You just tried some of the brightest, most analytical headphones at the price. Maybe you just didn't enjoy the sound signature. I personally don't like either of them too. Both are too thin and tense for my taste. Try something with a more casual tuning. Find out what you enjoy and what you don't. Move from there.

Headphones can create a mindblowing experience, even with low-fidelity content. I'm honestly struggling to even hear the difference between regular mp3 and lossless, no matter what gear I use.

Depends. They all have different strengths and weaknesses. In terms of resolving abilities, I would put them slightly below Sundara but above Phantom or HE5XX. Slightly above Verum 1 or HE400se. But again, it depends.

With lambskin pads, they have fun bass and casual warm tuning but an intimate presentation, kinda like a more V-shaped HD58X or warmer HE4XX. Having a bit more isolation they feel rather semi-open, similar to Verum 1. Their biggest issue is the weird midrange that lacks eargain so it's like there's a huge hole in the upper mids making them sound kinda nasal and compressed. But bass is really impressive and it's a great all-rounder.

I prefer them with velour pads. With them, they sound spacious and engaging. You loose the sub-bass, but upper mids are better filled, and the overall clarity improves. The dynamics is also better as they generally sound less dampened and more impactful, even more than Sundara. The biggest change is the soundstage - it's like the complete opposite of lambskin pads. Now it's a proper open-back. Significantly more spacious than Sundara, so it's more like HE5XX or Ananda, or given the midrange-oriented signature, more comparable to something like Avantone Planar or LCD-2C. Their overall tonal balance is actually pretty neutral but their treble is not smooth. It's like everything above 1k is a bit darker except for mid-treble so they sound warm, thick, and relaxed but also airy and sweet. That makes them a bit fatiguing and sibilant, but also my favorite for relaxing music like this because they bring out the best of it.

I wouldn't recommend them as your only headphone though (at least not with velour pads). I don't think they're comfortable enough to be used all the time. It's more like a sidegrade headphone that's great for specific use and I use them only when I'm in the mood for them and when I start to feel uncomfortable I swap them for something else.

One of my favorite headphones with velour pads. Good deal.

For me, it's one of the least comfortable headphones I've tried. The headband is super-stiff which doesn't work well with its weight and loose clamping.

After he called 660S hot garbage and Ananda technically worse than R70X I stopped listening to him. His measurements are useful though.

I don't know what exactly are you looking for but when it comes to bass, DT990 and K702 are similar in terms of dynamics. The difference is the bass on DT990 is a bloated muddy mess while K702 is rather neutral. K712's bass is similarly neutral to K702 but it sounds noticeably more dynamic/engaging and more refined in the treble.

Someone mentioned that Sennheiser is working on a successor to 660s. Or at least a revision. We’ll see.

I think it’s also very likely Hifiman will release the stealth version of Sundara and HE6.

I don’t know if anything will happen in 2023 though.

In my experience, DDs are usually better for spatial localization than planars. I don't mean that any DD is better than any planar, but in general, the best imaging on planar is not as good as the best imaging on DD.

Sundara is IMO decent but nothing special. In your case, it's probably more about closed-back vs open-back. Or bloated mess vs clean-sounding headphones.

Everything is important. It doesn't matter what it is that makes it enjoyable. The point is that there has to be something that makes me want to use the headphones and at the same time I shouldn't be annoyed by something else too much.

But if by transience you mean dynamics I have to agree that it's often overlooked. A good example of this is Thieaudio Phantom which is a pretty terrible headphone overall but it does dynamics so good I still keep them as a benchmark. Another examples are DT900, HD660S, or K712. People often say that they're not worth it because of DT880, HD600/6XX, or K701/612/702, completely ignoring a huge gap in the dynamics. On the opposite, this is also the case with Hifiman's non-round open-backs which on the opposite lack the dynamics and people often ignore it, saying for example that Ananda is the straight-out upgrade from Sundara which isn't true.

The only thing that makes it unnatural is the U-shaped tonality with distant upper mids and emphasized treble. I guess that's also why many people say the soundstage of HD800S is unnatural.

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>Audeze offers leather and leather-free options. Are the leather ones an improvement over the leather-free ones (aka the ones I have)?

AFAIK the difference between leather and leather-free pads shouldn't be higher than the difference between each individual pair of pads of the same type.

The real question is, do you have the latest thinner 2021 pads or the memory foam ones? The latest ones should improve both bass and midrange.

I agree with most of your findings. 560S is so bright I thought they were broken and got another pair just to confirm they're really bright. It's mostly about the imbalance between lacking fullness in the lower mids/upper bass vs emphasized lower treble while also being a bit peaky in the upper treble. I actually find 58X to sound more neutral. But with 58X, pads are very important. Out of the box they are even a bit sibilant. When pads are worn they're too muffled and that's when it gets muddy. Here is the FR of 560S against my target and here is 58X.

Let me give you another example. 58X and 660S have the same signature with very similar tuning and spatial qualities. 58X has just more bass and treble. But even if you EQd them to have the same FR, 660S would still sound miles better in terms of resolution and dynamics.

Let me give you an example.

The FR of Susvara and Nan-6 is almost the same. In fact, there is more variation between different units of the same model than between them. And yet they sound completely different. Yes, they sound very similar in tonality but that's literally the only thing that's similar between them. The spatial qualities, resolution, or dynamics aren't things you can read from the FR graph.

These talks about headphones being minimum phase systems and that FR is the only thing that matters are all just theoretical. In practice, the FR graph doesn't tell you anything but tonality. And even the tonality is only relevant to the specific measurement rig, headphone unit, and position on the rig.

That's also why headphone measurements by ASR are not very reliable because Amir only measures 1 position. And that's also why 5128 is the best rig ever only theoretically. It's so incredibly sensitive to positional variation without having stable resonations it's more practical just using Gras...

It's more about sensitivity than impedance. Actually, I would be rather worried about impedance being too low than too high. Most motherboards die at low impedances (below 32Ω). But if that was the case, you can always get a $10 Apple dongle. For high impedances, the headphone would also need to be inefficient which is rare at high impedances. Such examples are DT880/990. But for example, I have no issues driving a 470Ω R70X off my motherboard. Of course, I don't know what is your laptop's motherboard capable of, I'm just trying to help you understand that you don't necessarily need 32Ω. For example, I'm certain you would have no issues driving a 150Ω 660S off any motherboard.

Their sensitivity and impedance are quite low indeed. But even if it was too quiet, OP can always get a $10 Apple dongle which is effective at low impedance.

Aeon Closed X, but you need to wait for the next sale if you want them for $400. Also, why do you need them to have 32Ω?

That's incorrect. DAC provides power. Amp only amplifies it. If you use a proper DAC with 2V output to power an amplifier, you'll get more power than feeding it off the Apple Dongle for example.

>audio device with planar driver demands higher power

That's not always the case. For example, Avantone Planar is very easy to drive.

>how to determine the requirements to drive certain devices

You have to find out how much power/voltage your source provides at the headphone's impedance. That's not always easy to find out as manufacturers usually specify only the power at a few standard impedances. Or they don't mention it at all.

When you know the power/voltage, you can use the power calculator to find out how many dB can it push. 110dB is considered the minimum to drive headphones loud enough even with the HDR content.

But that's only speaking about power. At the end of the day, power is only loudness. There are other things that determine audio quality and you can't just read them off the specs.

1. Comfort
2. Soundstage

I've never heard them but here are some FR comparisons:

Elear w/ stock pads by Oratory (orange) and Crin (green) - pretty much the same except Oratory using a regular coupler and more smoothing (Crin uses the hi-res coupler) so you see a bit more detail and peakiness in the Crin's measurement.

Elear w/ clear pads vs elex pads by Resolve (clear pads - purple) and Crin (elex pads - red) - more or less the same, both using the same measurement setup but different units.

Elex by Oratory (orange) and Resolve (brown) - the same low-end and air but strangely, Oratory's measurement shows peakiness in the lower treble and smooth mid-treble while Resolve's on the opposite is smooth in the lower treble and peaky in the mid-treble.

Here is the gross average of Elex (green) vs the gross average of Elear w/ clear/elex pads (blue) - except for those weird inconsistencies in the lower/mid-treble, they seem about the same.

Here are Elear w/ stock pads vs elex/clear pads. Should have a positive impact on the treble evenness but adds a bit of midrange honk.

Queen's Gambit OST

Alan Silvestri - The Real Hero

GoT OST - Light of the Seven

Ramin Djawadi - Paint It, Black

Basically, anything that can show the upper bass dynamics and stereo separation of K712.