What's wrong? You lose good center when drivers are imbalanced.

My K612 have perfect center image, because, you know, I have said about channel balance.

>Mic enabled >Stereo sound

No.

AKG is a good base for equalization in my experience. They're less bassy but their bass is lower distortion so they're better to EQ.

Direct answer - you didn't tune your headphones to Harman target because you need a parametric equalizer AND some time to tune oratory1990 base preset for your headphones.

Indirect answer - ANYONE who dislikes Harman target just never equalized their headphones correctly to it. Correct Harman target sounds absolutely beautiful - just like big speakers playing a lot of details.

They ARE Harman target except for bass and a bit of mid-treble. I've tried to tune them closer to Harman target and got almost no difference in perceptible sound - more air, more low quality subbass (because distortion) and that's basically all.

Equalize K702 to oratory1990 preset and you will be close to that feeling.

Actually no stock headphones give that feeling to me. Including planars.

>I think, that the extra sharpness might be because of lost detail

It may be because of high output impedance as well. But maybe yeah, it's a distortion.

I personally found Xiaomi phones to be problematic with software sound chains by default (effects, equalizers that you can't turn off, problems with gain, etc). So maybe DAC/Amp in your Redmi are not that bad, you just need custom firmware like Pixel Experience or something like that to keep software sound chain clean.

Soundstage is adequate, they show that on binaural sound.

K612 has multiple audible narrow peaks in treble that make the sound piercing - it's not about the whole treble being elevated, it's about these peaks. Fun story is - I have heard Beyer DT990 250 ohm, one of them. And the trick was - even though treble was obviously very elevated, I didn't find these headphones too piercing to my ears. Going through the sine generator helped to get the drill - I only got constant upsceding from 4 khz that never got into a dip or peak until 10 khz. This is a preferable thing for me - I'm OK about a bit elevated treble, I just dislike when treble has sharp peaks and dips.

As for the bass - I can't argue with Harman because all headphones by default sound bass deficient comparing to good near-field or far-field speakers with correctly tuned subwoofer, while Harman does not - it does the impression of speakers pretty much accurately. But AKG goes even further because they feel bass deficient comparing to even Sennheiser HD650 which are bass deficient too (though it's about extension there - no information under 100 hz).

Fun thing is - I can't call AKG being particularly detailed either, even though it should be the main point of having reduced ("tighter?") bass.

I have K612 myself because out of all AKG K6/K7 series they were the most listenable by default and (funnily) they were the cheapest. Still they're bright, piercing and bass deficient by default, although no problems with upper mids, + that deficient bass is surprisingly good extended - K701/702 have less bass that's not extended at all.

>Could be that you're comparing to harman target?

Yes I do. I approve Harman target because that's how I understand the linearity of sound when I do a sine sweep, and that's the sweet spot where music is the most detailed and entertaining for me. K371 is not completely Harman neutral but it's close, and I prefer its sound over the whole AKG K6/K7 series. It's just not comfortable sadly because it's a closed back.

Harman is epic for everyday listening, and I would say it's great even for mixing. K6/K7 series is good for evaluating the cleaniness of the sound (is it artifact free? Does the space feel right?), otherwise they're not good both for critical listening and for professional work because they're very colored - bright and cold.

>Headphones do sound different if they're properly powered, you're not saying that this statement is wrong, do you?

I do, because power has nothing to do with the sound quality, unless you don't have enough volume (because volume=power, and more volume is the only thing you get with more power). All my headphones sound the same from all my devices (RME, MOTU, Topping, FiiO, LG phone, Meizu phone, Realtek - I don't have obviously bad devices though).

AKG are shouty because of 2 khz and they sound thin because of obvious lack of bass. You can get used to it and use these headphones as a reliable tool for work, but it is not a right sound and it won't be right regardless the source you use. Doesn't mean they're bad - they're a decent instrument for studio.

>With all of that, they need more power, than sennheiser hd600, and if that power is not met, they won't sound right.

They don't sound right nonetheless. The trick with all AKG owners is that they adapt to the sound of headphones in process of changing amplification and make conclusions that amp helps, which is a wrong conclusion (with ANY headphone).

> I have a pair of Senheisser 660

No difference at all.

Speech is definitely 44.1 khz there, and music is MP3 (I don't remember what exact quality though). I was talking about sounds like Combine talk, zombies, headcrabs, etc - I was surprised to know that they're 22.05 khz.

>In terms of games generally, you have to think about the fact that while compressed files are smaller, having to decompress is more math on top of the game for the CPU to do.

Yeah, correct. That's why there aren't really any compressed files in any game - back then it was a bad idea because of CPU overhead, now it's a useless idea because it's not much of a disk space comparing to all the other resources.

Absolutely agree with you (not for 8 bits though), but the thing is - these things do not have any compression artifacts, they are just highpassed hard way.

Also interesting thing is how game engines handle all the sounds. I have checked Half-Life 2 after I wrote a post, and was impressed that a lot of sounds there were 16/22.05. I have never payed attention to this in game. Maybe it's a resampling without high-pass filter (the ladder - of course it WILL make artifacts), maybe it's the reverb that worked marvelously in HL2, but still.

I'm not your bro.

I wasn't saying that they sound the same, but I'm too tired to argue.

One question - why do you think it's me who justifies any purchases and not you? The term "justifying purchase" works both ways, that's why it's stupid by design and grown people don't use it in discussions.

Also, people who talk about ears right from the start are almost guaranteed to not have any. That's my personal experience.

Not a huge problem for guys who have access to r/oratory1990 ;)

Half-Life 2 only has music being compressed to MP3, otherwise WAV 16/22.05 or 16/44.1 Mono/Stereo. I believe sounds in most games are uncompressed actually. Even if it's an older game, it's likely to have lower sampling rate for its samples (16/22.05 or 8/22.05 for example), but still they're often true PCM.

I can say that I have heard too much 1 khz in Hifimans as well, some on the same level as Audeze, some - a bit less. One of the reasons is 2-3 khz dip, just like you said in your post (dips always make frequencies before and after it appear to be hotter), the other is evenly descending FR from 1 khz towards bass, which makes 1 khz being a peak.

I guess that open-backed Focals are more comfortable in terms of sound signature than other hi-fi headphones.

You just proved my point by comparing headphones with cars :)

Imagine spending money on a lot of hi-end headphones instead of learning to use EQ ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Consumerism doesn't make you a great specialist in sound. Ignorance doesn't either.

I know what you're trying to say because highly praised headphones (including mid-fi) often play percussive sounds sharper and with more attack than HD6** series does, thus the initial feel of realism is higher. That's why I said about AKG K612 because they have the same characteristic - you would call them more realistic because they're overall closer to what you love to hear in TOTL than HD650 is.

Because, let me repeat that once again, - you can't really compare HD6xx to anything else because they have different approach to the sound comparing to the most other headphones (the only real contender is Shure SRH1840 I believe). It's not about their price, they really have different tuning. The tuning that lets you raise high shelf after 6 khz for "less muddiness" and be with it because of how linear is the treble. It's about balance. They have the least flaws not because they hit a lot of things right but because there're not many things that they do wrong. It's a coincidence that the only area where this approach pays off heavily is the vocals, and the others are just "meh" until you get used (after higher-end headphones as well).

>If Sennheiser truly believed hd650 was the least flawed possible then there would be no point for their hd800, he1, Orpheus.

You don't seem to understand what "flaw" is. And yes, HD800 is a more flawed phone than HD650. It's flawed for a purpose, like almost whole hi-end is.