I may have been too harsh on the Clears .... There is no headphone on the market that is not a compromise in some way. And Clears do sound great ... but I thought that I should talk about the "bad" points as those are not mentioned as often in reviews.3ee wrote: ↑Sat Mar 13, 2021 11:08 pm
Sorry to hear you don't think Focal Clear are high quality... I think they are even though I also feel they are 'a bit' far from perfect..
..but yes, they are sensitive to placement, that's why when checking something more precisely I align them on my head using pink noise
About the microphonic cable... do you have the silver colored one? I hear that the cables that come with that are different and aren't good at all in terms of what you are describing... I have the red-ish colored one and use it with the coiled cable, absolutely no problem with it being microphonic or something..
Sorry to hear about your experience with the Elegia.. I also was a bit nervous about investing on a pair of Clears due to many comments about driver clipping and what not..
Yeah, really great sounding headphones, in terms of sound signature probably the best compromise in the 500 to 1500 price range. Do they have a "$ 1500 sound" ...mmm, I don't think so... But I bought them for about € 900 and that is kind of OK...
The other thing is that I'll always be nervous about them lasting a long time... and they are not servicable ...like a Sennheiser is in that you can basicaly get any spare parts should anything go wrong.
And that brings me to another point. What makes the HD6XX (and Sony MDR 6507, Beyer DT DTxx0 line...maybe AKG K702?) headphoens a great reference tools is that they have been around for a long time and I will trust Sennheiser/Sony/Beyer that they will be awailable for some more time. Without long term consistancy and availability nothing deserves the "reference" title. Focal already came out with a new version for the Clear line... who knows how long the Clear ("Classics"?) will be around for? What Focal does to me seems a very Hi Fi market strategy but in the studio world we need reference tools which means long term consistancy and reliability