TECSUN Professional Open Back Over-Ear Hi-Fi Stereo Headphones, Grassroot Version, Cao Gen Headset

this product is defective false claims about it is better than thousands of dollars headphone

What can I say? There are a lot of manufactures producing headphones these days, and having tried quite a few headphones manufactured state side and abroad, most of them in general are less than stellar. I have been trying a variety of headphones from all ranges of pricing. But for what you can spend on this headphone, and some minor modifications I will get to in this review, this headphone is one of the best you can buy for under $500. Keep in mind the modifications will set you back some money, but will still be significantly less than $500.I love the HiFiMan Sundara for the sub $500 category, but it is above $300. This headphone (I purchased for less than $150) is an interesting beast. It is an honest headphone, doesn't have what I call the annoying V-shape response where the bass and highs are boosted. If you look online and see the actual graphs of this headphone for both frequency response, balance, etc., this looked too good to be true. Well, it is true. It is almost as flat as a ruler across all frequencies, and playback is very good.The build quality is less than stellar, but I like the color and the wood with fabric grill is very nostalgic, reminding me of the 70s style speakers. The cable that is included is a brown color matching the color of the headphone. The quality of the cable is par at best, and it connects via 3.5mm TS to the headphones and terminates to a single ended 3.5mm TRS cable. The ear pads were also not the best as it is too close to the ear canal when they decided on such a thin pad. It comes in a wooden box with something that looks like faux hay inside, and I definitely don't intend to use that to store my headphone.Knowing that these can be significantly better, I decided to modify the headphones. First thing I did was removed the factory pads with a Brainwavz velour pads for large headphones. They don't attach like the factory ones (see photo), but they work very well. It puts a bit of distance between my ear canals and the headphone driver. It adds a sense of air, better separation, less harsh in the upper mid range and the highs. The bass sounds extended without the muddiness in the lower mid and mid range. Huge improvement from just the ear pads alone.Next thing I did was to upgrade the cable to a balanced cable, first with 2.5mm TRRS cable and second with a 4pin XLR balanced cable. The 2.5mm cable was a drastic improvement. The clarity improved and it takes less power to drive it. Then, I went to the 4pin balanced cable. Wow. It's like a different headphone. The voices are clearer, the strings can be clearly heard, the hi hats and snares have the detail that the original recording has captured. Upright basses are round but punchy, and kick drums are prominent. I have also tried a variety of music from orchestral, jazz, rock, hip hop, typical pop and classic rock, as well as country. It is simply solid for all genres of music. If you don't have balanced headphone outputs (differential balanced output is always preferred), just upgrade the cable anyway and maybe get one that supports both 3.5mm and 1/4 inch. This will allow you to at least hear them on both your phone and your stereo as these headphones are easy to drive.Of course, there are better headphones, but my investment was less than $260 all in, and it sounds as good as or better than ones in the $500 range.If you want to stay under the $500 range, I'd seriously consider this headphone with the modifications. I also bought a case for this, and I am very happy with the purchase.Hope this helps.

You won't be able to impress anybody with their look. They look just ugly. Designers(?) didn't even provide any means to distinguish left cup from the right. Pads are too small. For these all shortcomings, I will have to take out one star. As other reviewiers suggested, I replaced pads immediately with Brainwaz large hybrid (velour ones were sold out). They look even worse now. I don't remember exacly, how they sounded with original pads, I remember only that I was not impressed at all with the sound and was thinking about returning them. Maybe new pads, maybe some burn-in or a new cable (I am getting more religious with age) caused that I started liking the sound. There's more low bass now, also more trebles which were a little bit subdued before. They are not neutral. They are pleasantly warm due to slightly elevated bass and low mids. But all other frequencies are also present in the right amount up to the high trebles (can't guarantee how it is above 12.5kHz because I don't hear much above that). Bass can extend very well to the lowest frequencies and it is of decent quality, but not of the same quality as my Hifiman HE560 of course. But HE560 was much more expensive - $350, and due to its rediculous brightness requires use of equalizer, which brings the total cost to at least $500. Tecsun headphones don't require any tonal correction by equalizer on majority of recordings (which is a rare case). Their tonal characteristic makes the music very enjoyable and engaging. But when I want to enjoy the sound more than the music by itself, I am using my Hifiman HE560. If I had to compare the sound of Tecsun phones (with Braiwaz pads) to my other phones - HD6xx, I would say that Tecsun's are winners here. Maybe not because Tecsun phones are so good, but because in my opinion the sound of HD6xx's is pretty awful (at least my copy is pretty awful). Not only it distorts bass at higher volumes, but rolls off trebles to the high extend. Nothing like that was noticed by me in the case of Tecsun phones. Tecsuns, on the other hand may have not so great sense of being present in the recording studio or concert hall, but for that you will have to pay much more I guess.The other thing I don't like bout Tecsun phones is that they are not closed and isolated. I am finding listening to the open headphones very problematic, even late at night due to traffic noise, even distant one is detectable and affects listening experience. Unfortunately, this affects vast majority of residences in the USA. We live in the "Culture of Noise" and only the richest can escape from it.