It’s been quite some time now, since I first bought Sennheiser HD 201 headphones (unboxing and first impression) and I feel the time is now ripe for a full-fledged review of these headphones.
After several hours of listening (read hundreds) and even a few hours’ worth of white and pink noise burning, the sound quality of the headphones has improved quite a bit and now I can notice a marked change in the overall sound quality and in particular, bass!
However, even now, treble can end up overpowering the bass in certain situations/tracks and induce listener fatigue and can be considered as a major chink in the armor of Sennheiser HD 201, which are otherwise great entry level headphones.
However, once you have soundtracks which can truly take advantage of the HD 201 eg. How Long Do I Have To Wait For You by Sharon Jones and The Dap-Kings or movies which feature terrific sound quality and effects, HD 201 really come to life and shine.
In fact in movies like Master and Commander, Pearl Harbor etc. the bass produced by an explosion is strong enough to vibrate my ear drums (at somewhat loud volume) and at the same time one can clearly hear other sound effects, like wooden shrapnel falling! This lends a whole new dimension to movies with intense fighting/racing scenes and has ensured that I no longer prefer to watch such movies on my 2.1 Creative speakers, which in any case, used to disturb other family members quite a bit and thus had to be toned down, which in the end, really does not do justice to scenes like the attack at the harbor in Pearl Harbor.
Overall, Sennheiser HD201 are comfortable, however during peak summer of Delhi, wearing them continuously for an hour so can become uncomfortable and one is forced to take a break and let the sweat around the ears dry up, before going back and listing to whatever you were listening earlier.
Aside from this, I haven’t yet come across any other shortcoming of the HD201 and feel they are perfect VFM for Rs. 1,200 that I paid for them.
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