Next day, after cleaning the headband and pads a bit, I decided to give it a listen on one of my cassette walkmans. I would not use it much with a DAC/amp or a DAP, as for serious listening I have much better pairs. I used to be active on these forums for years, and I thought I did a decent job of building a mostly endgame system for myself within my budget: Teac HA-501 amp, Schiit Gumby mulitbit, HD 600, HD 650, Shure 1540, DT990/600, and LCD-2F. I even had a Trafomatic amp in rotation before it developed a static. Still never got that repaired, mainly because the Teac sounded so good to me. It's defintely wider than the HD 650, and most definitely wider than the HD 569. I'd say the sound stage is about on par with the LCD-2F. There's no 3-headed blob here. Sounds pan left and right very nicely. There's no congestion, either. The torture test I put them through is Brian Eno and David Byrne's "Home." The HD 559 passed with mostly flying colors. I also play Rush's Tom Sawyer to hear how the drums pan right to left. No issues here. In lesser headphones, they pan from your right ear, over your head, to your left ear. With the HD 559, they pan through your head. Impressive. The cups are very large and deep, so your ear will stay suspended inside the cups, not really touching anything. The impedance seemed high at 50Ω, but I said to myself that I can use the power amplifier which I had connected to my computer as that has a 6.3mm headphone output.

HD 559 | Sennheiser HD 559 | Sennheiser

Well anyway, I recently decided I wanted to use closed headphones to watch movies at night as to not disturb my girlfriend or downstairs neighbor. No problem, I'll use my Shure 1540. But, despite being properly stored in their box for years, they still managed to fall apart within a few hours of use. The ear pads disintegrated and the headband pad fell apart. Geez. That was discouraging. Single-entry cable. I've grown tired of the double entry. Ok, that wasn't a must, but it would be a bonus. EQ can make this headphone close to neutral sounding, apart from the sub-bass region. Elevate the sub-bass in EQ and distorsion will rise exponentially, allowing you to only listen at low to medium levels. To be completely honest, at the price these sell for the only serious complaint I have is the recessed treble. Holding the headphones up side-by-side, it is clear that they have vastly different designs. The Sennheiser HD 559’s headband is made mostly of plastic. It also has a super soft cushion on its underside that is coated with a light velvet material. Oh the other hand, the Grado SR80e’s headband is made of metal and is coated with leather. It doesn’t have any significant padding. However I found it to be more comfortable than the HD 559’s headband. Why, you ask? The HD 559 is heavier than the SR80e and hugs the head tighter. The SR80e is incredibly light and doesn’t squeeze my delicate head.It should be noted that some instruments can seem a bit harsh in the upper register, especially with lower quality amps or digital music files. At 50Ω, the HD559 are at the boundary between low and high impedance. While they are not that hard to drive at 95dB/mW (don't be fooled by the 108dB/V given in specs, as the voltage sensitivity is always much higher), most low power devices won't be able to drive them hard, meaning you will only get a medium to reasonably loud volume. So in regard to comfort, for the money you're paying (as of 2023 these are available for ~70euros) you really get very good comfort. Anyway, where do these headphones fall on the spectrum? The bulleted list I provided above, or the muddy junk some reviewers would have us believe? The mids are good. Male voices sound nice. Where the HD 569 were a little honky and shouty, the mids on the HD 559 are smooth, open, and natural. They have a little bit a rough edge to them, especially when compared to the HD 650, but then again, which headphones don't in that comparison?

Sennheiser HD 559 Over-Ear Headphones | Audio Emotion

The first device I tried was a walkman with modest output power (2 x 5mW) and it was able to drive them nicely without feeling the need for more power. Volume wasn't super loud, but more than enough for casual listening. This sounded promising. It's not really a big deal, but at this low price you will need to add ~20euros for a new cable if you need it. Another thing I immediately noticed was it sounded kind of muffled, like vocals were recessed from the rest of the spectrum. Suffering from the slight compression in the upper mids (a recurring theme we’re seeing with a lot of the new Sennheiser models), the HD 559 may not do some vocals justice, but the rest of the midrange remains largely intact, with adequate detail and good clarity. The SR80e doesn’t have a lot of low end extension, and has modest lows in general. However, it regains some of its energy down there by a boost in the low-mids, where bass guitars love to bump.Due to a scoop in the midrange, music with a lot of electric guitars and synths feels a little thin and less powerful than one might want. Therefore, these headphones are better for folks listening to acoustic music such as folk, jazz, Bluegrass, or any vocal centric music that don’t rely on low-end for emotional impact. Sennheiser HD 559Again the Sennheiser HD 559 headphones can be considered an entry-level audiophile set of headphones with Hi-Fi sound quality. Depth and placement are okay here, delivering a sense of soundstage that is present, but far from arresting. This is about what I expected from the entry-level model, though the overall dynamic sound probably lends some improvement to this modest impression. As already stated, don't expect the sound signature on these to be neutral (at this price I would not expect this anyway). While not very far from neutral, the recessed lower treble and missing sub-bass rumble are obvious.

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Said to myself to give it some time to break-in and see if there was a difference after a couple of days. Being made of velour, the pads are way more comfortable than leather and they will also last much longer.

How does the Sennheiser HD 599 sound?

Like the other review said, this kind of tuning with recessed lower treble will be much more forgiving to flaws in mastering compared to a neutral or bright headphone which can give the sensation of piercing your ears with some music. Recently, seeing that it was collecting dust I decided to give it another try. The headband was partly detached (a typical issue on many Senheiser 5xx series), so I glued it with gel type super glue and let it cure overnight on the headphone stand.