ESS 422H AMT Hybrid Headphones

[sk971]

I’ve had mine for a couple of days and these beauties are a lot of fun!
My ones have something of v shaped sound profile with mids and vocals a little sucked out although not noticeable on many tracks .
Bass is huge and perhaps slightly flabby . Treble is extremely detailed but a little perky . Soundstage is good for a closed back headphone . So perhaps not perfect but very impressive overall

So time to mod . Unfortunately my replacement pads seem to be on the slow boat from China so in the meantime I have used a bit of 2mm wool felt teased out on the cups and put some Newplast on the baffle perhaps I may add a little more later .
It hasn’t dramatically changed the sound signature but I am fairly sure that bass has more punch and is cleaner sounding .

 

[Chris01_67]

Hi there! Thanks for posting this mods! I just received a pair and put them to burn in. I am curious how do you dismantle these cans? can you post some pics and some instructions? I want to change pads and they seem to fit very well into the cans. I do not want to break actual pads and I am afraid how will I put new pads onto them... sry for this stupid request...

 

[pelanj]

The pads just need to be pulled off gently. There is a rubber band around the edge, you can carefully remove it with a toothpick. I have the Shure earpads installed and they do not need the rubber bands.

 

[Chris01_67]

removing looks easy... but what scares me is putting new pad into this small gap... I ordered brainwavz ovals. Will be replacing after arrival

 

[pelanj]

When you remove the rubber band, the gap is actually large enough. I have read in a review, that the rubber bands are there because the original pads have a loose fit - and I can confirm that. Installing the new pads was prety easy.

 

[Chris01_67]

Thank you. I inspected the whole thing once more and I discovered this ruber band fitted nicely into the into the slot on the edge - I removed this band now I can see it is so easy. Sorry for troubling you!

 

[freddi]

are the LF drivers 50mm? - have they been changed since 422H's introduction ? What values does it use in its crossover?

I use a set of cheap Oneodio running off an old Macbook. - they produce good bass without much clamping force, don't bottom out on percussion or bass drops, very little distortion = good enough for wide range of genre - cheesy looking but don't break like Grado's flimsy swivel. It would be good to know if 422H aren't shamed in the bass region compared to the $30 Oneodio.

 

[xrk971]

They have very good bass - one of the best relative to my other cans/iems (DT880-250, OB-1, HE-400i, ZS-5).

 

[N101N]

A revised externally located crossover would help, but these headphones won`t be able to produce a decent midrange and are thereby not for the serious music listener.

 

[xrk971]

What makes you say they lack a midrange? Do you have instrumented head dummy measurements that show it lacking? It’s a full range dynamic driver with an AMT tweeter. The mid comes from a single dynamic cone like 95% of other headphones, which seem to have sufficient midrange. Mids are important to me in speakers - I know as I use a Scanspeak 10F/8424 as the mid tweeter with a woofer for bass. These headphones don’t seem to lack bass from what I hear.

 

[N101N]

A single driver with a large membrane area is a better condition for good midrange frequency response.

 

[Cobra71]

On Page 7/8 you see my changes on them.
I added a resistor to the dynamic Driver and took other cushions.
Now they Sound far more linear.

Kind regards

Marc

 

[VeightTripleDivision]

Sorry if it was already mentioned (I did read all-through, yet didn't notice), but did anyone actually measured value of the kcapacitor? I left my good multimeter at grandfather, so I won't be able to measure myself.

 

[Cobra71]

Hello, the cap is a ceramic one with 10yF.

 

[VeightTripleDivision]

Ahoi, thanks for clarification.

 

[VeightTripleDivision]

So I was looking for 10uf film caps online, they are quite large, 27,5mm space between pins, 7,27 ccm3 volume. Not sure if it is a good idea to reduce volume of headcups in trade for better caps there.
Would like to hear opinions/options on this case. There are tantalum caps of small size available or electrolytics that could be bypassed with film. Abother option is to route wires outside of headphones and have caps installed in small, weightless "mystery box".

 

[VeightTripleDivision]

Ehh, a bit disappointed by channel imbalance after receiving my pair. Opened the weak side, driver has melted plastic there. I'll try to ask for replacement driver, if possible to buy maybe.

 

[Andersonix]

They're on sale for $99 right now:

ESS 422H



– ESS Speakers USA

 

[freddi]

Does anyone here know of a parametric EQ file and/or graphic EQ approximation for 422H?

 

[freddi]

Did my 422H get totally fried when I forgot to set the volume down from my T50RP's comfortable level on the Bravo V3 amp? (I think "SO")

It seems like "RIP AMTs" (unless a capacitor opened) The overload event was loud as hell on my hearing and lasted perhaps 20 seconds before being able to reach any level control.

quick and dirty measurements with Dayton mic and a comforter and notebook separating the two cups - - cups faced down at the comforter - no real seal - but the little ECHO was interesting.