How are these for normal listening or gaming?
To be honest, you will never find a similar headphone at this price.
They are not very comfortable ( compared to open back over ear headphones) but isolation is superb.
Most importantly, this is the headphone, where Sennheiser demonstrate they can very well lift their infamous veil ( and why they keep it)
The bass is plentiful and very very fast. The mids are typical Sennheiser. Highs are what makes them special. They are Grado like, extremely detailed but not very spacious. They are merciless with poorly recorded compressed music. But absolutely fantastic with well recorded and masteredstuff.I went through at least 50 headphones, and none can reproduce acoustic drums like this.
For heavy metal, classic rock these are GOD level.
Imagine a Grado with more midbass in a closed on-ear with fantastic isolation, that's how this is.
It's a lot better than than any AT M series, million times better than XM3 ( sonically it's an A tier headphone)
Yes, like most good Sennheiser cans, it scales well with amp, but can be driven adequately with modern smartphones.
I even used mine ( the 80ohm version II) with a clip plus years back with good result.
If you're only after sound quality, it just can't get better at this price. If you have a DJ friend, ask him/ her ( 90 percent DJs have/had them at some point) It's a true legend.
Hope to see it come back with proper pricing.
