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I'm a hardcore fan of akg k240s, but after hours of use, since my right ear is slightly touching the inside cushion of the drivers, it starts to hurt. This is like, if I'm laying down tracks for the whole day.

So, after close to 10 years of loyal use (several k240 in a row), I'm going to start to look for a replacement. I'm looking for something to do tracking, vsti adjustments, and some volume fiddling. I usually also do most sound shaping (eq and comps) with headphones too, and then check with monitors during the day. Also, I need full cup, and not semi cup since semi will press against my ear and cause the same problem.

k240 was awesome because it had really natural bass response, especially the new k240 after the revision. So, that's something I definitely value. I also prefer open or semi-open back over close back.. It's nice to be able to talk with headphones on, and just have to stop the music. But I guess there aren't too many of them around.

so any suggestions, pointers welcome. I wished my right ear fit in the darn thing..

I see that now there's a k240 mkII.. I'd recommend it if your ear fits.

has anyone used the custom UE? Or any of the Ultimate Ears high end models? I'm not sure I'm sold on their max freq of 16khz.. I can hear beyond that, and although 16khz range is good for monitoring to hear what you're playing, I don't think I can do any sound shaping with that. Not that earphones would be my final decision, but usually I can get it pretty right, only requiring fine tuning on speakers.

How about the Shure series of in ear? I used one of their earliest models, forgot which.. actually had to do some mixing on it, and it wasn't bad.. though I didn't think it was good enough for regular use. Maybe the new ones are better.

Anyway, I was thinking if cup over ears may press against my ears, why not loose it all, and just go in ear. I do use Etymotics ER4P (or S, I forgot), but the frequency response on that is too mid-high heavy. (3k-4k area) I can eq to compensate on the mixer, but if I plug in to anything else, that will be lost.. so I'd rather have it right in the first place. Darn.. I'm just so picky aren't I.

ok, so just as a backup thing for when my ears start hurting with the k240, I made an eq preset on my mixer that makes my Etymotic ER4S sound just like a k240. It's very close other than that ER4S only goes up to 16khz, and that the k240 has a more "roomy" bass response, particularly down low < 80hz.

I made mine for an old dsp factory card, but you can transfer these values to any parametric 4 band eq:

1: peaking +6.0db 74Hz 0.5q
2: skip
3: high shelf -5.5 db 1260Hz
4: peaking -1.5db 20.2khz 2.50q

And the attenuate the entire signal down a few db. I couldn't read the value off the attentuation knob in dsp factory for some reason.

I use AKG 240 Studio and AKG 271 Studio. I prefer the second.

imho it's hard to beat the AKG series X01 in long time sessions.
They don't apply much pressure (to the head - practically none to the ears) and have a kind of 'roomy', almost speakerlike sound stage. Tone is precise and balanced and not fatiguing at all.
The 3,4 and 501 are out of production obviously, leaving only the 601and 701.
I'd prefer the 701 as there is a noticable increase in detail. Thomann recently sold them for less than 240 Euro - not sure about the US prices.

At least you should be able to check the 701 in a good hifi store, as it's kind of reference in the 'affordable' part of the so-called high-end segment.
It's certainly not the boomy club tracks favourite mate, but for anything else it should work as a perfect speaker replacement.
It does have a very deep and precise Bass though, but more of the 'mid-position' kind of placement instead of edge positioning in the room.
Once you know the difference, it's fairly easy to adjust to it.

cheers, Tom

Hey Ken, I was about opening a similar thread. You anticipated me

Probably I should had to undergo an audiometric test to my ears before (although the medical test doesn't extend to the extremes of the range afaik).
Though I've just performed some sine sweep tests with my (old?) K240 Monitor:
in the high range I lose the sound around 13.8 KHz , then it flashes back on a 14.1 KHz peak. In the low end the sound starts to gradually weaken below 100Hz .
The more evident unevenness I can notice are a notch between 2600 and 3900 and a peak between 5700 and 8000; also a narrow peak around 9200 and other minor and narrower in the neighbourhood of the band extremes.
By my ears I can hear the sound like evenly swelling (apart from the above mentioned issues) from low to high, but afaik that's peculiarity of human hearing...

I feel comfortable wearing the K240, apart from the heat especially during summer. In ear models usually bring to me kind of irritation in long term use...

Been using Ultrasone HFI-2000's for some time now. They were amongst the recommended open-backed phones a few years ago in SOS:

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/dec03/a ... phones.htm

They're comfortable and do a good job IMO.

Not sure what what I'd recommend out of the current options, but looks like they re-covered the issue last year:

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jan07/a ... phones.htm

I still have my Sony mdr cd1700, and even though its curve may not be as flat as some other headphones', I love it for the unmatched wearing comfort and fatigue free response. it's a pity they are not being sold anymore since some years.
It has a very warm midrange, audible but unintrusive low end, and non agressive highs. it sounds too good to mix on it alone, but it's perfect when you need to work on details for hours in a row.

Brotha' Man Ken,

I have been using the new design from JHAudio who recently sold UE and started another company with newer designs.

I also bought some System One nearfields which while sounding very good shake the shit out of my house, and I haven't applied any acoustic treatments like bass baffles, etc. So I use the wireless in your ear monitor / mic combo which is a newer 3 way stereo design. It produces the same image as the System Ones when I played back the 2 different mixes on my live Barbetta cabinets. I was very impressed. It has bi-amped stereo and sub drivers.

Your presets for Celmo's X-Machine sound great in these. The sub out from the X-Machine and the stereo send make it a great channel strip to master with when wearing these.

The real benfit is no wires and you can even apply vocals. I often walk away from the racks to make a drink while listening to the mixes, which is way cool. Another benefit is blocking out the excited kids as they play video games , and make it impossible to hear cackling hens that seem to enjoy speaking to themselves when I like to mix and record.


Check Your PM...................NOW.

holy cow! Jimmy hooked me up beta test a new custom in ear monitor from the man who invented the Ultimate Ears technology. (http://www.jhaudio.com/) Just got my ear impressions done.. we'll see how it goes. I'm very excited, and many thanx to Jimmy for doing this.

Let's know.



This is from the 2nd link in the sharc's post

Because of their low impedance range (usually between 32(omega) and 600(omega)), you can't plug headphones into line-level outputs

Since I usually plug headphones into the 1/4 TRS output of my Luna boards, I'm wondering how far this might be a wrong move...

I dunno what's on the Luna, but I guess it's also 5532 based (just peeked at the Pulsar)
that Opamp has internal short-circuit protection and can drive a 600 Ohm load, i.e the classic AKG 240 Monitor would fit perfectly (or is it only 300 ?)
Anyway, audio specs may suffer somewhat from a 32 Ohm load (as most cans seem to have today) but no harm to be expected.

cheers, Tom

Thx Tom.

Yes the K240 M is 600 Ohm but, very seldom indeed, I connected there a Sehnneiser headphone having 64 Ohm impedance.

The Sehnneiser HD650 is 300 Ohm; the AKG K701 is 62 (the coming soon K702 too).
Since I usually don't use external mixer consolle, I guess is better I'll have a look around for some headphone amp, at the time I'll decide to upgrade my headset...

No Problemo Ken,

You will find their quality rather phenominal.

The quality mic headset that comes with it is actually top shelf as well.

My favorite thing about them is to record everything, and while trying out different mixes I can walk around wireless.

Maybe my next acquisition will be a wireless controller to make adjustments during mastering.

I have never mixed or mastered while taking a shit before, it might be interesting.

can't wait to try them out.

on the other hand... I saw that akg will be coming out with a 702 soon.

The pads of the Sehnneiser HD600 and 650 have a different shape compared with the AKG models. Have you tried one of those?

interesting. I was trying to find one to check out, but with no luck yet. I still need a painless headphone to check the high end, so I'm still on the lookout. It's hard finding these things in NY because most stores are very poorly stocked, and extremely poorly maintained. (like GC and samash) I guess that's pretty standard for retail if you're out of the "rich whiteman's land". (uptown)

kensuguru wrote:It's hard finding these things in NY...

I wouldn't expect that.

Hard is still good. I've almost no chance to check out hi end headphones, nor studio monitor speakers here, unless i'm ready to travel. Even for instruments the choice is quite limited.

Maybe a bit offtopic, but have you guys noticed SPL's latest product?

SPL Phonitor

Because of the various parameters on the device you could listen through your headphones like you would listen to through your monitors.
You can adjust the "Crossfeed", "Speaker Angle" and "Center Level".

It might be ideal for the ones who often compose or mix on their headphones (e.g. at night, to avoid pissing off their neighbours ) , and then become shocked when they listen to their mix through their monitors the next day.

This gadget is not cheap, it's expected to cost around 1600 euro inc. VAT !

(I guess I'll stick with my monitors instead )