Topic: beyer dt990 distortion after repad

[weroflu]

repadded some dt990's today. i am pretty sure they were working perfectly before changing the pads. now there is some distortion in the right speaker. i vacuumed the speakers before changing pads. could this have caused damage?

the only other thing i can think of is that  there is  a loose wire on the speaker, but i don't want to take the pad off just yet as it's a pain getting it on again.

[Javier Cinakowski]

The vacuum could have certainly damaged the thin diaphragm. 

Good news is that Byer's customer service is awesome.  I sent my dt880's in for a similar issue and the sent a new pair (bench tested) back with the quickness. 

[Fatah Ruark (aka MIKE B)]

Other than the damage, how are you liking those cans? I tried a pair the last time I was in NYC and the comfort/sound ratio was pretty damn good IMO. Only got a chance to try them for 5 minutes in B+H though.

[Belexes]

I like my 770's. Wondering if I should jump up to the 8 or 900 series. 

[weroflu]

i like them  a lot. i mixed about 7 albums on them. they are 14 years old and sound(ed) great. there are probably better, but since they sound so good i have never had any desire to go searching.

[acidjack]

Other than the damage, how are you liking those cans? I tried a pair the last time I was in NYC and the comfort/sound ratio was pretty damn good IMO. Only got a chance to try them for 5 minutes in B+H though.

Ugh, that listening station is so worthless... Who knows what horrendous amp is behind the phones, and the music selection leaves uh, a lot to be desired.  Yes, B&H, I get it, these cans have lots of bass when listening to rap... this does me any good to know... why?

[weroflu]

now i'm not so sure i damaged the phones.

tried them out again hooked up to my netbook and though the netbook audio is not great there is no distortion.

i had listened on my cell phone last time (galaxy s) and those have some sort of proprietary audio jack. though i have used regular iem's on the phone with no problems. maybe there is an impedance issue since these are 600 ohm phones. i know there is a mismatch between both my phone and the netbook but i never noticed anything grossly wrong before.

still trying to figure this out. why would i only have problems on one channel if it is an impedance issue.

also if i damaged the driver it should sound a lot worse than it does, the distortion wasn't very pronounced and only happened on loud bass passages. is it possible there was a physical rattling of the speaker or other parts?

[tbger]

Could have been an impedance mismatch due to driver not having enough power to reproduce bass clearly, but given it only happened on one side and never before changing the pads, it's not the case here I think.  Another cause is, anything touching the driver while it maintains deep bass - which is hard to do - will likely cause trouble.  Things like hair or pieces of whatever you used for the vacuum (btw, don't do this again ...).  To check if that's the problem try to blow on it, to make the thing move.  Listen again with the particular recording you've had problem with (which you didn't have before).  If there's a hair inside then it might move and therefore makes distortion disappear, or to be more / less noticed.

I've read a thread on Head-Fi where a few people reported similar problems (link below).  A whole lot of solutions offered therein, also a few pictures that might be useful if you feel like opening the cup.

http://www.head-fi.org/t/218922/dt990-rattling-calling-beyer-experts


Don't mess with the drivers unless you're sure of what you're doing.  If you think you better not touch it any more, you can always send it back to Beyer.

Good luck !

[weroflu]

update...

i replaced the driver, but maybe didn't even need to. the phones have worked ok but still rattle with a lot of bass. finally today found the cause of it... cracked plastic shell that holds the right driver. can this be repaired with superglue/epoxy or are they toast?

doesn't look like beyer sells the actual housings, just pads and such.