It is what it is, give it some time and you'll more or less forget it's there.

One cool little trick for temporary removal is to cover both ears with the base of your palms, then drum with your fingertips on the base of your skull for about 30 seconds. You'll get maybe 10-20 seconds worth of pure silence after you take your hands away, sometimes it won't be quite as loud when it comes back too (can be useful if its keeping you awake). Doesn't sound like a lot, but if you've lived with non stop eeeeeeeeeeeeeee for years on end, it's honestly pretty surreal to not hear it at all, even for a few seconds.

Welcome to the club. For what it's worth, you get used to it.

Just bear in mind that once you have permanent tinnitus it'll only ever get worse, so look after your ears as best you can. It's not the end of the world, I've lived with ringing in my ears for over a decade and to be honest it's only an occasional mild annoyance. If you can avoid it altogether, good. If not, well, we all make mistakes, and there's no point dwelling on the past, just try to avoid making the same mistake and making things worse.

Edit: there are non hearing damage related causes for tinnitus as well, if you're concerned, see a doctor. If you've been exposed to very loud noise for extended periods of time it's most likely hearing damage though.

Admittedly I don't own any, but I think the general concensus is that they're very good... When they're not breaking. QC lottery and total lack of replacement parts combined with the price has always put me off buying clears, if I'm spending that amount of money I'd like to at least know that if a part fails, it can be replaced.

I think OP is suggesting pad wear is possibly the main factor in sound changes that some people attribute to burn in, which I think is probably correct. People often severely underestimate how much of an impact pads have.

The high output impedence will likely also be contributing to your focals (and possibly sennheisers as well, depending on how high the output impedence is) sounding extra meaty, since high output impedence sources on low impedence dynamic drivers will usually result in a boosted low end (definitely the case with focals)

Eh. Depends how you define neutral. Rtings target has a pretty substantial bass boost, which you may or may not consider neutral. In general when it comes to 'neutral' frequency response targets, its referring to the mids and top end, with bass quantity being a more preference based thing.

Hmm, this is once again making me think about modding my SA1. I just keep telling myself it's not worth the risk

Not sure that I agree on the total lack of bass part, it's definitely there... But I really don't rate the HD25 as a headphone for enjoying music. As a robust, lightweight tool for DJs? Sure. For actually sitting and listening to music, no, on so many levels, just no.

The people who daily drive these things are insane. There, I said it.

Does the Samsung have atmos enabled by default? I'm pretty sure my S10e did. It worked quite well with a handful of tracks, ruined the majority though

You can also tell from the vent pattern on the back, the A pads have 4 holes, and B pads have many holes. B pads deliver more bass and warmth in the lower mids (as well as maybe a little more upper mid presence).

I personally like the sound, some people say they sound bloated. To be fair, there does seem to be a degree of unit variation, one sample crinacle measured seems to be a fair bit bassier than the other, so it's possible my pair is a leaner sounding set.

Are you using the A or B pads? The B pads are quite stiff and uncomfortable to begin with, but it doesn't take that long before they start to wear down and fit the shape of your head. After that I find them pretty comfortable

So the female end has a release button on the connector, the male end doesn't. The specific amp etc might have a locking catch but that depends. The vast majority of headphone outputs have no lock, my KRK monitors have no lock, the rear inputs on my old A30 pro had no lock, but the inputs on my singxer SA1 do.

that's the female end, the male end that's used for headphone outputs friction fits. a lot of amps don't even have releases on the rear inputs either.

Only if you use the walkman to bludgeon the headphones... Which I'd advise against

I do use EQ, but only really to add a bass shelf to taste, or minor tweaks at the top end (DT1990 with fresh pads needs a small cut at 8Khz, with worn in pads it's fine).

I don't use presets because I've realised that they tend to destroy any unique character of the headphones, or that a preset created to someone else's preference most likely doesn't match mine.

The headphones that I actually use already have a frequency response that appeals to me, they don't need a major overhaul. I don't see much sense in starting with a headphone that you think sounds like shit and then digitally reworking every part of the frequency range until its acceptable. The possible exception to this might be if something offers an experience that nothing else can replicate, for example audeze's large diaphragm planar IEMs. Nothing else offers a true open back IEM experience, so if that's what you want, then EQing your way around the shitty tuning might be worthwhile.

Gaming in general, sure, from an immersion perspective a wide soundstage is great. But specifically in the context of competive FPS, its really not that important, in fact I personally find an overly diffused soundstage can be detrimental at times.

It's worth remembering that pro players are more often than not running IEMs or even standard gaming headsets. Also, the guys you mentioned aren't competitive gamers, in fact, crinacle himself has made this exact point, not so much specifically regarding soundstage, but just generally that it really doesn't matter that much beyond having a neutral/bright leaning sound signature.

It's all preference at the end of the day, there's nothing wrong with the 800S, but if you're spending over a grand on a pair of headphones in the hope that they'll make you win games more often, you're gonna be disappointed... And poorer.

Given their mediocre bass extension, I would have said the HD800S is a poor choice for EDM. I also don't get why people seem to think the widest possible soundstage is an advantage in competitive shooters, because it's not, its really not.

But to answer your question based solely on those two points, DT1990 pro.

True, but I think it's fair to assume that it is a feature here, what with it being the headline and all.

In just thinking in terms of potential sales volume. Logically they'd stand to make a lot more money off of a near universal cable with parametric EQ functionality than they would from a single IEM, since it could appeal to people running anything from low end to top tier IEMs (and not exclusively moondrop's own models either).

They could offer just the cable on its own, as well paired with an IEM (or even multiple IEMs across the price range). Looking at it that way it seems like the smart business decision to me, as it would minimise manufacturing costs and maximise potential sales. Whether they go this route remains to be seen.

Just edited my post, but IMO the most sensible option would be a 2 pin USB C cable, allowing wider use of pretty much their entire range.

Well it being a type C version would mean that it has its own DAC, allowing them to DSP correct to whatever FR they want. I'd have thought they'd do an app for EQ support, the question is which of their existing models are they going to base it on?

Edit: come to think of it, the more likely and logical product would be a 2 pin USB C cable (plus an app with EQ functionality).

I think OP is looking for a low latency 2.4Ghz solution similar to what you get with wireless gaming headsets.

Ah, well you see, I'm not in the US, and even at that price I should really hold off (planning to upgrade my GPU soon, which is gonna sting, plus energy bills over winter are going to be pretty brutal).

it's not even the headband itself breaking, it's the fact that you can't get replacement padding... at all. I'm generally quite lucky in that my hair and skin doesn't seem to secrete whatever caustic substance makes other people's pleather disintegrate within no time... but still, I'd feel much happier knowing that I can swap out the padding if need be.

I'm sure they are... But I already own TH909s, and I'm trying to reign in the irresponsible spending on audio gear.

I really want to try a pair of clears, but between the reliability issues and the complete lack of replacement parts basically necessitating the use of fugly headband covers, it just doesn't feel worth the risk.

I'd feel more inclined to take a chance with them if they were cheaper, but at basically a grand? Not so keen.