Philips Fidelio X2HR headphones for $99, best Christmas gift

I've decided to write my impressions on the Philips Fidelio X2HR course on the internet are either overly positive reviews or absurdly negative ones. After reading and listening to so many reviews and actual hearing those headphones was a difference IMO.

My advice is to listen first before making any purchase.

Disclaimer: my below written impressions are subjective – in other words, my tastes expressed in regard to music and how those headphones sound.

My current setup is composed by: Pioneer Reference M73 Class A amplifier, Pioneer PD-75 CD player, ROG Supreme FX8-Channel High Definition Audio CODEC S1220A soundcard, Infinity Kappa 8.1 speakers, bi wire cables and gold plated interconnects.

I bought those headphones new from a local online store for about 210 euro in the idee that if I don’t like them I can return them.

Bild quality and comfort:

They look and feel very well made from high quality materials and a metal frame support. The ear cushions are interchangeable but can’t be found anywhere new (Philips is not selling them as spare parts but are a lot of third-party ones on the market). The cable is 3m long but interchangeable (I like it as it is). My first impression was: WOW, those are some hefty headphones but they stay really well on my had and I find them very comfortable even for long periods of listening time. The impedance is 30 ohms so they can be driven by any source, even cheap ones. Of course, they will sound better with a better DAC but that’s valid with anything.

Sound quality:

They sound acoustic and very bright with hissing in human voice reproduction. Unfortunately I'm not very fond of the “very bright” part because it’s tiresome and physically causes me ear fatigue.

The bass is deep but dynamic, in no case to much IMO. The high mid’s are a little low @3kHz. My biggest problem is with treble: they start to rise @4Khz with a peek at 5kHz, then fall with a peek at 5.2kHz, rise again strongly starting with 8kHz with a peek @10kHz, fall again @14,5kHz, rise and fall…

Some people say “they are a v sounding headphones” but it’s not quite true, it’s more like up and won the hill and again and again. ߘꊊI’ve attached some frequency response measured by: Sonarworks Reference 4 and a frequency corrections graph. For those who are willing to spend 100+$, Sonarworks Reference 4 has a Fidelio 2HR preset (which can be bought).

I wasn’t, so I’ve made my own EQ preset in Equalizer APO (a free software), I can't attach them here but whoever is interested, send me a message and I can share them with you.

After correcting the sound curve in the EQ I rate the sound of those Fidelio X2HR headphones good, even very good after fine tuning to tase: the bass is deep but dynamic, the voices are well reproduced (no more hissing) and the treble are acoustic but sound proper and detailed. The sound stage is decent and if you immerse in listening you can forget that you have a pair of headphones over your ears and can hear to some degree 3D instrument placement.

Without any corrections, the frequencies most disturbing are @10kHz, the ones responsible for the very bright sound and hissing in human voice reproduction, which literally scratch my hearing and produce physical fatigue to my years. I say it out front, if I didn’t possess and EQ capabilities, I’d returned them and wouldn’t recommend at all! Frankly I listen more from my computer nowadays then from the CD deck and EQ correction is possible, so they are keepers.

I haven’t tested dozens and dozens of headphones so I can say those are better then x or weaker than y, but I can definitely say, after EQ correction, they sound much, much better than 100$ pair headphones (which I regularly change every 2-3 years course they are poorly made), even better overall than the more expensive Sennheiser HD 600 IMO (which have their share of problems). Not everything can be corrected with an EQ, for example sometimes I’d like even more deep bass and found that if I dial extra from the EQ, they start to introduce unwanted distortions thought the sound range and loose some fidelity, that’s why I’ve left the bass untouched on my presets. The good news is that the nasty brightness that was disturbing me is correctable without much losses.

Vitaliy_Kiselev

Big thanks for very useful post.

I strongly suggest you to look onto X1, as X2 and X2HR (two later are same sounding) are actually marketing team modification to original sound. X1 lack any hissing and not bright headphones. Personally I have 2xX1, X1S as reserve and X2HR.

Search for X1S model they made on old line for China, it can be still got new. X1 only very old abused are available. Some Taiwan guys still sell them, JD also had them recently but seems like this one source is up.

Important thing about such headphones is that if you work in them for really long period of time (>2 weeks each day for hours), your brain starts doing thing that Sonarworks Reference is doing. Neural network adops a lot.

Sonarworks Reference 4 can be got for free if you force little grey cells to work. Can PM me if not.

Headhones are $100 and I don't see anything of such construction quality around, even for $500. You can drop them 50 times from your table and won't notice it. Also cable is of proper construction, so as something accidentally pulls hard it won't pull your head or break the jack - it'll just pull out.

I also want to underscore very important thing - headband construction, by using proper steel rods it can be actually adjusted (by carefully bending) to your head. So it will be the force you like, allowing very long sessions.

Sennheiser HD 600 I have and it is very fragile thing. Note that almost every headphones start to sound bright and hissing after HD600 due to their famous veil :-)

Eno

@Vitaliy_Kiselev You also wrote some very useful things, thanks!

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