o.k. everybody: this is where this thread ends. the only reason i've continued to post anything on this particular thread is that i just wanted to conclude it the right way, (after all, it was me who started it in the first place), and two: it may help someone in the future. so. for what it's worth:
the box from the cable company arrived yesterday with the beyer t-1, and the senn hd-800. i've had two nights now of comparative listening with both phones through the phonitor and through the h/p out of a yamaha receiver.
and the results were a bit surprising. i expected the sennheiser hd-800's to fair much better through the phonitor than the beyer t-1's.
turns out, the t-1's sound better to me through the phonitor and the yamaha amp. although neither one knocked my socks off through the phonitor, the beyer's do give you more bass impact, while still doing everything the senn's do as far as mid-range and upper frequencies characteristics. and this really surprised me. i just knew that the hd-800's would sound better than the t-1's (at least through the phonitor, if not through the yamaha amp).
turns out, the t-1's give a better presentation through both.
to my ears, these two headphones are not worlds apart. the 800's may sound a bit less crystalline-clear compared to the t-1's, but as far as bass presentation (extension, articulation and tonal and timbral texture in the low frequencies), it's really not a big enough difference to argue over. you may be gaining a bit more punch and a bit more impact with the t-1, but only slightly. not the difference that other reviews had led me to believe.
soundstage (close your eyes and imagine where the individual instruments are in relation to one another): the senn's are the winner here. the
t-1's do have soundstage, but to my ears the t-1's have a fair amount of soundstage depth, but not much width. the hd-800's can place the instruments wider apart in what can seem like a wider room. but, again the t-1's can do some instrument placement. (some side-to-side, but mainly from front-to-back). so the beyer's are not completely without soundstage.
final conclusions: of all the headphones auditioned recently, you can't beat the lcd-2 and the he-500 for overall bass-presentation superiority. but the planars do this seemingly at the expense of the mids and highs.
the overall winner: the beyerdynamic t-1 headphone. (and this is a compromise, really because the t-1 leaves me still wanting a bit better bass
presentation, as far as depth and tonal and timbral quality).
but, compared to the two headphones that i now own (the grado rs1-i, and the akg k-701), the beyer t-1 is a clearly superior phone. (however, the bass on the t-1 is not as far ahead as i hoped for and expected). better? yes. absolutely. just not quite as far ahead as expected, when you consider the price of the t-1's and the hd-800's, compared to "mid-level" phones, such as the hd-650's, and others in that class/price range.
