Headphones reviews

To begin, I've been an audiophile since I was of a very young age. My father always had some of the best, expensive, and accurate equipment money could buy. I've always had a fine taste for things that sounded great... Especially for analog audio... and to be concise these headphones do not disappoint.

Unboxing these headphones is very straightforward. Not much documentation, but the basics are all there. The wire is uncoiled and seems to be coated in a high quality non-gloss finish with a strip of shrink wrap adhesive at the top to prevent splitting. Each channel splits to its individual side phone, rather than entering one side and leaving the guts to house the sound distribution wiring. The adjustment and swivel features are so brilliant they must be mentioned. The headband is one solid piece, with notches at each end and a dense foam pad at the top for comfort. Each phone has a tensioned wheel that locks into each notch on the band, so that instead of the cheap "plastic on plastic" slide that you get from other headphones, there's a consistent method of adjustment that does not promote wear and tear. Once again pointing attention at the ear phones, they swivel on this notch in complete 360 degree freedom. NO OTHER COMPANY HAS THIS. This means there are no seams, swivels or arms to be broken.

On to the thing that truly matters... the sound quality. I always test my audio with three types of music. Mainly Drum and Bass (for its long sustained notes in the low frequency, notably tracks by Noisia), Hip Hop (for its hard and quick hits of bass with periodical low frequency involvement, notably Outkast's - Spotieotiedopalicious being one of the mainstays) and finally a Best of Arcangelo Corelli cd (cello's and violins together provide a nice insight into the mids and highs). The overall sound appears to be tight, close, and very accurate. Highs sound razor sharp but not piercing, while mids an lows gently curl together leaving you floating. After several hours of breaking in the bass especially started to sound warmer and even more pleasing. I would definitely recommend running several hours of pink noise through these to break them in (wav files to run in a playlist can be found all over the net). What really blows me away is how easy it is to pick out poor quality mp3s and other recordings. Prepare to instantly delete anything under 256kbs within your music collection because you will probably notice. Ive tested many headphones and these standout as one of the few sets that scream SOLID BUY.

I sencerely hope you consider these for listening to your music. They are rugged, and sound phenomenal among all the cheaply outsourced pish-posh out there. Give them a listen I promise your ears will give you a big hug.

The passive noise canceling is better than any active noise canceling I have ever used. The frequency range is awesome. The sound is crisp and pure.

If you can have only one pair of headphones, this should be it. I've replaced both the ear pads and the wire cable, not because they don't work or are cheap, but because I have used the heck out of 'em.

To keep this brief, I am a new user to closed headphones.

In the past I used in-ear phones like the Sony MDR-EX71.

First of all these headphones are really good. The sound is excellent and the best feature is it's ability to minimize background noise.

When I brought these headphones I thought they would be perfect; good sound quality and noise cancellation.

However in the end, I was slightly disappointed with the former.

The sound isolation works a treat - no problem there.

However, it's the sound quality (in terms of crispness/sharpness, richness) that disappointed me.

Now I have to say, this observation is in respect to the Sony in-ear phones, which provide better clarity.

Those two headphones are quite interesting to compare.

The Sony MDR-EX71 are crisp and sharp in sound but can lack in decent sound isolation. Whereas the HD-25SP's are great on sound isolation but lack in it's crisp sound.

These are only my observations and I am comparing two different types of headphones here.

But I hope someone interested in changing from in-ear from close headphones may find this interesting.

At the outset I should be clear that I use these headphones for really listening to sound, not just for ambient music, so I tend to be fairly critical of my equipment. I work a lot with bird songs and use these headphones both in the field and back in the office. The sound quality is absolutely superb and allows me to tell precisely when the song of the bird I am recording is "burning out" or becoming distorted. This is often not possible with other headphones as the speakers themselves introduce some distortion - not so the Sennheisers! Back in the office I need all the precision and sensitivity I can get when analysing recorded bird vocalisations and these are once again the headphones I rely on - and so far they have proven perfect. And at the end of the day I can slip on these headphones and listen to my favourite music in prefect reproduction. Often standard headphones are not up to reproducing the wide dynamic and frequency range of classical music, but these do a sterling job.

Any disadvantages? The electric cord is pretty annoying and could be improved. I have had to replace it once due to worn contacts. The headphones are not very physically robust and I expect them to give out soon, though I have had them in the field come rain or shine for eight years now.