Gadgetory

everybody Brian from audio hood here with another headphone review for you today the subject is the fostex th five zero zero RP that's the th 500 RP retails for roughly six hundred and ninety nine dollars and ninety nine cents so it's a seven hundred dollar headphone pushing up a little bit from the bottom from the big kind of grouping of three to five hundred dollar headphones that are currently on the market if you're looking for a bit of like a mid tier obviously there are higher flagships in out there but you know a nice mid to your kind of section to be in kind of Rises is the seven to a thousand dollar area this is a planar magnetic headphone similar but not exactly the same to the t-50 RP the technology is the same however this is obviously a vastly different from the classic kind of modded headphone that fostex is primarily known for the difference is right off the bat being the price of course it's much more expensive it's also an open back design for the first time as opposed to the kind of closed plastic back of the t-50 RP that everyone mods so there's some major differences there obviously the quality of the build is has definitely been increased this time around you can see that it's a pretty plain open panel on the backside singular round and the the pet band in the fields is nice I actually found this to be really light on the head I found the wearability to be really really well done in this case there's a slight plastic bracket in a kind of an interesting way that it turns around the ear cup I'm not really sure how that's gonna last over the long haul but I mean on the head this thing feels good it looks pretty decent it's not like total flagship feel but it isn't flagship either is a really nice kind of solid easy to wear for long listening sessions kind of headphone the clamping pressure is very light at least in this review pair that I got you know that can vary and obviously the size of your head can vary so those two kind of elements may change for you but for me this thing wore really really good especially when you consider that it's planar magnetic technology and a lot of these guys when they make a headphone with this tech it's very heavy and cumbersome this not so much I thought it was very probably the best feeling headphone on the head for a planar magnetic that I've kind of reviewed to date so there's that great job there you cannot disconnect easily the wire cables from the headphones so it's single-ended connector that's pretty much what you're stuck with no fancy cable upgrades for this one at least unless you'd like a soldering kit and like the disassembled stuff it's a no easy way to change the cable up that's kind of a drawback but I mean for the most part it's it's a good kind of build over it overall and the headband is izla it feels good and it's got lots of good stuff now as for as far as the sound is concerned I did find these to be pretty close to the LCD 3s the are diseased LD LCD 3 is that I liked quite a bit in that they don't have too much of a treble forward presence a lot you know you can these guys can build a sound signature however they like but quite often it becomes is it trouble forward or is it trouble not in a lot of situations this one happens to be more laid back to my ears in that regard I have it to like that kind of a signature a little bit more but if travel is your thing then you may want to check out other ones the treble is definitely present it's definitely good I actually like I said before prefer this type of signature or anything that's too trouble forward but it's a it's a nice little headphone in that regard I also found that this headphone DRO at about the same power as the LCD 3 so it's not a really hard headphone to drive other planar magnets that I had on hand were harder to drive so obviously for for the most dynamic and the most kind of robust sound you would want to use the addition of a headphone a specific headphone amplifier for this to get the best out of your headphone these are definitely the type of headphones that are made for that kind of a thing but you can get by by just plugging into a regular source and be able to get draw a little bit out of it if you know not ear-bleeding levels but you could probably get there if you wanted to so it drives pretty easy overall well the base on this is also very good planar magnetics are kind of known for a really good base I found it low very good very thumpy not too woolly or overcast you know there's good definition not the best that I've heard out of any headphone but pretty good overall speaking there was kind of more defined out of the Odyssey LCD 3 but that is also a headphone that costs you know more than twice as much almost three times as much as this headphone so for the price nothing bad in the bass I really like the kind of reach in the grip that it has now as for the mids that's kind of where this one was a little bit different I felt at just that times that I got a hint of congestion or maybe a little bit it's like got a phat sounds but the tone and texture if you like kind of more of a fat sound I think that this is might be the way to go for you but if you're looking for like the the pristine super clean more trouble I also looked at the new high five man hg 560 which is about $200 more than this at the same time I did it a side by side evaluation and and that one kind of had more of that sound signature so if you're into texture and fat tone you know give this one a listen but if you are more of like a straight clean cut ándale kind of a feel you may want to check out that other one that's just to $200 more that HG 560 from high five man it's kind of interesting little twist on around the same price point you know but like I said it wears really well probably good for long listening sessions and overall you know a pretty good snapshot of what we're getting to at this point in the planar magnetic market because it's it's starting to the price is starting to come down a little bit more and the quality is starting to come up so anyways thanks for watching bye bye