 closed back. And you can correct a lot of it with gear synergies.

They're amp sensitive, but not a shapeshifting chimera like the HD800. I tested with three amps that run the gamut from neutral-dry to atmospheric river and the pairing results are exactly what you'd expect. They're too dry on Jot 2, better on MJ2 except too dry treble, and best on the wet DarkVoice with a mega-warm CV181 tube. With enough decay and tubey-ness, the Neumann coalesces into a reasonably balanced sound. I would expect them to scale well with better gear.

And despite being 150-ohm, they also work well with cheap gear like my iPhone. If all I had was these and the iPhone, the listening experience is honestly pretty decent for the compactness of the package. I'd probably still prefer Bose Quiet Comforts, but this seems nice to travel with, especially since they don't seem fragile, as the build quality is superb. The headband design is also excellent, and they are usable with glasses.

Comfort and accessories are a mixed bag. They clamp too tight, are kinda heavy, and I found them not really suitable for long sessions. For cabling, they give you two cables, but one of them is a kinked piece of shit. There's also no factory balanced cable, although 3rd party options appear available.

Do I recommend these? Maybe. If you're looking for a set of closed backs, I'd potentially consider them, especially if what ZMF or Dan Clark offers isn't your ticket. The NDH 20 articulation is excellent and they may prove a good companion on the road for short listening sessions and also in static setups with properly synergized gear. Flat headstage with pancaked layering is to be expected, but that isn't fair criticism in this category, as they do what they're supposed to do well, which is isolation, seal, and reasonably good performance across the board. Comfort is meh, but they're not awful.

Damn, it's 3am. That's what I get for drinking coffee after lunch.