Shure SRH840 - early listen

[CarlSeibert]

I just got a pair of these.

I'm not real familiar with everything that's out there in the sub-$200 range, so I can't comment on the "are they the best $200 closed back phones ever" business. But I think they're pretty good. I was looking for not-too-expensive closed back cans for my portable. Basically, they're right at home there. They do everything pretty well. My RSA Tomahawk drives 'em with ease. They're not over bright (My ears. I'm allergic to bright, so I assume that means they're really not bright. But you never know.)

They're nicer across the midrange with a Mogami Mini-Quad cable (said cable being a lot less of a pain in the ass then the coiled one that comes with the headphones) than with the stock cable.

The sticking point is the bass, which is huge, and seems huge-er with the Mogami cable. Depending on your point of view and ears, that could be a good thing or a bad thing. For me, it depends on the music and context. On hip hop they rock. On small group jazz, I think they're great fun. (I don't know why but somehow live acoustic basses sound bigger and slammier to me than I know they actually are, if that makes any sense.) Basses on the Shures sound more like I think they sound than the way they really sound. So, great for stuff that's all about bass or acoustic jazz, but on pop that might just be a little bass-heavy... not so good.

At CanJam, I was very impressed with the middle model Shures, the 440, with earpads from the 840. I remember them being flatter in frequency response than the 840s, but resolution-wise, pretty similar. Kind of like the way the SE-420s are compared to the 530s. I have 420s and prefer them to the 530s, but I went for the 840s for a variety of reasons. Looking for fun listen more than anything else.

At the end of the day, I think these are keepers, at least for a while. They kind of have to be, because of massive WAF. (Bonnie's a bit of a basshead.)

On the other head, if the 440s behave like these elsewhere, but with a tad less bass, THEY could be the deal of the century. Has anybody else tried either of these 'phones?

-Carl

[Dusty Chalk]

No, not yet, but they're wishlisted (I'm a closed headphone freak)...thanks for the initial impressions.

[Pars]

I bought a pair of the SRH840s and like them so far. I did note somewhat of a mid-bass hump on classical material. Midrange and treble seems quite good independent of the bass; these are not bright at all but very smooth and well controlled IMO. I have not done anything other than listen to these (i.e., no break-in if you believe in that). I am driving these with a Gilmore Dynamic (w/Gilmore PSU).

If the SRH440s were more neutral, I might be more interested in them, but so far I think I will keep the 840s. I also have a pair of AKG K271s with velour pads that I use at work for comparison.

[CarlSeibert]

I think that bump will go away.

The 840s are in the AKG 701 category of break-in-need. But it happens a lot faster. On my pair, the first hour was ghastly. I mean really pretty ugly. I put them in a picnic cooler and left them there for about 48 hours. At that point, they had gone from plastic-y and mechanical sounding to pretty enjoyable. The bass was vivid and authoritative, but it sounded disconnected from the rest of the spectrum. I let them cook some more and after another day or so, they had a sort of one-note bass quality, but that has faded as they've racked up more time.

I don't how if the new cable had a lot to do with the midbass bump fading. I'll have to put the stock cable back on and see. The midrange sounded kind of recessed on some music but now it's really quite nice on just about everything. I'm pretty sure that was the cable. I'm kind of a mid range freak, so that makes me happy. The treble smoothed up and I think that was cable.

[humanflyz]

This intrigues me: can you tell me how they perform un-amped, say, out of an iPod touch?

[CarlSeibert]

This intrigues me: can you tell me how they perform un-amped, say, out of an iPod touch?

Sure, I'll give 'em a listen straight out of my iPod.

[Fungi]

I was pretty impressed with them at CanJam out of my Sony S639F, enough that I just bought a pair. The world needs more "good" closed headphones.

[K3cT]

Anyone compared them with the venerable D2000?

[Cankin]

SRH840 is way more neutral than D2000

[CarlSeibert]

This intrigues me: can you tell me how they perform un-amped, say, out of an iPod touch?

This was interesting. I had no idea what to expect.

The iPod, (a 30GB 5G) did a credible job of driving the cans. The 840s took about 80% of the volume control on the iPod, as opposed to about 45%, with the Tomahawk set on low gain. Tonality was pretty good in a way. The iPod was brighter and the bass was lighter but woolier. Short term that was fine, but in a while it became clear that the effect wasn't like EQ, but was an indistinct glaze in the treble, which is the sort of thing that drives me crazy sooner or later. Bass wasn't as big but it wasn't as tight. Dynamics weren't as good, but weren't "oh my god this is flat as a pancake" either. Overall, it was very listenable. Heaven knows how battery life might be.

The difference between the iPod and the amp was sort of in between the "amount" of difference amp vs no amp with my SE 420s and my RE-1s, if I'm recalling correctly. (I didn't listen to either IEM today.) The RE-1s sound thin and anemic without the amp. The 420s work fine but just aren't as refined or dynamic as they could be.

This was with the Mogami cable.

Of course, YMMV.

-Carl

[humanflyz]

Thanks Carl, that was very helpful.

[jinp6301]

I wonder how they compare with the ESW9s

[CarlSeibert]

I wonder how they compare with the ESW9s

So do I, actually.

[Dusty Chalk]

Someone should send you a pair to do a comparison. These are not the droids you are looking for.

[CarlSeibert]

Update:

The 840s have about 100 hours now. The dinosaur sized bass has trimmed down to a speedier, more mammalian sort of beast. Midrange sounds a little faster, too.

My portable rig is being a ton of fun with these. I'm liking 'em.

[elnero]

I must admit I'm rather interested in these as an alternative to the triple fi's at work. Sometimes there's nothing better than IEM's to just block out the world but other times I end up not listening to music because of the hassle of getting them on. I go back and forth on this all the time but I've yet to find a closed phone to replace the iem's for use at work and I still haven't found anything reasonably priced to work in conjunction with them either.

Then there's that damn JH13 thread...

[CarlSeibert]

I've got to admit the JH13s sounded pretty damn nice at CanJam.

But not this year, I'm afraid.

I have the same problem. I have oddly shaped ears (on the inside, too ). Taking the effort to wiggle my universal-fit IEMs in to place to get a good seal absolutely ensures an interruption. Big old cans on your head have a bit of scarecrow effect in addition to being easy to shove out of the way for a minute.

That's a nice feature of the 840s, BTW. Their head band is padded all the way around so it's reasonably comfy down around your neck.

[hungrych]

I am strongly considering getting these as I need some better isolation (there are a billion fans going all the time in my dorm) than the HD600 can provide. How do they rate on the comfyness scale?

[bhd812]

very comfy

[CarlSeibert]

very comfy

Yup. No complaints.

[Pars]

I agree. I still only have maybe 20 hours on mine (probably less). Need to work on that

[doping panda]

Although I don't have my pair of SRH840, I thought I should say something about them. I was running them out of a Pico hooked up to my laptop. I felt that they were boring sounding to me. They were dark sounding without much sparkle. I didn't think the midrange was well articulate compared to my K500. The bass was a loose, but very tuneful with good impact. The sound was closed-in compared to open sounding headphones, but I didn't feel the sound was claustrophobic like I do with some IEMs. The SRH840 isolates enough to most ambient noise in a most situations, but not in loud ones like commuting. For closed headphones under 200, I think they're pretty good, but they weren't for me.

[CarlSeibert]

My friend, Mr Fordham Tool and I had a chat with my improvised plug at the headphone end of the cable.

The new MkII version looks like the picture. It locks under the little boss down near the actual jack and it stays pretty tight.

If it annoys me to cause the existence of a MkIII version, I'll make the taper shallower so as to allow more of a twist to lock or unlock it. Now it's about 1/8 of a turn, which means it is possible it twist it 1/8 of a turn to the left and have it come undone. That said, I took the headphones to lunch with a couple friends today. There was a lot of plugging and unplugging and passing back and forth and the cable stayed secured.

I'll attach a picture of the plug plugged into the cans as well, only to show that the ugly part doesn't show. You don't have to worry about aesthetics when you make this.

It would probably be better to lock against the same surface that Shure does, but at the moment it struck me to do this, I couldn't think of an elegant way to fabricate a plug that would do that. I doubt what I have now will irritate me enough to ever revisit the issue

BTW, at this point, the 840s seem to have settled in even more. The giant bass problem appears to be a thing of the past.

[Chekhonte]

how much are these cans?

[hungrych]

$200

I am really digging mine.