[eboleyn]

Hi all,

I'm very curious about the RAAL SR1a headphones...

I've long thought that headphones were just not there compared to high-end speaker setups...  but considering the very best speaker setup I've ever heard has RAAL tweeters in it (and that is part of the magic that made it so good), I'm led to think that the the RAAL SR1a's might be the right thing to try.

So does anyone know if is there any place near Portland/Oregon to demo them or anyone I could get to let me try them?  I'd even be willing to pay a rental fee to try them out in my own home for a short time.   

[Jon L]

If you can wait 'til December and willing to travel, Canjam Socal will feature Raal, among many others.
https://canjamglobal.com/shows/socal2020/

If you're not that patient, I would just buy one (used one if you can find one) because Raal SR1a (with Schiit Jotunheim R) is that good, and even if you don't like it, you will be able to sell it without taking much of a loss.  If you buy new, Raal even has 14 day money back guarantee.

0507201153 by drjlo2, on Flickr

[mresseguie]

I Googled for dealers in the US and found this place in Portland:

https://www.headphones.com/collections/flagship-headphones/products/raal-requisite-sr1a

I had no idea they existed till now. Thank you for asking!

Michael

[Wind Chaser]

I came close to buying the SR1a, then I got distracted by the >>> AMT Heddphone <<< but ended up with the Hifiman HE-1000se. Kept them for about a month and decided headphones aren't for me.

[eboleyn]

I came close to buying the SR1a, then I got distracted by the >>> AMT Heddphone <<< but ended up with the Hifiman HE-1000se. Kept them for about a month and decided headphones aren't for me.

Well, I do have some Hifiman HE-6 headphones, which when driven by a great DAC/amp combo, were just about equal to the best live speakers I'd ever heard...

Then I went and ruined it all via replacing the tweeters in my experimental speaker setup with RAAL 70-20XR units, and it started a tuneup race which led to the current situation which has again definitively exceeded any headphone results, but ... whew it's kinda pricey since it uses a DEQX unit plus separate amplification and the high-end drivers.  Even getting most of the components used the stack for these 2-way monitors cost me roughly $12K.  New all this would be more like $25K, or maybe $15K for the lower-end-but-still-great-sounding versions.

Long story short I want to see if there is an at least close-enough way to get there with headphones...  then I can move the crazy speakers to my living room system and just keep the headphones for my office space.   

[Jon L]

As good as speakers with Raal tweeters sound, when you have treble, mid, and bass ALL played by the single ribbon driver an inch away from your ears...indescribable things happen.

[eboleyn]

If you can wait 'til December and willing to travel, Canjam Socal will feature Raal, among many others.
https://canjamglobal.com/shows/socal2020/

If you're not that patient, I would just buy one (used one if you can find one) because Raal SR1a (with Schiit Jotunheim R) is that good, and even if you don't like it, you will be able to sell it without taking much of a loss.  If you buy new, Raal even has 14 day money back guarantee.

0507201153 by drjlo2, on Flickr

So is that your headphone unit or did you post someone else's pic?

[Jon L]

This is my system.  FYI, the headphones cables are aftermarket cables from Norne.

[eboleyn]

This is my system.  FYI, the headphones cables are aftermarket cables from Norne.

Are you connecting directly to the amp with those crazy headphones or is the "impedance matcher" box just not visible in the pic?

[Jon L]

There are currently two direct-drive amps for Raal SR1a available, with more rumored to be in works.  That amp in photo is Jotunheim R, so no need for impedance box.

https://raalrequisite.com/amplifiers/

[eboleyn]

There are currently two direct-drive amps for Raal SR1a available, with more rumored to be in works.  That amp in photo is Jotunheim R, so no need for impedance box.

https://raalrequisite.com/amplifiers/

Interesting.  I'd seen passing comment that "direct drive" amplifiers for the RAAL SR1a were being worked on, but I guess it's past the "worked on" stage now.

In my custom speaker setup that I'd compare with any SR1a's I was auditioning, I've been using Pass Labs .8 amps to drive the individual drivers of the speakers.  For voicing similarity and such I'd probably try out both my XA30.8 and X250.8 amps first, but hmm...  the low restocking fee on the Jotenheim R does indeed Tempt me to try it out along with the others.

Yeah, I think I'm convinced that I have to try it out in my home so I can get parity comparisons.

[eboleyn]

There are currently two direct-drive amps for Raal SR1a available, with more rumored to be in works.  That amp in photo is Jotunheim R, so no need for impedance box.

https://raalrequisite.com/amplifiers/

Out of curiousity, did you try other amps with the impedance box, or just went with the Jotunheim R?

I'm trying to get a sense of how much it's worth trying vs. my other high-end amps.  I.e. is it comparable sound quality, or just good and portable...?

[Jon L]

Out of curiousity, did you try other amps with the impedance box, or just went with the Jotunheim R?

I'm trying to get a sense of how much it's worth trying vs. my other high-end amps.  I.e. is it comparable sound quality, or just good and portable...?

To beat the Jutunheim R direct-drive with the impedance box + amp , you'll need a really high-end amp that puts out a lot of power.  I refer you to this review which has lots of comparisons:
https://www.headphones.com/blogs/news/bolt-from-the-blue-raal-requisise-sr1a-earfieldtm-monitor-headphone-review

[eboleyn]

To beat the Jutunheim R direct-drive with the impedance box + amp , you'll need a really high-end amp that puts out a lot of power.  I refer you to this review which has lots of comparisons:
https://www.headphones.com/blogs/news/bolt-from-the-blue-raal-requisise-sr1a-earfieldtm-monitor-headphone-review

Well, for me I'm indeed looking for that "peak" listening experience, so if it takes one of my high-end amps, so be it.

I'm really hoping for this headphone to convince me not to try to buy a second of my high-end speaker/amp setups, which takes *two* of the high-end amps (each of which cost more than the SR1a's) plus building the speakers whose drivers alone all together (the tweeters are RAAL ribbons) plus then a digital processor each for another pile of $$$$.  There's nothing else I've heard like it, and I want to move it from my basement "lab"/office to my living room while keeping the experience down there if I can.

Wish me luck...  I'll report back how it goes in any case for those interested. 

[eboleyn]

So it's been almost a month, but I finally got my SR1a's.

All I can say is wow, they really do sound that good.  I'm definitely keeping them.

As good as speakers with Raal tweeters sound, when you have treble, mid, and bass ALL played by the single ribbon driver an inch away from your ears...indescribable things happen.

I'll play devil's advocate a bit here:  In my limited listening so far, sound character-wise on one of my really good amps they sound so close to my custom speakers with RAAL 70-20XR + Seas Excel W18EX w/DEQX processor (using a massive 192 db/octave linear phase crossover and separate high-end amps for each driver set, so it's crazy more expen$ive) that I can't tell the difference modulo maybe a bit of the fact that these don't have quite the full "soundfield experience" of a 2ch speaker setup, as has been reported elsewhere.

In any case, to this point I'd never heard ANYTHING like that setup...  but now I have.   

I'm expecting to move this custom speaker stack to my living room now and adding some Rythmik F18 subs for the coup-de-gras, but I'm super-pleased to say that it looks like I'm meeting my goal of not having to replace it with a similar setup without feeling cheated.

To beat the Jutunheim R direct-drive with the impedance box + amp , you'll need a really high-end amp that puts out a lot of power.  I refer you to this review which has lots of comparisons:
https://www.headphones.com/blogs/news/bolt-from-the-blue-raal-requisise-sr1a-earfieldtm-monitor-headphone-review

2 things:

First off, I really do notice at least a bit of difference between the low-end and high-end amps driving these.  But I'm using these as a "high-end speaker setup replacement", so I'm a bit biased here.  It does indeed seem like these are more "forgiving" of amps which I felt were not as good on various speakers, to which I'm tentatively attributing to the fact that the headphones look very much like a simple resistive load.

Second, I'm pretty sure I'm not even driving 1 watt into these right now (even for it being "loud" for me), but admittedly I like quiet listening compared to most people.

Of course, there's a lot to be said for not doubling or worse the price on top of the headphones for a crazy pricey amp, plus having some portability if you want it. 

Anyway, thanks again for the comments, and hopefully this is helpful for others who are wondering about the RAAL SR1a's themselves.

[nathanm]

How much different do these sound compared to regular headphones in overall presentation, not just frequency response?

Does the sound actually appear to come from in front of you, or just a little bit?

How loud do they sound in the room when not wearing them? Would it be comparable to a clock radio? Louder? Softer? Could you credibly annoy someone in an adjacent room with them?

Thanks!

(I know I took a big risk replying to a 30 day old topic, but I've prepared myself for whatever might come from that red text.)

[eboleyn]

Hi nathanm,

How much different do these sound compared to regular headphones in overall presentation, not just frequency response?

Does the sound actually appear to come from in front of you, or just a little bit?

Well, it depends on what headphones you compare it to.  I will say that I have not compared them to any greater-than-$1.5K-ish headphones.  The most high-end ones I have tried other than the SR1a's have been Hifiman HE-6's, but also a smattering of ones going down in quality from there.  Less than the HE-6's, the difference in naturality kind begins to dominate.

Given that, I'll say that these took my experience from being "really really good" (Hifiman HE-6) to "almost alien it is so natural" (SR1a) in the sound quality space.  The sense of hearing the imperfections in headphones strongly vanishes for me, though the soundfield isn't the same as normal speakers either ... more on that below.

OK, this gets into a bit of a diatribe, but you asked a guy who is an "accuracy is king" kind of audiophile, so there!

Basically I have a pseudo-quality scale I use for speakers, with usually some gradation at each level (note that I define "imaging" as a category containing both spatial positioning and the sense of "presence/immersion"):

• Krappy - Typically cheap hardware here, like the proverbial bargain-basement headphones or bad computer speakers.  Very imbalanced, little imaging correctness.
• Good - Tonality is pleasant but not perfect, but still pretty bad imaging.
• Great - Tonality is very good but not perfect, imaging is decent.
• (basically) Perfect Tone - Tonality is amazing, imaging is very good but not perfect.
• (basically) Perfect Imaging - Can't really distinguish the tonality from the previous case, but the imaging is noticeably improved to almost eerie levels.

So, in this tonality scale, with typical source(DAC)/preamp/amp/speaker chains the imaging quality kind of lags the tonality quality.  This is probably due to how human ears perceive detailed spatial positioning and "presence" vs. tonality, but there you go.  For these tests I have used top-quality (i.e. high-end speaker setup level) chain of everything just changing the speakers/headphones.

To me, headphones roughly have followed this scale with the caveat that spatial positioning is just different and typically mostly defeated, but "presence" follows the "imaging" sections mentioned above.  I mean sure, there *is* still some positioning detection going on, but it's just not the same level.

HE-6 is, to me, in the "Perfect Tone" zone.  I could notice maybe a tiny bit of difference in tonality (but tiny if that) and the sense of "presence" wasn't quite as good as an experimental speaker setup (which I rate as "Perfect Imaging", the highest on the scale) I have.  This is, FWIW, using as much as possible identical other components.  I was never quite satisfied with my listening sessions as I would feel at times like my enjoyment of the spatial positioning was messing with how I was rating the HE-6 vs. the experimental speaker setup, but I just *enjoyed* the speakers more on a visceral level I couldn't quite pin down.

Having said all the above, the SR1a using the same components clarified everything to me.  It is clearly in the "Perfect Imaging" zone and a level above the HE-6, with no even marginally perceptible difference vs. my experimental speaker setup in anything but the spatial positioning.

The SR1a's spatial positioning is not like a set of speakers, but it's not as missing as it is with headphones either.  I honestly haven't done a careful set of tests with it (so take this with a giant proverbial grain of salt), but the one passing try I did noted that the imaging sense became a bit more speaker-like when I set the "wings" to a very wide configuration.

All-in-all I am VERY happy with them.   In everything but spatial sense it is literally the very best I have heard (truly equaling my experimental speakers), and in spatial sense it bests any other headphones due to it's hybrid off-ear nature.

How loud do they sound in the room when not wearing them? Would it be comparable to a clock radio? Louder? Softer? Could you credibly annoy someone in an adjacent room with them?

It depends on how far you are setting them from your ear (the "width of the wings") and how loud you like to listen.  I listen to fairly quiet music by most people's standards, and the wings are relatively close to my ears in my standard setup, and when I took them off and tried a test, I could only barely hear it when it was sitting on the table maybe 5 feet from me.

Sure you could use a clock radio to emulate it (given the size of the drivers in the SR1a), so basically if you want to test it, take that clock radio and set the volume to what it should be by your ear at the right volume, then move it 5 feet or further away.

I think you'll find it's not super loud unless it was already being used both with "wide wings" and you like very loud music.  Even then it'll still just be audible, not "loud" to someone else.

Thanks!

(I know I took a big risk replying to a 30 day old topic, but I've prepared myself for whatever might come from that red text.)

Heh, longer than 30 days, but I still got the notice. 

[nathanm]

Thanks much!  I have Sennheiser hd600s and Audeze LCD-2s and although they are both “good” I really have zero desire to listen to music at all on headphones. I have two problems; I love my speakers but can’t play them loud enough and not after 10pm. Secondly I can play my headphones loud but it still sounds like headphones and is not compelling at all. That’s why these intrigued me.

[Russell Dawkins]

Sure you could use a clock radio to emulate it (given the size of the drivers in the SR1a), so basically if you want to test it, take that clock radio and set the volume to what it should be by your ear at the right volume, then move it 5 feet or further away.

Good suggestion with the minor exception that the bass on the SR1a is dipolar so you will hear less bass in the room from it than you would from the clock radio when both are adjusted to sound similar in level at 2" distance. If the clock radio has very little bass, which is quite possible, then this would be a very valid test.

I find the SR1a intriguing, too, Nathan (welcome back) and for similar reasons to yours. Sometimes I want to crank the music up but live in a quiet house with people who don't always want to hear what I do. I also like the promise of very low IM distortion.
One concern is the mounting system, with the strap around the back of the head, etc. It doesn't look as well thought out as my AKG K-1000s which I enjoy very much and which swing out similarly. I bought them for the promise of proper headphone playback of my Blumlein recordings which require the speakers positioned at ±45º. These angles are achievable with the K-1000s but the imaging is not quite as focused as good speakers at the same angle. The K-1000s still sell, used, for as much as double, sometimes triple, their original cost 30 years after they went on the market for the then-outrageous price of $1200.

Srajan Ebaen, as you might know, thinks very highly of the Raals.

[Jon L]

These angles are achievable with the K-1000s but the imaging is not quite as focused as good speakers at the same angle.

I loved my AKG K1000's, but at high angles, bass disappeared and ruined the tonality.  Same problem exists with Raal SR1a as you angle out more, but the bass quality is at least a couple of levels superior to K1000 to begin with in terms of bass definition, solidity, impact, and speed. 

In fact, it's the level of resolution and sense of cleanliness (less distortion) of the Raal that separates it from not just K1000 but every other headphone out there, even compared to my Abyss 1266 Phi TC. 

Even then, my horn speaker in room is more engaging and fun to listen to, and no headphone, even Raal, will give you that vibrating and pulsating involvement.  Some of that can be achieved with on-body vibration devices such as Strap Edge:

https://www.woojer.com/strap/?gclid=CjwKCAiAqJn9BRB0EiwAJ1SztSy2-jPBMGu4Hbs5sJxGFafym5NpiXF3LXmf_w9OesTxNa4VOiQwNhoCt6YQAvD_BwE