Image 1 — My F150R L7 finally came in!
Image 2 — My F150R L7 finally came in!

My F150R L7 finally came in!

Hello everyone! I have finally received my Convoy L7 with the F150R emitter in 5000K, I will be taking some beamshots in the upcoming days as i'm currently away for work.

What I can see right now however is that It's plenty bright to light up a room with its spill but also has a well defined hotspot. Its hotspot isn't perfect as its a hotspot with a smaller hotspot inside it but nonetheless very good and when pointed at a wall is much brighter per area than for example my M26C SFT90 or Olight Baton Turbo.

Really curious to see how it will perform out in the open soon, will keep you all updated!

Shine on!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 4 days ago

Bang & Olufsen BeoSound A1 3rd gen. Portable greatness

Hey everyone, I've had the Bang & Olufsen BeoSound A1's for a few months now and I can happily say they are great! I use them on the go for media playback and they work miracles, in stereo they really open up and are not only clear but actually have a surprising amount of body for a speaker so small. They somehow manage to produce a cleaner, Fuller and more natural sound than any other bluetooth speaker I own or have owned, including half the JBL lineup (only the larger models, never cared for the small ones), alot of industrial speakers and alot of party speakers. The thing I can compare these closest to would be my Focal Hifi system which costs many many times more and is fully DSP In-Room corrected. Ofcourse the Focal system sounds alot better but its the only thing I would compare these to. They aren't party speakers and thus also do not have the loudness or a big JBL speaker but that is logical since these are the side of a thick CD. Battery life is amazing, using them in a loud SNG OB with a loud rack next to me forces me to use these at around 80-100% volume and even at that they last me 3 full days of use (~8 hours of use per day) and I have not once ran out of battery with them.

Overall, especially for the price, these things are bloody brilliant!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 18 days ago

This is amazing.

Before I start, Many thanks to user u/mereyan for helping me out on my journey into Tongue drums!!!

After getting amazing advice from Mereyan I ended up buying the 18" Thomann Sonority C Major tongue drum, it arrived a few days ago and it's the best therapy I've ever had. Each time I pick it up it calms me and time flies by, when i'm stressed i'll put it on my lap and play for a while and it really helps me ground myself and come to rest and relax. The drum sounds great, very warm with lots of warm vibrato and echo, the tongue's are spaced apart nicely and are easy to strike with a mallet. My hands are a bit weird due to work so for now i'll stick to playing with mallets (If anyone has a recommendation for different mallets that give a different sound, let me know!) but if I strike it with the side of my thumb or alike it works and sounds great so it's definately a problem with me and not the drum.

Tuning is spot on and if you hit the low C it manages to resonate audibly for about 10 seconds (Granted i'm in my fully sound proofed studio right now while I just stopwatched that so your mileage may vary).

The drum is, well, big, very big, but just the right size to still be played with on your lap ((2nd photo for reference, I'm 188cm (6'2" and 90kg)) and it is quite heavy (5kg+) but not too heavy and actually feels really nice.

Build quality is great and it comes with a sturdy travel softcase that also functions as a backpack.

The included rubber mallets are fine and made of a dark wood but I'd like to experiment a little with different, possibly softer, mallets to replicate that hand played feel.

Overall I'm extremely satisfied with my tongue drum and give it a 10/10 will recommend.

Many thanks again to u/mereyan for helping me find the right tongue drum. Onto many many hours of enjoyment!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 20 days ago

Thomann 18" C Major vs 14" EQ D-Kurd?

Hey everyone, I have recently fallen in love with the sound of handpans and tongue drums, I want to get one for myself at home to simply play around with and relax a bit with (no need for a €1.000+ handpan) and was wondering which would be better for relaxed playing, the Thomann Sonority 18" C Major A=440hz or the 14" EQ D-Kurd A=432 HZ? (The 440HZ D Kurd isn't in stock for atleast a few months). And if you'd go with either one would you maybe add another smaller drum to compliment it or just 1? And is there any other around 250 bucks that would be better perhaps? I dont really care about portability neither do I care much about the mic in the EQ D Kurd one. I just want something to play and relax with.

There are also a couple of 10" Pearl Tongue drums like the "Metal Spirit" C Lydian and "Awakening" G Major around this price, these are much smaller but just as expensive, why is that? Do they sound that much better?

I mostly want warm deep sounds but also a tad of range so its not just a bass instrument.

Thank you for all the help and i'm sorry if I ask something stupid.

reddit.com
u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 28 days ago

Miniature A9 (Beosound A1 Gen 3)

Hey everyone, I use a pair of A1's for travel because I, ofcourse, can't take my Focal system on the go with me, Overall been really enjoying them, I recently cake across these 3 legged stands for them and while not being the most true "Bang & Olufsen look", I'd say they look quite alright, especially in a hotel room or in a remote workplace. I work as a tech in live television so i'm often traveling and having such a small (yet capable) system to take on the go with me from hotel to hotel is great! Thank you B&O for making a solution that isn't only portable but actually sounds good! Whenever the Focal's need upgrading, i'll definately go for a B&O home system.

Does anyone else use A1's, either in Mono or in a stereo pair and if so, how do you like them? Would love to hear and chat about speakers and sound!

Cheers!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 1 month ago

Why is almost every post here about cheapo wannabe "studio monitors"?

As the title states, I haven't seen a real studio monitoring system on here at all, 99% of posts is about the same cheapo shitty monitors that are just glorified powered speakers that are terrible to actually mix and master on. Why are you all raving so much about these crap built wastes of money? Have you never had to actually do anything significant with them?

reddit.com
u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 2 months ago

Opinions on Katey Sagal?

Son of a preacher man - Katey Sagal & The Forest Rangers

I can hear alot of resonances left in and albeit ofcourse very produced (Its for a tv show afterall) it doesn't suffer as much from the "Pop compression mess filter" as alot of other music.

tidal.com
u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 2 months ago

[NHD] Something different.

So, I got yet another new headphone...😅

Story time! Almost all of my headphones lack treble extension, My HD600, My Meze Silva, my Focal Elegia somewhat, My Old Fashioned and I never really seemed to notice it. Now lately I have been getting a bit into room treatment for my office and doing DSP Room correction which corrected the high end extension in my HiFi system there and then I noticed how much I was missing out on in my headphones. Me being me, Instead of trying to EQ I figured "Why not buy another pair that already does it"! And since I listen to quite alot of classical and Jazz and I always heard about Grado's being good foor classical and jazz I started digging a bit into those. I came very close to buying a pair of 225's after seeing a video from Dankpods praising the SR60E's into oblivion but then I read somewhere about their cables being very microphonic, Now I never thought about that because all of my other headphones have replaceable ones but the Grado's have a non-detatcheable cable and apparently it is annoyingly loud if you're sensitive to it, and unfortunately, I am sensitive to it. So I had to go another route. Then I stumbled upon a post here that was talking about the DT880's being slowly discontinued and looked those up since I never heard about the 880's and then I found them, On Amazon of all places, Seller being the official Beyerdynamic store, for €139 Free Shipping. What a steal, I thought so I put it in my basket while I looked a bit online what I could find about these, turns out, They're 600 Ohm O_O, Yeah that's a bit more than my little tube amp bargained for, but then I saw this video from Zeos where he was using an Emotiva speaker amplifier with these and while he claimed it was neccesary, which is BS ofcourse, It did give me the idea to use my Marantz Hifi amp with them. Quickly said quickly done I added some Banana plug to Jack adapters to my basket and I ordered these. Fast forward 2 days to today and they arrived. I hooked everything up and I have to say, I am shocked.

Now onto the DT880 Edition's 600 Ohm.

These headphones have the best imaging of any headphone I own, they are truly 3D, they don't have any dead spots or oval issues, Objects move freely in space around me, above me, Through me, behind me, infront of me, Everywhere, Things are pinpoint accurate and on certain tracks from Yello and Hooverphonic you can follow certain sounds with your eyes closed to the point you get Dizzy from all of the stuff moving around.

The balance: These are lean, top heavy but very smooth headphones, they can be sibilant on poor recordings but that is more of a matter of them revealing the flaws. They are going to become a tool i'll use while editing in the future as these are great at showing flaws, better than my HD600's. The bass is deep but not very punchy, At parts you can feel the Rumble in them but they won't punch you as there is not much 40hz energy but rather a bit of a laid back bass that albeit deep isn't like a closed back headphone. They do reach deeper than my Meze Silva's however and much deeper than any of my other open backs. With the proper amplification the 5hz claim from Beyerdynamic isn't just a claim but a fact as these will literally shake from the rumbling on extreme low notes or droning sounds. On tracks like Hans Zimmer's Chevaliers De Sangreal you can feel the subbass layer under the regular bass and clearly make out details in the ultra low regions. The mids are natural albeit not relaxed, they are accurate but they won't forgive a bad recording like for example my less accurate Meze's do. Overall I would call these high fidelity but lacking slightly in punch.

I have Dekoni Elite Velour pads on the way to see if that will change my opinion on this headphones low end as those should, if I understand it correctly, enhance its bass and midbass while leaving the Treble alone.

Comfort is a solid 7/10, the pads feel nice and the headband is comfortable even after many hours of use, i've worn it for 6 hours straight now and have not felt any discomfort. The reason why I give it a 7/10 is because it doesn't dissapear like my Meze's do, they are lightweight but you will still know you're wearing headphones as where with my Meze's i've had a couple times where I accidentally stood up and tried to walk away not realising I still had them on. Second pointer is that atleast on my head the earcups are just a tad too shallow, my left ear sticks out a tiny bit more than my right ear and thus just barely touches the inside of the earcup, making it ever so slightly more noticeable that you're wearing them. Headband adjustment system is a small trial and error but once you have it set you can just leave it like that.

The regular DT880's come with a carrying pouche but these, due to being the "Edition's", come with a sort of soft case, Its basically just a big block of foam with a giant scoop taken out of it that the headphones sit in with a soft fake leather layer around it all and a zipper. It works fine however and is very welcome, especially at this price bracket.

The cable is a 3 meter long straight cable and although I normally would like a shorter cable am very glad that its a straight cable. The regular DT880 comes with a coiled one and those for me are a no-go. Its not very microphonic, Infact I haven't really noticed any Microphonics while using it unless actively rubbing the cable against yourself by hand and even the its quiet, better than my stock HD600 Cable even. Now I would have enjoyed a replaceable cable but at this price range I think its no more than fair not to expect that and if it really is desired then one can quite easily mod one onto it.

Now, To Powah, these are 600Ω with a 96dB sensitivity. Not impossible to drive but to drive them well you need mostly voltage, I'd say a good 5Vrms is more than plenty to drive these properly and well into hearing damage regions, that being said, I drive them currently with 19Vrms on tap. Yup, That equals to 600mW@600Ohm RMS, Enough to make these smoke. Its overkill in every sense of the way (even tho it's actually slightly less than what Zeos said was the minimum) but I must say that it sounds...amazing. that amplifier is a €700 Marantz Stereo amplifier that normally is powering my Focal speakers and is an amplifier that I already have always been extremely happy with and that might add to why these image so well because my Focal's do the same and I believe it might have to do with that amazing amplifier. For a Pre-Amp I am using a Fosi Audio GR70 Tube Pre-amp with 1972 NOS Voskhod 6J1P-EV tubes rolled in and as a DAC i'm using a Topping E30II Lite, The Marantz and Fosi live at 12 O'Clock to prevent channel imbalances and my Topping DAC lives at around -30dB to -08dB depending on how loud a track is mastered. Music for now comes from Tidal but will soon be testing it with Vinyl and CD's (Nice thing about being connected to my Marantz is that I can now use my Turntable with them.).

Overall I have to say that these surprised me alot and might be my best performing headphones from a technical perspective. These are a very welcome tool aswell as a device that is great to enjoy music with. I think along with my Meze's that these will become my most used headphones in the future.

Highly recommend them, especially at this price. Clear 9/10 from me.

Thank you for reading my impressions of the Beyerdynamic DT880 Edition 600Ω headphones.

Any questions, opinions or just want to say something? Feel free to leave a comment, I'd be very happy to talk about headphones with you all!

Thank you and if I dont see you soon, see you later!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 2 months ago

Where did all the music go?

Remember back in the day how all the time great new music got released? Music so good it made you save up and run to the record store? Where is all that now? All you hear on the radio is the same pop songs recycled over and over and it all sounds the same, everything is super compressed, Auto-tuned to hell and back and loud. Nothing is original and 99% of all modern mainstream music is about Sex, drugs, Cheating, criminal activity or mental disorders. Sure we used to have that too but in a very different way. That being said, even looking past the subjects for the music, every song nowadays sounds the same. Put on a song about love from Dire Straits, Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, The Eagles, Steely Dan, TOTO, Yello, Huey Lewis, Sting and whoever else that used to be mainstream you want to add to the list and they all sound different, Do the same with todays artists in the relatively same genres and they all sound exactly the same with besides the singers voice no distinction between one artist or the next.

Where did everything go? Why is all music nowadays feeling like quick cash-grabs instead of art. Where did the artists go? Sure there are still some Indie artists that sound different but that group is getting smaller and smaller every single day.

What is your opinion about what is going on and what do you think this will mean for our future and for the future generations?

reddit.com
u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 2 months ago

No wonder everything sounded bad.

I just spent €300 bucks on an IK MultiMedia ARC Studio and it has changed my life, my setup consists of a pair of Focal Chora bookshelfs and a Focal Chorus SW800V subwoofer all powered by a Marantz PM6007, A Tube Pre-amp and a Topping E30II Lite DAC. I haven't used my speaker system in a while since i've been working mostly on headphones, however I'm stuck at home now for 3 weeks so I started using my system more, well, It didn't sound good. First I picked up that Focal sub to replace my old boomy JBL one, then I did some minor room treatment on first reflection points (More is coming in next week for the ceiling and corners) however the system still couldnt come close to for example the sound of my Meze Silva's. Now part of my job is being a live sound engineer so I've been using room correction systems for a bit but always the insanely expensive €5000+ systems that have licenses and all that just for the room correction so I didn't really think about it to use in a hifi sense, that's when I discovered this little device. It's 300 bucks, Comes with a measurement mic, takes XLR in and out and is made in italy (Not Chi-Fi), It's standalone so after calibration you can unplug everything from the box, including the pc and just use the box inbetween your signal path, It has a true bypass for when you want to turn it off, it comes with alot of customizable settings aswell to tweak everything even further and it has turned this nightmare of a room of mine into a place I can mix, On hifi speakers! Ofcourse adding more room treatment when it comes in is still essential and I'll need to recalibrate everything after that since it will change the room but what this little device can do is shocking.

Yesterday I was debating if I should even buy it since a poor room will always be a poor room without tons and rond of treatment but this is like some kind of black magic wizardry, My Focal's suddenly sound like much Higher-End ones with ultra clear voices, complete harmony and extremely natural realism.

What the thing did do however is make the system alot less bassy which ofcourse is good but for movies that's a bit of a downside but for music, man this is amazing! I can finally work on this system!

Question if you've read this far, do you use Room Correction and has it made an impact for you? Would love to hear it.

Peace.

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

HEAVN - Bright Lights

What do you all think about HEAVN? My Tidal recommended them to me and I must say they sound amazing, On my system it sounds like i'm sitting in an orchestral hall but with actual bass. Its like a pop song merged with audiophile music.

Its just very relaxed and chill, quite like it. Very nice to just chill with. Same for songs from them like "Great Mother" and "One Day".

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

New IEM day!

First off, One thing no reviewer or sales person lied about is comfort, These things fit unlike anything else, Completely dissapear with 0 sense of something being in your ears. I have an S eartip on my left and M on my right ear and they feel good without causing pressure. They also are in very securely.

Onto the sound, Well they sound like a €169 Meze Product, Not as good as my €500 Meze Silva's but that isn't expected for the price. I dont have other IEM's to compare except some cheap KZ's but these are I think best described as a Meze headphone with wooden cups that has a V boost added to it. More bass and more treble but still quite balanced and controlled. Currently I have it on a tube amp and it sounds clean and surprisingly spacious and wide, Got a good 2 heads width of space on either side. Treble is sparkly but controlled without much sibilance, Mids are relatively flat and natural, Brass sounds great on them. Bass is a bit boosted like I said earlier but still well controlled with good lunch rather than Rumble, I dont think these go very deep as in room my Focal subwoofer goes deeper but they do have good punch and dynamics.

Overall I'd recommend them just for the comfort alone. These things rock! Cable Is a little tangly tho but that's an easily replaceable part.

Overall for the money 9/10 for me, Would be a 10/10 if it had a slightly thicker cable and perhaps a bit less bass and slightly more 800-1khz as it seems to dip a little bit there based on what i'm hearing. I could be way off tho so that's that.

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

New Sub Day!

Hey everyone, I bought a new to me sub today! The Focal Chorus SW800V, An 11 inch sub! Never heard of an 11 inch sub before! Plays great and makes for an excellent extension to my Focal speakers. Finally some real extension and depth instead of just "Boom" that my old JBL sub gave me.

Its not a home theater sub as it really does not have that BOOM that a theater sub gives but man my bookshelf speakers now feel like giant tower speakers and more, Extension down to 27hz with this thing sounds and feels great.

Love it! Bought it for a r/BudgetAudiophile kind of price too!

Currently in a temporary position as I need to get a longer cable tomorrow to put it in it's official spot. Can't wait!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

New Sub Day!

Just picked up this Focal Chorus SW800V! Have to say it's a big upgrade over what I had before (Old JBL SUB200/230) what do you think?

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

Does anyone have any info on the Focal Chorus SW800V Subwoofer?

Hey everyone, like the title says, does anyone know more about this woofer? I found a secondhand one in good looking condition and for a price that fits in my budget. The thing is, I can't find jack about this subwoofer, not a review, not a recommendation. So if anyone happens to know more about this woofer I would love to hear. I want to pair it with my Focal Chora 806 speakers since they sound great but lack bottom end and my Previous JBL Sub200/230 just doesn't sound good.

Thank you.

reddit.com
u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

Does anyone have any info on the Focal Chorus SW800V Subwoofer?

Hey everyone, like the title says, does anyone know more about this woofer? I found a secondhand one in good looking condition and for a price that fits in my budget. The thing is, I can't find jack about this subwoofer, not a review, not a recommendation. So if anyone happens to know more about this woofer I would love to hear. I want to pair it with my Focal Chora 806 speakers since they sound great but lack bottom end and my Previous JBL Sub200/230 just doesn't sound good.

Thank you.

reddit.com
u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago

What EQ do you use on your Pi8's?

This is what i'm currently using but I still need to do some fine tuning.

This is the standard EQ from Android btw.

Would love to see what you all are using!

u/ZookeepergameDue2160 — 3 months ago