My time with other headphones like the 660s!

So throughout all my time with the headphones, deemed as Audiophile grade headphones that is, I have in my brief experience had very good quality to judge headphones by. My first pair were the 58x's. I picked them because of the way they were created and why. This headphones was created and asked for by other Audiophile users. Reason? Because they were tired of the same old standards of rolled off bass and lack luster sub bass found in many audiophile headphones. They believed that the sacrafice of the bass extension and sub bass was too great of a cut off to assure the treble highs and to avoid any bleed ins in the mids. And they were right. So Massdrop(at the time) partnered with Sennheiser and looked at their most Iconic headphone, the 600's and took the driver found in the 700's(Not the 660's) and tweeked it a bit to deliver results that gave perfect balance accross all three areas of mids, bass, and treble. It maintained the silky smooth vocals and mids most have deemed Sennheiser for and yet didnt have the rolled off bass extension and provided very clean and amazing sub-bass (when called for). So getting this for my first Audiophile headphone, unknown to me, put me a bit of disadvantage for advancement of other headphones. So when I got things like the $499mrp Sundara or the $499mrp Sennheiser 660's ...I had already seen that movie sort of speak. It was like seeing yet another "Die Hard" moive and hearing that same line from the first movie "yeppy ki yay". Yeah we got a different situation in this movie with a new enemy but it's the same hero and that moment just can't be redone with the same feeling again.

So even though both the Sundara and 660's are great and have small advantages over the 58x unless I had started with them ...it just didn't really allow me to get the full effect of these headphones as far as excitement or highs. So is the 660's a better overall headphone if the prices were the same? YES. I love it's looks and build quality over the 58x. If i'm honest the 58x seems cheaply made compared to the 660s. I love the box presentation as well compared to the "throw in the box" look of the 58x. Even their cables are higher quality, IMO. And lastly for me the 58x were purchased as a slightly used pair with no warranty so getting a brand new pair of 660s would be a better way to go for me if this was the direction I took. Same can be said about the Sundara as well. In fact you could make an arguement that of the three...the Sundara were probably the overall champion if we are going by boxes checked. They had the better look over the 660's even but what hurt them was their QA issues with drivers and physical build quality that you just couldn't see lasting as longs as the Sennheiser have been on the market, espeically since I had to exchange them within days of getting them originally during my testing time with them.

So yes all this resulted in two headphones by Sennheiser fighting for first place. The 660s looked like the winner on the surface if only by nothing more than it's looks, build quality, and warranty. The advantage of the Sub bass on the 58x still made the sound contest complex. The 58x still had the better bass extension but the 660's has a little better soundstage and imaging. The problem was, the soundstage and imaging advantage didn't bring better intimacy. When you listen to the 58x...you experience the music. When I listened to the 660's I was too involved in finding difference and I wasn't experiencing the music more than technically listening to it. And on top of that, the 660's Pads felt more stiffer,more clampy, and less comfortable than the 58x( and that might change over time of use and break in). Overall, if the 660s were the first, I would have never gone backward to get the 58x and I don't believe the Sundara would have bested them either with it's QC issues(yes if there had not been any QC issues). So at the end of the day the Dog in the fight that keeps getting back up is the 58x even when newer more advanced headphones come along. Am I saying that the 58x is better than all other headphones like the 660 and Sundara? No! What I'm saying that that coming into this the world of Audiophile equipment for the first time...what you start off with will be the biggest jump and all other jumps may very well never duplicate that jump within any reasonable price range. Even seasoned Audiophile people that are honest with themselves and others admit that the differences between headphones in the audiophile ranking are small 5-10% difference accross price ranges. Basically the Law of diminishing returns.