Shure vs Grado

[Paulq]

I have always been a fan of Shure headphones and love the SRH1540 that I have. They are one of 2 closed back designs I have with Denons.

I have always yearned for a set of open back Shures and am contemplating the SRH1840 but they are quite a lot of money to buy blind. I have a set of Grado SR80e's as my only open back headphone and the reason I am tempted with the Shures is that the SR80 open back is far more revealing (in a good way) than the closed back cans I have. Are the Shure open back likely to be similarly revealing and higher quality or would I be shelling out for something that the Grados already give me?

Thanks!!

 

[dalethorn]

I have always been a fan of Shure headphones and love the SRH1540 that I have. They are one of 2 closed back designs I have with Denons.

I have always yearned for a set of open back Shures and am contemplating the SRH1840 but they are quite a lot of money to buy blind. I have a set of Grado SR80e's as my only open back headphone and the reason I am tempted with the Shures is that the SR80 open back is far more revealing (in a good way) than the closed back cans I have. Are the Shure open back likely to be similarly revealing and higher quality or would I be shelling out for something that the Grados already give me?

Thanks!!

Compared to the 1540, the 1840 has a notably weaker bass** and a significantly stronger upper treble. The main difference between the 1840 and some of the classic "neutral" headphones like the Senn HD600 or 800 is that the 1840 has less output in the low-mid treble, which I liked a lot. Even so, that output was a little more than the 1540, and its upper treble output much more than the 1540.

**The 1840 bass overall is probably no less or worse than the Sennheisers I mentioned, but in all of the samples I've heard of, the 1840 has a serious problem in the deeper bass. Get a copy of Jennifer Warnes' Rock You Gently and note the opening drum beats - they will sound natural with decent impact on nearly any headphone, but they fall apart on the 1840. It's astonishingly bad, but there you are.