claims. There are so many marvellous headphones out there - with a fan base for each of them - why tell others that one and only one headphone is the best? Is there such a thing as a single best headphone for everyone anyway? Objective 2: to persist in an even bigger project of mine, which is to attempt to advance the development of an adequate language to describe the sound of headphones. The language we use today has evolved through the decades within the context of a loudspeaker-centric audio world. A language specifically for headphones has not yet been constructed. Some Head-Fiers construct DIY amps - I construct here a DIY language. This is an ambitious project; one that I started 4 years ago, and it is heart-warming to see that a few people have begun to use the term headstage since its introduction back in 1999. In this write-up, I will be offering a crystal clear explanation of the term headstage, and then I will be adding even more words to the lexicon of headphonespeak. This write-up is therefore not just a simple review of the Omega II - it is also about the creation of a new language, new terminologies and a new review methodology. My review of the Omega II may at first appear sporadic and strewn all over this essay, but actually theres a structure: every time a new term has been properly defined and explained, I will subsequently proceed to review the Omega II using the newly created terminology. Then I will proceed to the second terminology, define what the new word or words mean, and proceed to describe the Omega II using the second set of new words and so on. Lets start. BEFORE THE FOUR COMES THE ONE First there is the One; then there are the Four. I will be touching on the Four Depth Cues towards the middle of this essay, but from the beginning I want to say that there is one sonic mechanism that overrides the Four Depth Cues. This One is the sense of sound localization. We acquire the sense of sound localization because our left and right ear each receives a slightly different input, and by comparing the two our brain interprets the location of the sound source. When we put on our headphones, the headphone transducers are positioned very near our ears - we can locate the source of the sound, and we are aware of this proximity of the sound source. Every time I use the word locate, I am referring to this One mechanism - the mechanism of sound localization. This One mechanism is more powerful than the Four Depth Cues. This One mechanism gives rise to the headstage.

INTRODUCING: THE HEADSTAGE I am listening to a section of Beethovens Pastoral symphony (andante movement), and I think there are 20 musicians packed inside my head. Listening to music via headphones can be a paradoxical experience. I know that 20 people cannot fit into my head, empty as I sometimes swear it may be during my stupider moments. Yet the steadfast illusion right now is that there are 20 musicians in my head. There are some recordings that make me go wow, what a huge soundstage. But heres the rub: I happen to have a wall-sized mirror on one side of my listening chair. When I look into the mirror, the illusion of the huge soundstage is stripped away and revealed for what it truly is: a cramp head-hugging soundfield. In the mirror I can see all those sonic images sticking to my scalp like a bad hair-do. I look away from the mirror, close my eyes, lose all sense of scaled reference to the real world, re-invest my concentration into the music, and the huge soundstage re-appears. But when I open my eyes and look again at the reflection of my headphones in the mirror, I once again see the scalp-bound soundfield. I call this soundfield that stubbornly refuses to take leave of my head the headstage. The difference between soundstage and head-stage is illusion and reality. The soundstage is the (desired) illusion; the headstage the (unfortunate) reality. Another way of stating the difference between headstage and soundstage: headstage is about the localization of sonic images in relation to your head. Lets say you are listening to a piece of music that contains 3 sonic images. One image is located at the right temple of your forehead, another image is skimming the top centre of your scalp, and yet another image is located an inch beyond the left earcup. The arena within which all these sonic images are located is called the headstage. And it is a tiny arena - I estimate this arena on the Omega II to be maybe 8 wide and 5 tall (it could be bigger on your headphone - Ive always said that the Omega II has a small headstage - but more on this later). The sound-stage is something else altogether. The sound-stage is the qualitative perception of ambient cues captured in the recorded music. The soundstage can be very big, as big as a cathedral nave, if that was what was indeed captured in the recording. When listening to headphones we can choose between perceiving the soundstage or perceiving the headstage. Your mental concentration can swing the perception one way or the other. During moments when we are utterly absorbed in the recording, all you have to do is to tell yourself to snap out of it, and chances are that you will lose sight of the majestic soundstage. Whats so majestic when you choose to become aware that the whole violin section of a grand and majestic orchestra is only 4 inches wide across your forehead? When listening via headphones, most of us choose to be aware of the soundstage instead of the headstage, in an effort to distract ourselves from noticing the cramp head-hugging soundfield or in an effort to lose oneself in the recording - the latter is valid and is after all the whole point of listening to music. But distracting yourself from scrutinizing the head-hugging

soundfield will not make you a more discerning listener. You have to understand the headhugging headstage first, cramp as it may be, before you understand the soundstage. HEADSTAGE: ANALOGY OF A PHOTOGRAPH What is the headstage, really? First I will put forward an analogy, then I will offer a working definition of the term headstage. Analogy: imagine a 5-inch wide photograph depicting a sprawling mountain scene going on for miles and miles. A photograph is nothing more than colour pigments distributed on a flat piece of paper. There is no mountain on the piece of paper, nor inside nor behind the piece of paper. The mountain is in the eye of the beholder. Furthermore, a photograph does not need to be mountain-sized in order to depict a mountain. Additionally, a statement that the mountain in the photograph is 10 miles away does not contradict the fact that the colour pigments representing the mountain are lying flat on a piece of paper. The two-dimensional headstage is analogous to the two-dimensional photograph. If a small photo can depict a large scenery, why cant a small headstage portray a large soundstage? And if a flat photo can depict distance, why cant the two-dimensional headstage depict depth? This is the definition of the term headstage: the headstage is a flat plane, small in size, positioned vertically such that the plane intersects both ears, and all sonic images are chained to the two-dimensionality of this plane. None of my past articles has offered such a concise definition of headstage. Please take time to digest this: all sonic images are chained to the two-dimensionality of the headstage, much the same way the mountain is chained to the two-dimensionality of the photograph. Why do I say that the headstage is two-dimensional? In order to be aware that this headhugging soundfield is actually two-dimensional, you have to stop yourself from being swept away by the soundstage illusion of the recording, and start to focus on the location of the images in relation to your head. Your headscape offers several landmarks that you can reference the location of the images against. Landmarks on your head include the front centre of your forehead between the eyebrows, the front centre of your forehead where your third eye would be if you were a Buddha, front top of your forehead where your hairline is if you havent started balding yet, the left and right temples of your forehead, and the left and right ears on your head. It may seem unnatural at first, but try not to focus on the soundstage cues inherent in the recording, but instead focus on the location of images in relation to your headscape.

the acoustic space.) Princess Leias Theme develops slowly but inevitably to its mournful conclusion - at the end, a solo violin weeps its last farewell note, gently dying into the night. (With such a sweet but sad ending to the theme, its a wonder that the Princess didnt die in the movies.) The Omega II convincingly portrays the layered perspectives of this theme utilizing depth cue #1 (as well as #3 - but more on this later). But if a sonic image is soft-sounding, couldnt it be that the instrument was played softly by the musician and not because the instrument was far away? How do you differentiate between the two? This is how: on a hierarchical order, depth cue #1 is at the bottom of the rung, and can be overridden by depth cues #2, #3 and #4. Depth cue #1 is the weakest of the four cues. You will perceive a volumetrically soft image as being far away, per depth cue #1. But if you hear a volumetrically soft but tonally rich image, #2 will override #1, and you perceive the volumetrically soft image to be nearer. Example: I am now listening to Stravinskys The Soldiers Tale (Track 6 The Three Dances). The track opens with a violin and timpani, then a soft-sounding gentle cymbal crash from the rear of the stage. Or at least the soft-sounding cymbal seemed at first listen to come from the rear of a deep stage, due to the effects of depth cue #1. But on closer listen, the cymbal was in fact played softly rather than played faraway. How can I tell? Because while a faraway cymbal would lose much of its metallic shimmer via depth cue #3, the soft cymbal crash I heard in this track retained a highly specific metallic shimmer. (In talking about the texture of an instrument I have actually gone a little ahead of myself. Textural specificity as a depth cue is touched on later when I come to Depth Cue #3.) This soft-sounding cymbal crash retained too much texture for it to be far away - implying that it is nearby. High-end headphones like the Omega II make it easier to differentiate between those two situations. Another example where the Omega II allows me to experience depth cue #3 overriding depth cue #1: Death Of Darth Vader (a fellow Sith, by the way), from the soundtrack of Return Of The Jedi. Towards the ending of this piece, when Vader dies in his sons arms, a gently plucked harp softly plays Darth Vaders Theme. (Usually Darth Vaders Theme is pompous and militaristic, played by snare drums and brass instruments; but in this scene where he dies, a harp - a harp! - takes up the theme.) The softly plucked harp sounds unmistakably near despite depth cue #1. The leading edge textural detail of the plucked harp is clearly heard - I can almost see the fingers plucking the harp strings. Depth cue #3 says that when the textural detail is high, we perceive the image to be near. We can infer from this observation that depth cue #1 is easily overridden by depth cue #3. DEPTH CUE #2: sonic images that sound tonally attenuated appear further, unless otherwise contradicted by depth cues #3 and #4 Hypothetical scenario: You print out on hard copy the threads at Head-Fi titled Do You Believe In God?, In God We Trust? and Jude vs God. You bring the printed stack

There are two incarnations how depth cue #2 manifests itself, and this depends on the recording. First incarnation is called tonal blandness (#2a): there is a simultaneous attenuation of high frequency harmonics and low frequency harmonics. This results in the distant sonic image sounding more tonally bland. It is very satisfying to hear the effects of distance on the tonal character of instruments. It seems odd to say that it is satisfying to hear the loss of tonal richness of an instrument - shouldnt it be the opposite: that it is satisfying to hear the tonal richness of an instrument? Well, both are satisfying in their own ways. Small works that are miked more closely will give me the tonal richness and intimacy of each instrument, whereas distance-miked works will give me the satisfaction of hearing greater distances and a grander scale to the proceedings. Sometimes a sonic image is meant to be tonally bland due to effects of distance. The second incarnation of depth cue #2 occurs when there is an attenuation of only the higher harmonics, with a preservation of low harmonics. This leads to what I call a harmonic shift (#2b), to coin a new term. When the higher harmonics are attenuated due to the effects of distance yet the lower harmonics remain largely intact, the resultant tonal character of the sonic image shifts towards the lower harmonics. The sonic image seems deeper-sounding, with more heft in the lower regions. (Its always a harmonic shift downwards - never upwards. The example of the distant thunder roll described at the start of this section is an example of harmonic shift.) What challenge does depth cue #2 pose to the audio playback system? The challenge that the Second Depth Cue poses to the audio playback system is two-fold: tonal neutrality and harmonic diversity, to coin a new term. The first challenge is tonal neutrality. If the headphone is not neutral, i.e. if there are segments in the frequency spectrum that are spotlighted at the expense of others, this would create havoc to the sense of perspective afforded by the Second Depth Cue. I suspect that the headphone that portrays depth cue #2 just right is the Grado HP-1; but Im saying this from memory. (See sidetrack below.) The second challenge that #2 poses to the audio system is harmonic diversity. Nearer images sound tonally richer, while further images sound tonally blander. You need an audio system that can portray tonally rich images and tonally bland images simultaneously. The ability to portray differing tonal richness fosters a sense of differing depths between images. Sidetrack: To be sure, tonal neutrality is a complex issue for headphones because almost all headphones are voiced for what is called diffuse field equalization. Due to complexities in the coupling between earcup and ears, specific tonal adjustments have to be introduced for a headphone to sound tonally neutral. A headphone with a ruler-flat frequency response would sound awful. But I can swear there does not seem to be a single consistent execution of diffuse field equalization, because I observe that almost all headphones purporting to be diffuse field equalized sound so tonally different from each other.

Depth Cue #3 says that sonic images that have greater textural detail appear nearer. The RS-1 is the more detailed headphone - it portrays more sonic information on the textures of instruments. Via depth cue #3, this creates the impression that the instruments are nearer to the listener. Depth cue #3 is the reason why we customarily say that HD600 is more midhall, while RS-1 is closer to the stage. One criticism of the RS-1 that I am hesitant to agree wholeheartedly with is that it is coloured - it has become too commonplace for audiophiles to accuse a component of being coloured when the only sin that that component ever committed was to be texturally specific. (I made the same mistake 4 years ago in my review of Omega I vs Omega II, when I referred to the Audio Note DAC2 digital-analogue converter as being coloured, when what I actually meant was that this lively DAC was texturally specific. My apologies to Peter Qvotrup, who did give me a gentle rebuke on this matter and insisted that his DACs were not coloured when I e-mailed him to inquire whether the ultrasonic grunge emanating from his DAC3.1X zero-oversampling DAC, which I subsequently bought, would fry my T2 amp. It just shows that when we dont have the words to describe something accurately, we end up using whatever available existing descriptions, however erroneous.) In the case of the RS-1, it is less a matter of coloration than it is of the headphones rendition of mechanism #3. Headphones that render textures vividly sound more up-front. The language that audiophiles use in describing sound has become too dependent on descriptions of tonal balance. If a headphone is more up-front - blame it on the coloured tonal balance. If the headphone is more mid-hall, ascribe it also to the tonal balance. Everything becomes simplistically reduced to a matter of tonal balance. The effects of textural portrayal (#3) is not mentioned or not noticed. Two tonally neutral headphones can sound different, despite their similar tonal neutrality. The headphone that renders #3 more vividly will sound more up-front and closer to the stage. What challenges does #3 pose to the audio system? Depth cue #3 requires that the audio system be capable of portraying textures vividly when the occasion calls for it, as well as portraying textures less vividly when another occasion calls for it. The challenge posed to the audio system is therefore textural range, to coin another new term. If dynamic range means the ability to portray the gamut of dynamics from fff to ppp, then textural range means the ability to portray the range of textures from less texturally specific to extremely texturally specific. Textural range means the ability to portray a highly textured sonic image alongside a not-so-highly textured image, such that a sense of depth is portrayed. It is not easy for audio systems to portray textural range accurately. Lesser playback systems tend to homogenize the sound, such that all textures tend to appear equally textured. Superior playback systems do not homogenize the sound, allowing textures of various instruments to come across as being texturally specific or texturally nonspecific, independently of each other. Textural range is a key performance indicator of an audio system, especially in a headphone-based system where headphone-users have to rely

off the walls of the cave. The echoes of the fluttering wings light up the cave walls, and for that short duration when the echo could be heard you can see the extent of the cave walls. Music is tied to architecture. I am not talking of the metaphorical relationship between music and architecture (that music is architecture in motion, or that architecture is frozen music). I am talking of the literal relationship between music and architecture - that some forms of music are so inextricably connected to the venue it is played. Choral and orchestral music is better heard in halls, and best heard in certain halls. Such music played in the open outdoors loses its usual sense of lushness. Reverberation in recorded music occurs when sound is reflected off the walls, floor and ceiling of a recorded venue, and the microphones capture both the direct sound and the reflected sound that comes milliseconds after the direct sound. When you are nearer to the instrument, the amount of direct sound overwhelms the amount of reflected sound. When you are further away from the instrument, the ratio of reflected sound to direct sound gets larger. This gives rise to depth cue #4: whenever a sonic image is diffused with a reverberation halo, you perceive that that image is further away. I have consistently found by listening to recordings that depth cue #4 takes precedence over all the other three cues. Depth cue #4 comes in two incarnations - overlapping reverberation (#4a) and impulse reverberation (#4b). Overlapping reverberation (#4a) tends to occur with continuous sound sources, such as blown or bowed musical instruments as well as choir voices, whereas impulse reverberation (#4b) tends to occur with struck or plucked musical instruments. Overlapping reverberation (#4a) is the reverberation that overlaps with the direct sound of a blown or bowed instrument whilst the instrument is still playing. The net result of this overlap is that the sonic image of the blown or bowed instrument acquires a certain halo of diffusion. Depending on the type of instrument and the hall characteristics, there might a core at the centre of the halo. Some diffused images do not have a central core; some do. I find that instruments that give off high-pitched textures tend to retain this core. Amazingly, sometimes the core can be so sharply delineated (because the core is texturally specific) that the core appears nearer (via depth cue #3) while the halo appears further. Curious. (Because the overlap between direct sound and reflected sound causes a diffusion of the sonic image, I also call this type of reverberation diffused reverberation. Overlapping reverberation and diffused reverberation are one and the same thing.) Impulse reverberation (#4b) is when the transient sound starts and then stops quite abruptly, with the reverberation quickly following in its wake. This occurs mainly with struck or plucked musical instruments. There may even be a very brief gap between the end of the direct sound and the start of the reverberation, similar to what you find in an echo. The reverberation also starts and stops quite abruptly, hence the name impulse reverberation. During the short duration of the impulse reverberation, the edges of the recorded venue

lights up momentarily but dramatically. Nothing, and I truly mean nothing, lights up the recorded venue quite as dramatically as impulse reverberation (#4b). It is as if you were a blind person but for a brief miraculous moment you were given the gift of sight. Quite wondrous really. An example of impulse reverberation can be heard at the conclusion of the 4th movement of Beethovens 5th. The whole orchestra concludes in the C Major key in simultaneous syncopated bursts. Each burst is very brief, but very intense (because the whole orchestra contributes to the burst). A short moment after each burst, the hall answers back with an impulse reverberation burst, almost as if the reverberation note was on the composers score sheet. At those moments when the hall answers back, I can see the limits of the acoustic space. Sometimes reverberation can be applied electronically, but I have found post-event reverberation to sound odd at times, and at rare occasions, truly hilarious. (The most comical application of electronically-added reverberation was in this particular piece where the female voice came from extreme left and the reverberation of her voice came from extreme right, and all through this piece there was a pretension of simulating a real acoustic space.) I find it acceptable to hear electronically-added reverberation if it was done in a witty manner or if there were valid compositional reasons. Certain music forms like rock, which is a form of amplified music, have no pretensions of being played in a natural acoustic setting, and if rock employs electronically-added reverberation I have often found that rather acceptable. The electronically-added reverberation was just one more electronic manipulation in a series of electronic manipulations like the judicious use of equalization and heavy mixing of multiple close-miked sources. Im all right with it so long as there is no failed pretension at simulating a real acoustic space. What challenges do depth cues #4a (diffused reverberation) and #4b (impulse reverberation) pose to the audio playback system? The proper portrayal of #4a and #4b requires that the headphone playback system be (i) transparent such that there is little or no loss of ambient information contained in the recording, (ii) highly resolving such that each sonic image has ample breathing space and (iii) nimble-footed with quick transient response so that you perceive a heightened sense of real instruments playing in real acoustic environments. How well does the Omega II portray depth cues #4a and #4b? STAX headphones have a great tradition of being able to reproduce hall ambience excellently. There is an ethereal magical chemistry between STAX electrostatic headphones and reproduction of hall reverberation. STAX headphones have a light nimble touch that gives us the sense of real instruments hovering in real acoustic spaces. The Omega II does not significantly depart from such pedigreed lineage. But the Omega II does not portray depth cue #4a (diffused reverberation) as vividly as other STAX

headphones like the Lambdas and the Omega I. The restrained upper-midrange and treble of the Omega II prevents the upper-midrange harmonics of ambient air from being lit brightly enough. There is no lack of transparency and resolution - via the Omega II you can hear right to the very rear of the soundstage, but its as if all the lights had been turned off and the recorded venue is plunged in darkness. The Omega IIs incredible transparency and resolution impart a very clear portrayal of ambient cues and hall reverberation. It is a superbly transparent window to the acoustic hall - its just that the Omega II is an utterly transparent window to a darkened hall, rather than a moderately transparent window to a more brightly-lit hall. Sidetrack: For this reason, I frequently turn off all the lights in my listening room when I listen to headphones - the actual darkness of my listening room complements the apparent darkness of the recorded venue. If I had a wish list for the new Omega III (if and when it comes out), it would be that the Omega III shines a little more light on the upper midrange spectrum of ambient air. Just a little more, but no more than that; or else the presentation would sound a little too hi fi-ish. It is a very tricky balance to get right. Other than this slight gripe, the Omega II is clearly superb in rendering hall reverberation and depth cue #4. For example, it is able to afford me an instructive demonstration of depth cue #4a (diffused reverberation) in Johann Strausss Explosions Polka 4th movement (Banditen Galop). The first explosion at 0.07sec seems reasonably nearby, while the second explosion at 0.11sec sounds further away than the first explosion because there is a greater reverberative diffusion (#4a) around the image of the second explosion. Coupled with this, there is also a sense of harmonic shift (#2b) with the second explosion that was absent in the first explosion. The third explosion at 0.19sec sounds even slightly further than the second explosion; this sense of greater distance was contributed by greater degrees of both #2b (harmonic shift) and #4a (diffused reverberation) relative to the second explosion. The location of the image of all three explosions remained the same: they were all located just beyond the left temple of my forehead. #2 + #3 + #4 + Air btw instruments: THE SENSE OF PERSPECTIVAL AIR Now I want to share with you something really magical called perspectival air. (There may be no such word as perspectival, but perspectival air is a newly coined phrase given definition and meaning in this essay.) When two or more of the mechanisms combine, you get a greater effect of depth. Most convincing is when a single sonic image demonstrates #2, #3 and #4 simultaneously, coupled with a strong sense of air around the image. This combination of #2 + #3 + #4 + Air offers a devastating sense of perspectival air (played over the right headphones and set-up) perspectival air to die for. For example, I am now listening to Chris McGregors The Brotherhood Of Breath (a VTL

perspectival air is about the intervening distance between musicians and the microphones. Seen from this angle, the fact that STAX headphones are prodigious portrayers of perspectival air should not make them deserve the epithet earspeakers. Perhaps by earspeakers STAX meant that their headphones co-opt the ear flap the way loudspeakers do, and not that STAX headphones are prodigious portrayers of perspectival air. How well does the Omega II fare compared to previous STAX models when it comes to portrayal of perspectival air? I would describe Omega Is soundstage as being especially charged with the sense of perspectival air and that Omega IIs soundstage, while not lacking in the portrayal of perspectival air, is not as super-charged. The slightly brighter middle-midrange and uppermidrange of the Omega I shines the light on the midrange spectrum of ambient air, making the sense of perspectival air super-charged, as if the air molecules above and around the musicians and between the musicians and the microphones were frenetic with vibration energy. (This occurs only if the correct recordings are played via Omega I - recordings that have a lot of perspectival air.) But what the first Omega lacked relative to the second is the sheer effortlessly relaxed clarity of its successor. (Summarizing the essay so far: Before going into my next section I just want to pause and take stock of what weve covered so far and what still lies ahead. Weve covered the headstage, the Four Depth Cues and this incredibly lovely thing called perspectival air. I will now need to complete my review of the Omega II. I reviewed the Omega II using a review methodology structured on the Four Depth Cues, but an assessment of a headphones depth portrayal is not enough - there are other things to evaluate. I will be touching lightly on six additional aspects: Background Blackness, Portrayal of Details, Bass, Midrange, Treble and System Matching. The reason why I am lightly touching on these aspects is because I do not wish to usurp the significance of the headphone review methodology based on the Four Depth Cues.) ADDITIONAL REVIEW ITEMS OF OMEGA II BLACK BACKGROUND All too often with lesser headphones, you become aware of the black background only when the music becomes less complex - the transition from the passage with many instruments to the passage with few instruments seem also to be accompanied by a transition from busy background to a quieter background. With the Omega II, you never transit from busy background to quiet background - the background is always quiet and black, no matter how many instruments there are. I believe that the Omega IIs refined black background is due to its near-zero distortion. I have gotten so accustomed to the absence of distortion that I have become sensitised to it. After getting used to the Omega II, I suspect that there must be many types of insidious

may not be as hard-hitting as compared to a brighter headphone. The sense of a hard-hitting drum is attributed more to the presence of high frequency textures than to low frequency weight alone.) Lower harmonics of voices and instruments - this is even more important to me than bass slam because not all recordings call for bass slam but all recordings will benefit from a rich reproduction of lower harmonics. A deep, rich bass makes the tonal character of voices and instruments so much more authoritative and weighty. No headphone Ive heard sounds as authoritative and weighty as this one. Lower harmonics of ambient air - this is also very important to me, especially when I play albums that feature a lot of perspectival air or albums that feature harmonic shifts (depth cue #3b). No other headphone Ive heard tells me so convincingly that hall reverberation also comprises of low frequency harmonics. People say that bass is matter of solidity, but I beg to differ. Bass to me is a matter of air as well. There is such a thing as a low-frequency ambient air - when you play large-scale orchestral works, it is the lower harmonics of hall reverberation that gives a sense of architectural scale to the music. The sense of weight and gravitas to music - this is Omega II territory. MIDRANGE The all-important midrange, where most of the music is. Magical is how I would characterize the Omega IIs midrange. I really dislike the phrase smooth liquid midrange because it is so overused, but I cannot think of a better phrase to describe the Omega IIs midrange. There is nothing to dislike about the Omega IIs midrange and everything to love. Also, it is never just how this headphone portrays its midrange, but how the supporting bulwark of qualities such as velvety black background, ultra-high resolution and casual clarity come together to offer a clean, clear and sweet midrange. One important thing to mention about the Omega IIs midrange is that it is so fused with its treble and bass, that all the sonic images seem cut from the same cloth. The differentiation into bass, midrange and treble is in fact an artificial division. When you hear a trumpet via the Omega II, you dont just get midrange richness - you get the sound a trumpet that comprises the midrange principal harmonic plus upper harmonics plus lower harmonics all fused together to make the complete sound of a trumpet. What midrange? I only hear a trumpet. TREBLE The treble of the Omega II is difficult to describe. I have not read any review whether in HeadWize or Head-Fi or any professional magazine that accurately described the Omega IIs beguiling treble (including my own review in 1999). Quantity-wise, the treble of the Omega II errs very slightly on the side of insufficiency. Quality-wise, the treble of the Omega II packs oodles of clarity and resolution. Calling the
headphone dark is somewhat true, but only half the truth. Dark carries the connotation that the treble is soft-sounding, and this is true of this headphone to a certain extent. But dark also carries the connotation that the treble is muffled or not clear enough, and nothing could be further from the truth, for the Omega II is capable of resolving very finely textured treble detail. Its treble seems finer than silk - so fine that you can journey between the superfine grains all the way down down down to the noise floor of your amp and source components. This strange combination of a superbly fine-textured treble, yet shy treble, results in a headphone that is revealing-yet-forgiving. Because the treble is very finely textured, you can hear upstream nastiness like sibilance and smear, even in small amounts, but because the treble quantum is subdued, the upstream treble nastiness loses much of its sting, which accounts for the headphones forgiving nature. Revealing yet forgiving: the secret is in its treble. This type of treble is a slight departure from absolute tonal neutrality. It errs on the side of warmth. But one good turn deserves another: I am willing to be forgiving of the Omega IIs tonal warmth, because it has been forgiving of my less-than-stellar recordings (of which I have plenty as well). Its revealing-yet-forgiving treble goes a long way in making my entire collection of CDs listenable and also in reducing listening fatigue to near-zero levels. SYSTEM MATCHING Tricky issue to deal with. If you are a long-time owner of previous STAX models, you would welcome the Omega IIs non-fussy coupling with all sorts of source components and cables. This is because the Omega II does not sound as bright as previous STAX models such as the old Lambdas, which were more fussy about the tonality of system matching. But if you are new to STAX headphones and you belong to the category of people who prefer up-front immediacy, then system matching becomes a more pertinent issue. When I first bought the Omega II, I was using the Muse Model 2 as my digital-analogue converter, which I would characterise as a little laid-back. I thoroughly enjoyed this partnership. (Im a transparency freak, and I dont really need up-front immediacy.) Then I bought the Audio Note DAC3.1X non-oversampling DAC. Audio Note DACs are musically lively, possibly due to the zero oversampling design, and it transformed the Omega IIs presentation into something more musically lively. I would say that the Omega II + Muse would not have appealed to people looking for greater immediacy, but Omega II + Audio Note - now that might rock your boat. CONCLUSION (FOR REVIEW OF OMEGA II) The Omega II is a beguiling headphone. It has unique headstage characteristics (slightly frontal, small-sized, fulsome, hyper-focused). It portrays the Four Depth Cues well, in particular it has a most amazing textural range (#3), which greatly helps the listener in using

remember: you are bobbing your head up and down to the rhythm and melody of your favourite music. (Either that, or youre waving your imaginary baton in empty air.) How can that be a chore? If anything, the awareness of each images portrayal of the mechanisms only serves to deepen the enjoyment of music. After some practice, the awareness of the planarity of the headstage and the perception of the Four Depth Cues come quite naturally. With practice the enjoyment of the music is integrated with the perception of depth cues. It seems counter-intuitive - the idea that in order to hear depth cues better you need to first focus on the planarity of the headstage plane. But keep practising at perceiving the planarity of the headstage and its Four Depth Cues and you will become a more discerning headphone listener who can quickly and accurately decipher the depth cues inherent in recorded music. Footnote-essay no.2: NON-CARTESIAN CO-ORDINATES If I were asked to paraphrase the headstage and its 4 depth cues into a computer programme code for processing of depth cues via headphones, I would create the following 8 variables: (x, y, z, r) + (a, ,b, ,c, d) where x = left-to-right location of image y = up-down location of image z = 0, which will create a flattened headstage r = radius or roundness of images a = loudness of image (depth cue #1) b = tonal richness (depth cue #2) c = textural specificity (depth cue #3) d = reverberation amount (depth cue #4) You might notice that (x, y, z, r) are variables that arise out of the One mechanism of sound localization. And (a, b, c, d) are variables that each arise out of the Four Depth Cues. Assigning z = 0 will create a flattened headstage. Variable x is simply about stereo panning and should be easy to programme for a pair of stereo headphones. Variable y is difficult to programme - what gives rise to the sense of up and down placement of images? Variable r is difficult to programme - what gives rise to a sense of roundness of images? Variable a is easy to programme - it is simply a matter of volume control. Variable b is simple to programme - it is simply a matter of equalization. Variable c is difficult to programme - how does a computer programme increase and decrease the trumpetness of a trumpet? A computer cannot recognize the texture of a trumpet simply from wave analysis. Variable d is
simple to programme - it is a matter of feeding slight delays to the original sound. But using a computer programme to simulate good hall ambience must surely be an art form. Footnote-essay no.3: CAN YOU INCREASE HEADSTAGE SIZE? To increase the headstage size means to create images that are located further from the head, even to the point of creating out-of-the-head images. The only way to significantly enlarge the headstage is to listen to binaural recordings, but as Ive noted previously, its unlikely for the your personal HRTFs to coincide with the dummy head used in the recording. Consequently, most of us will still experience an in-the-head headstage when listening to binaural recordings. But there are some options open to you if you wish to slightly increase the headstage size. (Keyword = slightly.) The headstage is the result of the transducers location in relation to your ears. I have not auditioned them before, but I would imagine that Jecklin Float headphones create slightly larger headstages than most other headphones, simply because the left and right transducers in a Jecklin Float (and AKG K1000 as well, come to think of it) are about 2 inches wider apart than almost all headphones. This increased distance should create a slightly larger left-to-right soundfield, i.e., a wider headstage, but Im not speaking from firsthand experience of the Jecklin Floats here. Swivelling the K1000s earpieces frontally should create a most amazingly frontally-located headstage, unrivalled by any other headphone probably except the STAX Sigmas. The tonal character of a headphone has a small but perceptible effect on headstage width and headstage height. Brightness in the middle-midrange and upper-midrange results in slightly taller headstage heights when playing distance-miked recordings, but results in a solidifying of sonic images when playing close-miked recordings with no apparent effect on headstage size. Brightness in the upper treble has the effect of slightly increasing the headstage width in close-miked recordings, but slightly increasing the headstage height in minimally-miked recordings. I am generalizing here - not all close-miked recordings sound the same and not all minimally-miked recordings sound the same. But my central point here remains valid: the tonality of a headphone or recording slightly affects the resultant headstage size, either in width or height or both. I must emphasize the slightly part. But a larger headstage is not necessarily better than a smaller headstage. Its bit like saying that a 6 photo is better than a 5 photo. Is it really? Of course it is nice to have a larger headstage (in the same way it is nice to have a larger computer monitor), but how about comparisons between clarity, resolution, texture and colour saturation? Size of headstage is only one consideration out of many. Moreover, the differences between headstage sizes of various headphones are not that significant (at least from my experience), so it really

becomes less important to compare headstage sizes. If the difference between the 5 photo and the 6 photo is only 1 (if my math isnt rusty), and the 5 photo has better clarity and colour saturation, then why not go for the 5 because more significant factors outweigh the small gain in size? Footnote-essay no.4: WHAT DOES LARGE SOUNDSTAGE MEAN? Now and then I come across posts at Head-Fi that says headphone X when coupled with headphone-amp Y creates a large soundstage. What does the phrase large soundstage mean in perceptual terms? In abstract terms we all know what large soundstage means - it means that the soundstage is large. Duh. But what exactly did the person perceive that prompted him to use the term large soundstage? It could be any one of five possibilities that prompted him to use the term large soundstage: (i) the headstage itself has increased in size, i.e., meaning that a sonic image instead of being located in its usual position touching the left temple (for instance) has now suddenly acquired through happy accident an illusion of being located 3 inches in front of the left temple (for instance). By happy accident I mean a freak coincidence where your personal HRTFs and the phase/frequency peculiarities of the recording and phase/frequency peculiarities of a headphone system commingle to result in a binaural-like illusion of an externally-located image hovering 3 inches beyond the left temple. This occurs very rarely. It is extremely rare for images to drift away to some out-of-the-head location. (ii) the recording he heard had a deep soundstage and he could hear to the very rear of the soundstage. The backdrop of the soundstage is created by a sonic image that portrays a depth cue or a combination of depth cues, and the depth of the backdrop is further emphasized by the presence of a foreground object. The foreground object is tonally richer or texturally richer or reverberatively poorer than the backdrop image. Experiencing this clear background-foreground relationship may account for another possibility why a person would say he hears a large soundstage. (iii) the recording had ample reverberation cues and his headphone is transparent enough to render such cues. Reverberation diffuses a sonic image and makes the sonic image acquire a halo around the image. The presence of this halo of diffusion results in a perception that the sonic image has increased in size as well as making the image sound further away (#4). The bigger and subjectively further sonic image leads to a subjective perception that the soundstage has correspondingly increased both in lateral size and depth. (iv) strangely, some instruments tend to stand tall in the acoustic space. Choir voices and horns tend to do that. I have no idea how or why this occurs. The Four Depth Cues only work in the z-axis, and I have not been able to account for mechanisms that work in the y-axis. So another possible reason for a person to say that he hears a large soundstage is because