Sennheiser HD250 Linear 1 Monster Review.

0:01 [Music] everybody it's monster and I am back again with another headphone review today I'm going to be talking about a vintage headphone that's kind of hard to find and not too much is out there about these this is the Sennheiser HD 250 linear one it's kind of a mouthful see it there uh this was made back and I

0:47 believe it's the early early to mid 80s and I think they discontinued it in 91 and then they brought out the linear 2 which I assume is kind of the same sounding headphone but don't quote me on that this puppy is 300 ohms with a 94 sensitivity there is apparently 600 ohm versions but I have not heard those I've only heard this pair right here so let me tell you about these so kick back relax and enjoy and we'll talk about this really truly remarkable sounding headphone alright so a little background about a year year and a half ago I was

1:34 reading through the various headphone forums and I came across a thread entitled the HD the Sennheiser HD 250 linear one and I was started by a headphone member named Alphonse and in his thread he was comparing the linear' to the HD 650 more the 6 X X and he was saying that essentially it sounds kind of similar to that but with better extension on either end and I've always kind of been a fan of the 650 so I kind of kept an eye in an ear open for the 250 but I didn't really pay too much

2:20 attention to because I mean frankly a lot of people rave about headphones and they say that they're the greatest thing ever and then I get a chance to listen to them when I'm just like God things are terrible so people I'm not saying people are wrong they're just not my taste don't often I shouldn't say that my teeth sometimes are different than other people's we'll leave it at that anyway um so a couple days later I'm cruising the classifieds of another website who specializes in vintage audio and lo and behold there was the

3:05 Sennheiser HD 250 one ear one for sale including shipping for 75 bucks and I looked at it and I'm like this is a headphone I was just reading about the other day and when I saw the price and seventy-five dollars shipped and I'm like for 75 bucks this thing's gonna sound like garbage I mean any good headphone that's gonna sound cuz I'm gonna sound good for 75 bucks but on the flip side of it it was only 75 bucks so I said screw it and I bought it and I got it a few days later and I plugged it in and I was thoroughly impressed with this thing I was really surprised at how

3:57 good he said phone sound um I have no idea I can't seem to find any literature documentation as to how much they cost when they were new I don't know the differences between the 300 ohm and the 600 ohm and I don't know the differences between the linear one and the linear two for all I know they could all sound identical I have no idea so if you're watching this and you've got a linear 2 or a 600 ohm and you want me to check it out and you and send it to me and I'll take good care of it and I'll do an ad and I'll report back anyway so I don't even know how much these cost originally but it was a small price to

4:42 pay and for 75 bucks and I got these and I immediately tried them on one of my vintage receivers because again these are 300 ohms and they're 94 sensitivity so they need some juice they're not as hard to drive as a sextet summer but they still need some power and at 300 ohms the vintage receivers are a good match and they sounded great they sound a really really good um I then tried it on my law Figaro 339 tube amp and it jumped from like here all the way up to here and sound quality I was really shocked and I thought I had

5:29 reached the maximum that I could reach with these headphones and then a couple months ago I bought a new OTO app from Gwen called the Glenn Oh tio of the Gio TL and that amplifier took these two even way up here and I'm not exaggerating when I tell you these sound like 2 or $3,000 headphones and I got it for 75 bucks [ __ ] anyway um let's get into the build quality and the comfort of these these

6:21 are very light headphones like it's like it feels I almost feels like a toy they're so light in there all their plastic everywhere and if I'm gonna say anything negative about these headphones it's going to be with the way they look they look like toys they look like garbage they look like something that you would find at Walmart for 49 bucks but don't let the cheap plastic and kind of ugly if I'm going to be honest appearance of these fool you they've got a leather headband the cups are very shallow they're very shallow if you can

7:07 see that and then on the inside it's got a belt liner in the inside um I have read that some people that have these are having trouble getting a seal a good seal for the bass knock on wood I have not experienced a lack of seal even with my glasses and if there was any more bass coming out of these these would be almost being said headphones so you know if you have these and you're having a tough time with the seal I I'm sorry I feel bad for it because you're missing out um these are approximately 30 almost

7:55 35 40 years old and obviously they're still going strong for me but again it's all plastic and it doesn't scream luxury so these are not headphones that I would be comfortable taking out in public or taken to work even though they are a closed back design I would be afraid that these would fall apart but again there are almost forty years old and they're still working good for me so how do these sound one word two words [ __ ] brilliant these phones are so good they are they're they're a very I'm

8:44 hesitant to say the word neutral because as I've described in my other videos and other reviews neutral oftentimes means be slight but if you look at the graph of these headphones it's pretty neutral this headphone has got incredible extension on both ends so you have really deep diving sub-basin ease and because of that I like to compare it to the LCD - which also is known for its

9:35 prodigious sub bass the mid bass slams with good authority um it doesn't hit as hard as say like my Atticus but sometimes the Atticus almost hits too hard for some songs so when I say that it doesn't hit as hard as the Atticus that's not necessarily a bad thing all the time the mids on these are slightly recessed I wouldn't go as far as to call it v-shaped per se when I picture an EQ graph and somebody says

10:20 v-shape I picture a canyon these are kind of more like a puddle when it comes to the mids being resist they're slightly pushed back but not offensively so the treble is super detailed to the points where on a few songs it can get a little bit break it doesn't kill me like some bigger dynamic headphones - but it can be a little bit bright but again you are dealing with a headphone that it's incredibly transparent so if you if the song is bright

11:07 you're gonna hear bright if you've got a bright solid States parada if you have neutral or above tubes you're gonna hear it so when I had my love Figaro 3 3 9 that was an incredibly warm sounding amplifier and the tubes I had in there were kind of warm - and my DAC at the time was an idea of GDR - our 11 which is warm and I've since changed most of my setup so now I'm kind of running a neutralist bright DAC with a

11:53 very transparent amp Indies like I said if the song is old and sharp you're gonna get a little bit of that sharpness and in the trouble but it's not it's not piercing at all but the detail on this it just goes all the way up and you can hear details I'm still picking up stuff after all these years on these headphones that I've never heard before and other songs through other headphones um though tonality of these is I don't like this word because it doesn't really mean anything but I can't think of another word the tone is very sweet it's a very sweet musical sounding headphone and to be perfectly honest I would say

12:41 that other than the he6 which I used to own this is probably only the second headphone that I've ever owned that I would consider a true all-around headphone in other words I can play any genre I want and it's gonna sound with Judy's headphones now I have other headphones that do certain genres better like my sex stats and how to cos doom metal better than these but these do not fall on its face from metal they're they're fairly quick they've got great slam great extension on both ends and as I said the mids aren't that far back so

13:27 you're not losing you know that that aggressive guitar sound it has great texture it's got great tonality the soundstage for a closed bag is brilliant I mean it comes out not only does it come out really wide but you've got a lot of up and down and back and forth with things um these these are great headphones I'm almost these are almost like my favorite headphones right now and I got it for $75 these scales really well so if you're listening to my words and you go out and you plug them into cord mojo or Magne two or three or you

14:16 plug right into your phone you might not be as enthusiastic about what you're hearing that as I am but if you feed these with a good amp especially in OTL these love tubes these [ __ ] love tubes so if you've got an OTL and you're looking for a new clothes back that's got great extension that can do any genre well you need to check out the 251 ears these are so so good in his thread malfunctioned that there that there similar to the HD 650s in my

15:03 opinion these below the 650s out of the water in fact my 650s or over there behind the camera in a box I sold him last night because I never listened to him because these are in my opinion that much better um in my opinion I'm probably going to get some heat for saying this these sound the way that the original pre-phase are odyssey LCD twos should have sounded because you've got that massive sub bass extension with these as you do with the LCD tubes so it is a logical comparison

15:48 you got that sub bass that just keep going then going and going you think LCD too well not I think these the mids on these in my opinion are better than the LCD tubes and the trouble it's not even it's not even close to me this is the way the LCD to should have sounded that's how much I like things um rock folk metal trance these sayings are epic with trance or so good attracts it's like holy [ __ ] it hits hard the extension goes down the three-dimensionality of the the

16:36 soundstage the imaging it's all right where you want it to be the trance like oh um like I said I'm not I get to play in genre through and when I was kind of underwhelmed with it I haven't done one genre yet that this can't handle really well you can occasionally find them on eBay I've seen him seen a few of them go new in the box I don't have unfortunately I've seen them as low as 180 and I've seen him as high it's like 500 bucks so I don't even really know what these are going for I know there's one on head fire right now and the classifieds for 260 I think it is so the

17:25 guy can't sell it and I told people dude you need to go buy this headphone and it's still sitting there so I don't know I don't know what a fair price for these is they certainly do not have as rabbit of a fan basis than sex tents do and I keep comparing them to the sex sets because they come from essentially the same era these are a little bit newer than sex sets but not by much maybe five six seven years um so I really don't know what it what a fair price for these is based on sound quality like I said true my Quinn McClendon tube amp back here

18:11 besa these things like I'm like fifteen hundred two thousand dollar headphones to my ears so if he's broke today I would gladly Punk down 250 or 350 or even 450 to get another pair of these that's how much I like these so anyway this is a rather short and quick review I don't know a lot of the history of these headphones I do know that Sennheiser recently brought out within the past couple days in fact the Sennheiser HD 3 I think it's HD it's the 300 and they claimed it was supposed to

18:59 be based upon leaves and it's really that only a few people have the new HD 300 so I think it's HD I'll just I'll just say HD and if it's not even crucified me only a few people have had a chance to hear the HD 300s but the people that have said it's it's not even close to these so that's a bit of a disappointment because I was hoping to get a brand new updated version of these and apparently it doesn't even come close so I would stick with the originals again I don't know if there's a difference between the linear one in the linear two as far as the sound goes further I don't know if there's a

19:46 difference between the 300 and 600 ohm versions so what I'm talking about is the linear one 300 on I get a good seal and I'm certainly not missing based on these so anyway that wraps up this short review of my Sennheiser HD 250 s this has been monster zero and I'll see you again next time