Sony MDR-1A Prestige Overhead Headphones - Black

Product Information

I just bought this headphone this week. In the stores, I tested the headphone selections using Samsung Galaxy S7 Exynos version and Spotify's Extreme Quality. In terms of accessories, you get two standard length 1.2-meter cables, one of which has a one-button inline remote and microphone. It's geared toward Android phones but also works with iPhones, though in a more limited capacity (no volume controls). If you have Android phone, you can use the free SmartKey app to customize the button controls.

The case it comes with is basically just a bag. No hard case. Not a fan of soft carry-cases since they don't actually protect headphones.They can be powered by almost anything. My Galaxy phone has never sounded better. They really don't need that much power, which is a big plus. The highs are surprisingly detailed on the sonys, and even more present than the 598s. I found myself dialing down the treble frequencies on the sonys by about 2-3 db.

A bit less clarity and more muddled than mdr600. Especially with high hats and cymbals which sound unnatural and a bit splashy when compared to the 600. Snare drums also sound low quality like it has been downgraded from 320 to 128kbps. I suspect the 1A’s unnatural sound could be attributed to the massive peak at around 9khz and a big drop off from around 12khz onwards (thanks to rtings.com frequency graph). These are pure, plain headphones – no wireless, no noise cancelling, no extras. However, there are some more advanced, and expensive, models in the series too. The MDR-1ADAC have an inbuilt DAC to let you get the digital feed from a computer or USB audio-enabled phone (like an iPhone 6), and the MDR-1ABT offer Bluetooth. For music on the go. This are my favourites for the moment. I rate it even higher than the Sennheiser Momentum because the cans are much more comfortable. My hearing improves dramatically when I start looking at FR graphs — when I look at these graphs, I can hear up to 40K (50K on a good day). When I stop looking at those graphs, I can only hear up to 10K." --> music_4321 These things seem quite sturdy. The housings may be mostly plastic, but you can feel the sturdyness of the metal frame underneath, and while light they do have good heft. I wouldn't recommend tossing them around or anything, but they can take their fair share of abuse.

Because the testing occurred on a crowded show floor, it was relatively hard to make out the subtle nuances of the headphones. No surprise really, given the 40mm drivers are said to be capable of delivering a 3-100,000Hz frequency response, which is way outside of human hearing capability at both the low- and high-end. Psychoacoustics and all, but we need no mental evaluation to beam about how great these headphones sound. This kind of bass emphasis is of course the norm among style headphones, but is a sign that the ‘Hi-Res’ tag is there for the most part because these are supposedly ‘high-end’ headphones and that Hi-Res Audio is the current buzzword in hi-fi. The Audio-Technica ATH-M50x offer greater bass control and a ‘higher-resolution’ sound for slightly less money, for example.