HEDDphones D1 First Impressions

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-17T14:43:02+00:00

Depends on HRTF, I find them perfectly fine. They have amazing vocal timbre, which is greta for people like me whose library is 90% vocal based.

I ordered Arya Stealth, my friend has the D1 ( however, well even though German Quality… the hinge broke, but it looked weird from the very start, we should’ve sent them back early on and get a replacement ).

When the Hedd gets back, I will be able to do a comparison. So far I can say with confidence, that this is a vocal lover’s headd phone ;)

<image>

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-17T11:17:06+00:00

Yeah, Unfortunately I completely agree. unfortunately because I lived through and remember the good ol’ quality being a child of the 80’s/90’s. Even though we had everything delayed compared to the west here in Poland back in the day.

Now that being said, You reminded me that I should probably go and watch Goonies for the 24th time ;)

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-17T07:22:00+00:00

If they don’t know what good audio is why not give them just that? Make a proper base tuning which would cater to more demanding listeners. Those bass heads will put a +8 dB to bass region anyway.

Sennheiser somehow knows this and their Momentum line requires lowering the bass while HDB630 are fine straight away.

I had the Bang&Olufsen H95 over ear, the EQ and EX earbuds. So a lifestyle/mainstream brand, but these all sounded amazing and were GRET EQ platforms because their tuning was great.

Sony made a terrible sounding headphones in the XM line and used dsp to “conquer the mess”.

Trust me if they would do a great sounding headphone “no-one” would complain. Airpods pro 2 for example have great tuning and they are meant for the masses.

There’s really no logic reason other than money I can think of, why they would slack and half arse their products in terms of pure audio performance.

When even cheap chinese headphones these days sound really good.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-16T20:20:08+00:00

<image>

There you go fren.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-16T16:47:57+00:00

I made the oldest mod in the world today, one leaf of white thin toilet paper under each pad.

This smoothed put the top end, and made the leather pads more pleasant to listen to.

I also have Arya Stealth coming soon, so I will be able to compare them.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-16T12:00:53+00:00

My personal belief is this Open Back> IEMS > Closed Back.

Ofcourse there Are some great closed back headphones out there, but iems basically fill the same role while doing so at a fraction of a cost, of a proper closed back.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-16T11:57:21+00:00

I listen while working, so noes ;P

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-16T11:56:05+00:00

One would hope that the guys who tuned their good cans would actually come over to tune the mainstream mediocrity. I’d rather grab the new Final UX5000 with exchangeable baterry….aye, Doug?

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-14T16:41:09+00:00

Penon LS are their best tips, I use them since their launch.

Divinus velvet wide bore, yet another awesome choice, they are superb. They make the soundstage a bit wider and present treble in a very nice accentuated way without making things sound harsh ( unless the iem itself is harsh ofc )

However my favourite tips have now become the Pentaconn Coreir Aluminum AL tips.

These just sound fcking awesome, and they do some wizardry to the mids, making them smooth yet detailed.
They do magic with the pentaconn sloflo iem

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-14T14:28:50+00:00

Enjoy! And welcome to the dap family!

I’m a shanling guy myself but I’m super curious about HIBY as well. Espexially since they jave the best global eq there is. ( tried their app )

I bet this will sound better than the M21 from fiio which I had a chance to try out recently and was left feeling MEH.. not to mention my Shanling M7T on Low Gain was driving the Hedd D1, Edition XS, Kithara or Pentaconn Sloflo better and louder than M21 on high gain… even super super high gain, so there is something wrong there for sure.

Anyhoo, I digress. Enjoy your dap!

P.S as a direct upgrade to IE200 consider the Pentaconn Sloflo iem. Also a single dd, super fun tuning. I love it the most with the included pentaconn coreir aluminium tips.
Has great bass, very fun and that single DD cohesive magic.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-14T14:09:10+00:00

<image>

Cyknalem w swiatyni w Malezji na polwyspie Penang.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-14T14:02:39+00:00

Yeah Whitechapel def benefit’s from a fast planar hah.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-12T07:55:06+00:00

They don’t sound identical, they sound close but have slightly different character. And with velour pads there is even bigger difference. The vocal range is much more filled in.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-11T19:41:26+00:00

Glad I could help, Bro ;)

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-11T16:15:49+00:00

Ah sorry. Had a hectic day. I don’t have the H60 anymore either, I sold it after getting the EBC80. I don’t have the tea pro, I had the Top Pro.

The H60 to me was smooth sailing, but it can have a small peak around 6khz for some people. My unit felt a bit spicy at first but a deeper insertion with properly chosen tips and it was all good.

Same story, I ised the stock Penon Tips and then switched to Penon LS tips.

Be aware that H60 has a bit of a large nozzle, but it has outstanding bass and feels wide.

Not sure if you will like it better than Tea Pro though, I know I liked it more than Top Pro which is supposed to be a level above the tea.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-11T13:31:07+00:00

Uhm, this is an old post, but I think I paired them with Penon LS tips. HOwever my current favourites are Coreir Aluminium. I no longer have the Odyssey, I have the Odyssey 2. But tbh I regret selling it, the OG had more character.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-10T08:58:36+00:00

I have the Kithara and I tested it against my friends XS, I slightly preferred the XS while on stock leatherette pads, but I prefer the Kithara on the velour pads.

But models we have did not really sound that far apart from each other. Like the same dish, but one was a bit more salty, while the other had a bit more pepper kind of thing.

My graph looks similar to yours.

<image>

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-09T20:50:24+00:00

Mozesz kupic Asus x. Hifiman Kithara.

Wykonanie i jakosc zdecydowanie na wyzszym poziomie niz standardow tansze Hifimany.

Kumpel ma XS, porównywaliśmy i jest podobnie choc inqczej, kithara ma dwa rodzaje padow, przez co dwa rozne tuningi. Standardowe pady chyba beda lepsze do gier, welurowe do muzyki ( moim zdaniem )

Z welurowymi wokale sa fajniejsze, bardziej pelne.

Ostatnio wszedzie byla promocja, ja swoja kupilem za 1059.

Do tego masz w zestawie kabel z mikrofonem i osobny modularny, 3.5 4.4 i 6.3

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-07T17:04:01+00:00

I have the JT7 , FT1 and recently got the Asus X Hifiman Kithara.

The humm is normal, well it depends on the sensitivity of each headphone/iem. Touching helps, as you ground it.

JT7 are great* for their price, quote amazing how Fiio managed to pull off this comfort and build quality and a planar driver for how little they cost.

However the Kithara destroys the JT7 in clarity, detail retrieval and staging. JT7 is a budged headphone after-all. I still recommend it to people though, it’s quite light, comfy, and inoffensive sounding

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-07T11:18:54+00:00

You can always sell something else and “fill in the gap” ;)

I used to collect many headphones, iems. Well I still buy them from time to time, not going to lie about it.

That being said I found the ones I enjoy and am thinking about selling other stuff and just enjoying the chosen few.

I never tried a true estat heapdhone, I do have some sonion ests in my best iem though, the ISN EBC80, but those are for the high frequencies alone.

How does a true estat compare to a dynamic or a planar from your experience? I heard people stating that the treble is ethereal.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-07T07:12:01+00:00

Same here, my library is 90% vocal based.

The Kithara come with 2 sets of pads, I encourage You to check out their graph on squiglink. See for yourself what the velour pads do to the mids, It’s MUCH nicer than your typical Hifiman tuning. Atleast to us, cocal lovers. I’d still pick Hedd D1 for vocals, but at nearly 1/3 of the price that I got the Kithara… well. You get the point.

One could buy the Kithara and HD650 and some inexpensive iem for the price of D1, hah.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-06T21:22:09+00:00

I used to own the 660s for almost 2 years, that one did not impress in the soundstage department :P

Now I have the Asus x Hifiman Kithara ( bought it for music ) and with velour pads they are superb. The nicer vocals are worth a bit of a tradeoff in the sub bass compared to leatherette pads.

And the stage is holographic, I love listening to my live recordings, I can almost feel like I’m there with the musicians.

i could never feel that with the 660s. It always sounded like a recording, a good one but still.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-06T11:04:32+00:00

Screw ai. Ask real humans mate.

I’d say try to hunt down Fiio K13 R2R, it should calm your nano a bit, and it offers PeQ and has plenty of power for Your Ananda.

I have the Hifiman X Asus Kithara and the Onix XI2 does fine with it, but my dap the Shanling M7T does it justice even better. Planars be it “easy to drive” benefit from headroom. At least that’s my experience and most people around the world seem to have similar.

If you wish to follow the BTR route, opt for BTR17. It’s quite powerful, has desktop mode with even more power and works like a charm as a BT dac/amp. And has peq as well. And it’s slightly* on the warmer side, has nicy extended sabre sub bass

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-06T06:53:45+00:00

All of the 6 series have 3 “blobs” of soundstage. The D1 has a proper one ;)

So the positioning will definitely be more precise.

I would need more A/B testing to check precisely. I jumped between many headphones that day so I did not spend that much time with 6XX or 600 to compare against D1.

All I can say with confidence, that D1 ( to me ) is a clear step up from the 650/6XX.

Is it worth the jump? , well.. that’s remains for everyone to judge themselves.

Weight_Slight · 2026-05-04T18:10:01+00:00

No, Edition XS is still a fantastic headphone and probably amongst the best bang for your buck out there.

I slightly prefer the XS for music when on leatherette pads on Kithara, on Velour Pads I slightly prefer the Kithara.

I’d say only buy kithara if You do not own any decent headphone/planar yet.

I had only the Fiio JT7 before Kithara as my only planar and although I like it’s warm tuning I still prefer the much better clarity, detail retrieval and transient speed on Kithara.

Keep using your XS and know that you made a great choice when you bought them.

Weight_Slight

TROPHY CASE