Sennheiser HD650 Love (Appreciation Thread)

My new Romanian HD650 sound like my old Irish HD650, and are of the same quality, as far as I can tell just by looking and handling. Same cord, too.

 

I bought the new hd 600 a few months back. I had a fit thinking they possibly changed how they sound since they sounded so bad. There is a very harsh 5kHz peak that i could hear. It sounded very veiled in the treble. Sibilance sounded rough and grainy. Very warm fundamentals. I tried to like them for a week or two but gave up and returned them. Sennheiser needs to work on their treble in my opinion.

 

@Hands I appreciate the clarification. Somehow I missed the memo (and the thread that you linked also). I guess it's time to get your old stock 650 and put it away for a rainy day. Or not...

 

that new 7kHz cut is terrible.

 

I've got a pair from Romania and they sound like the typical HD650 when it's pre pad break in. That said at higher volumes the differences become more obvious theres something nasty going on even when I swap my pads from the Irish pair.


My Irish OG 650's have an inherently smoother, warm, lusher sound with the lovely timbre you'd come to expect.

In my opinion if you want a 650 get a used Irish pair. Parts are modular and it's unlikely the drivers will fail as they last forever. The pads would already be broken in too so sanitize em and job done.

 

How old is your used Irish pair?

 

I don't use my 650Ms that often, but I will never sell them.
(edit: especially now)

Just checked mine purchased in Dec 2015 and they don't have this hologram on either side. Seems to me those holograms would be easy to fake since they can make pretty much make anything in China ... ahem

 

The link doesn't work anymore but when I got mine I used the QR code on the box to check their authenticity, so I know mine are legit. They box also says 20140120REV01 so maybe they are earlier than yours and sat around for a while.

Edit: I see that 20140120rev01 code was used even on early HD6XX so I guess it's not relevant.

Edit2: just looked up my Amazon order, it was June 2016. Feels like it's been longer than 4 years but I guess they are 2016s not 2015s.

 

I remember checking the code on the box on the Senn website when I got the HD650s, but couldn't find anywhere to do it when I got my HD800 (NOS) earlier this year. Guess they gave up on it.

 

This is all pretty alarming. Will try and grab as many older pairs of HD650's as time and funds allow. I will Horde them !

 

2 years

 

After following the discussion on Romania vs Ireland I bought a new pair HD650 myself. Build quality is premium, same as it was in the past. Everything feels rock solid. Cable is identical apart from the missing Sennheiser logo. No reason to complain about the new version.

It sounds like a HD650, too. I have a 2016 HD650 and a 2017 HD600, these sound very similar anyways. The 2020 HD650 sounds like a typical HD650, nothing wrong with it. Right now I'd even say bass is a slightly bit better than on my old pair, that's most likely due to the new pads vs my old worn ones.

No reason for panic when it comes to the HD650.

 

I'm pretty certain the Romania HD6XX are still the same as the Ireland. They look the same to me in various photos on Drop (from Sept 2020), plus nothing has been updated. IE: The Sennheiser headband signing is the same and the L and R are still on the outer sides.

Also, the Romania box is the same (except it has a sticker with Romania) with the code 20140120REV01, which has been on every Sennheiser 600/650/6XX box from 2014 to 2019. The new 600 & 650 boxes no longer have it.

 

I think I've found the easiest mod to flatten out the boominess in HD6XX. It's probably not a new mod, but I haven't see anywhere mention it. Thus I post it here. I added 2.3 grams of wool to each of the cups, and that's it.I kept a little warmth to compensate the cold in my Gungnir A2's bal out. 3 grams of wool would make it even more neutral. However, it would be tricky to pack more than 3 grams of wool into the cup. I bought a pound of organic craft wool to mod T50RP, but found out wool does almost nothing to the FR except damping the bass a little, which turns out to be crappy for T50RP, but a great match for HD6XX. I bet a lot of you tried to stuff cotton ball in the cup, but cotton aren't as acoustically transparent as wool, which will mess up FR.

Here's the before and after on the SBAF 3.2 curve. The peaks and dips above 4 kHz are unit variation of my miniDSP EARS. I gave it a quick listen and it definitely sounds more clean and neutral. I don't think it changed any other sound characteristics beside the boom. Maybe absorbing rear reflection can help distortion, but I can't do reliable distortion measurement due to city noise.

 

I've stuffed my HD580 with ~2.5g of cotton ball exactly as you described here, result was subtle but positive, no huge FR change. Perhaps wool is better but cotton worked well for me.

 

How did you arrange the wool inside the cup? Picture is worth 1k words