Beyerdynamic T5P with A1 Amp

ngibbs

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Jun 12, 2010
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This is a review I wrote on Amazon for the Beyerdynamic T5p + A1 amp. Comments welcome.

I bought the T5p as a compromise: I wanted audiophile headphones but they had to be closed-back, so I couldn't go for the flagship T1. To give them the best possible juice, they are partnered with Beyerdynamic's own top of the range A1 headphone amp. My audio 'benchmark' is my Cyrus mono power amps partnered with Vienna Acoustics Beethoven Baby Grands. I'm also benchmarking these phones against my 50GBP set of sennheiser earbuds which sound insanely good partnered with my iPhone and being fed tunes (at home) from my Synology NAS drive (DS Audio amp). Here I'm previewing using my Macbook + Bit Perfect.

Sources: 24 Bit AIFF, ALAC and WAV files through Macbook Air (iTunes + Bit Perfect) and Metrum Acoustics Octave DAC to Beyerdynamic A1.

8.7.13 - I heard T5p needed A LOT of running-in time so I've put them through 50 hours of taped white noise to loosen them up. The result: a hugely-detailed yet incoherently-imaged audio mess. The sound of soup: you can hear every nuance in a recording but the organization is all over the shop. No stereo image, no space; headphones you might respect (for their detail), but definitely not love. I'll try giving them more running-in time (and post if my impressions change) but so far they are an enormous, and very expensive, disappointment.

Update 13.7.13 - After 100 hours of running in (taped white noise), they have begun to open up and reveal some scale, image and organization. I've upped my rating to 3 stars (from 2). While they're vastly improved from the incoherent, unpleasant (frankly) mess they were 50 hours ago and have begun to be a listening pleasure, I'm still not convinced that I'm listening to headphones worth 850 GBP. Will listen further and post updates.

Update 24.7.13 - 200 hours in (and no listening to music in the meantime), they are improved still, but my 3 star rating hasn't changed. The level of detail is impressive, scale and organization however leave something to be desired. Rhythms are handled well, vocals far less so. Still not convinced I'm listening to a 850GBP set of phones, much less one driven by a 800GBP headphone amp.

It's all horses for courses, of course, but to me the T5P are far from impressive. Personally I never feel I'm 'inside' a recording with these in the same way I do with good set of earbuds: it feels as though the recording stopped at the door instead of coming right in. And I thought that was the whole point of headphones...
 

quadpatch

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Thanks for sharing your thought on these two ngibbs! It's always nice to know what people think of these high-end headphones (good or bad). It's unfortunate that you didn't get on with them though, I've always been curious about these high end closed back headphones - there really aren't many. I bought the Denon AH-D7000 and was (and still am) pretty damn pleased with them. The soundstage on them (as with the similarly designed Fostex TH600/900) is amazing, but it's isolation is pretty poor considering and I've always thought that was an inherant tradeoff. How was the isolation on the T5P?

Did you compare the T5P to many other similarly priced headphones before you bought them? From reading your ending statement it sounds like you jumped in to over-ear headphones here with this combo, where these your first?
 

ngibbs

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quadpatch said:
Thanks for sharing your thought on these two ngibbs! It's always nice to know what people think of these high-end headphones (good or bad). It's unfortunate that you didn't get on with them though, I've always been curious about these high end closed back headphones - there really aren't many. I bought the Denon AH-D7000 and was (and still am) pretty damn pleased with them. The soundstage on them (as with the similarly designed Fostex TH600/900) is amazing, but it's isolation is pretty poor considering and I've always thought that was an inherant tradeoff. How was the isolation on the T5P?

Did you compare the T5P to many other similarly priced headphones before you bought them? From reading your ending statement it sounds like you jumped in to over-ear headphones here with this combo, where these your first?

I'm glad to hear you've found some success. You're right, there don't seem to be many hi-end closed-backs around, which is why I plumped for these, what with the good reviews 'n all - particulalrly of the T1, which I know is open-backed but I was hoping the magic dust would have rubbed off a little. The only comparision I made was a very short session with the T1, but that was very short and without any running-in. The isolation on the T5p isn't at all bad (to me anyway).
 

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