Audio Technica AD900X Measurements

Dekoni Audio is pleased to revisit a “deep dive” look into our Audio Technica AD series Elite Earpads, specifically tuned to elevate your listening experience. 

 

We start with comfort, using our soft, high density, slow rebound memory foam for an extra plush experience that conforms to the shape of your face (and accommodates glasses stems). Dekoni serves the open ATH-AD headphones with a choice between real Sheepskin Leather, Fenestrated Sheepskin, and Elite Velour finishes, maintaining the isolation of the headphone and offering a smooth, premium feeling. We also tested and ensured the pads mount just as securely as the stock pads. Finally, we shaped and measured the pads on the ATH-AD900x to tune the sound and share a preview of how they sound compared to stock pads.

 

In our measurements, we use the measurement data from the headphone coupled with the realistic ears of our microphone dummy head. We have been fortunate to have acquired a certain well-known Audio Precision-based measurement rig, and will continue to keep the measurements coming! The data is presented raw and uncompensated, except to cancel out the ear response of our microphone dummy head, and it’s the average data from 5 slightly different seatings of the headphone (centered, forward, back, up, down, and centered over the ear again). Some graphs made no others have an excessively wide scale on the wide axis to make their graphs look very “flat” – We also use a Y-axis scale that is fairly “zoomed in” to reveal more differences between the pads. Some measurements by others are made without headphones actually sitting on model ears, or with subjective compensation adjustments – we don’t do that, because as every experienced audio enthusiast knows, we all have different ears! So, as part of a series of Dekoni Describes posts, we will walk our readers through understanding our graphs.

AD900x Comp

The first thing to understand about an uncompensated graph is that it will sound different to the listener than the graph will show. For one, we haven’t smoothed our graphs, so there are many peaks and valleys that would have been lost information, but also there are other factors, such as the effect from the earcups and pads resting against a head and around ears, the human ear’s extra sensitivity to vocals, and that the shape of our ears and depth of our ear canals can actually amplify certain frequencies. For the purposes of swapping earpads, it is enough to say that a flat line along the 0 dB line wouldn’t sound “good” on these uncompensated graphs, a dip in the midrange is to be expected since human ears are more sensitive to that region, and mainly we want to focus on how a Dekoni pad compares to the Stock pad. We also decided to begin aligning the frequency curves at the point they all reach 1,000 Hz, as many people base their volume settings on vocals in this midrange. With our measurements, we used the open ATH-AD900x, which comes Stock with Audio Technica’s velour pad.

Our Elite Sheepskin pads offer a fully sealed, non-scratchy option with similar highlights but overall slightly warmer sound than the stock velour. While you can see that the graph looks nearly identical from 1 kHz (mids territory) down to about 60 Hz (subwoofer territory!), the mids and bass will still seem to be emphasized because the upper mids and treble (everything above 1 kHz) has been cut by an almost even 4 dB. The subtle but wide-sweeping change is usually what people want when looking for a sealed, leather pad!

AD900x SK

AD900x FNSK

Our Fenestrated Sheepskin pads are the best choice for a listener who doesn’t want the sound profile to change much BUT wishes to have the option of real leather pads. The most noticeable difference is from 6 dB less amplitude at around 7 kHz, which along with the general recession of treble in this area helps keep the headphone from sounding sibilant while still sounding bright and sparkly overall. The Fenestrations also allow more heat to escape, which would be another benefit for long sessions.

AD900x ELVR

Though the graph shows a slightly warmer “tilt” with a dB or two higher amplitude below 1 kHz and a dB or two lower sound pressure with pitches above 1 kHz, overall the Dekoni Elite Velour pads have a practically matched acoustic profile as the stock pads. Considering how the AD900x series is designed to pin down your ears, however, it is worth noting that the Dekoni pads have a softer memory foam and a higher thread count velour, which should provide dividends on long-session wearing comfort!

 

The subjective factor of experiencing headphones and earpads matters the most, of course. If it sounds good, it is good! We listen with our pads for several revisions before release, and we want to thank the reviewers and our patrons on Head-Fi and other platforms who have shared their experiences. Real user experience is the best judge, and we thank everyone who has tried to describe their experience!

 

Our Audio Technica AD-Series pads are available now! Ask about them with your favorite retailer, and check us out at dekoniaudio.com.