Damn Burson Soloist 3xp would show up on HFG now lol
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Dang, I bet that would be an awesome combo. Originally I was kinda “settling” for a warm pairing with the wa8 but I just don’t see it the same way anymore after starting to use the stock cable. The treble still managed a way to shine and generally is super balanced with bass, mids and treble where I’m like OK with this is fucking awesome in its own way.
I just am coming off a phenomenal music session off these. This time I used the RS6 Dap and have new thoughts on the situation. The PW fostex is suuuuuper amo dependant. When playing through the WA8 amp, it’s got a very elevated sound, elevated bass, mids and treble too of course but mostly the bass really gains alot of body and punch and mids some more heft as well. The stage kind of becomes more hazy m however and the treble leaves wanting. When using the RS6 as the amp it’s completely crazily different, first of all treble is AMAZING. Straight up best and most fun treble I’ve ever heard, just gives so much life to all my music, I always had a suspicion but it’s finally time to be true to myself and come out as a treble-head. From the times in which I would pair hawks with pleather pads + xduoo amp to now where I can say that I ABSOLUTELY love the treble of the PW + RS6. Mids are also just as amazing gaining some shine in the upper treble without becoming sibilant nor anything of the kind. Bass however whike present is actually fairly neutral and the headphone in general sounds waaaay more neutral/transparent. Stage becomes way more refined.
Based off what I have heard the perfect amp for the PW is somewhere in the middle of the WA8 and RS6. Something that had the ability to maintain the neutrality of the RS6, the sparkle of the RS6 pairing plus the bass of the WA8 pairing. I understand it probably won’t have the bloomy type of impact that the wa8 has but I think I can live with that lol.
Its been such an awesome and interesting experience to hear the massive differences caused by a different amo with the PW
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Really awesome to hear how versatile the RS6 can be. Ive actually really enjoyed the hd600 straight out of the RS6, as well as the RS6 acting as a DAC feeding the Tuba to HD600. Awesome that it works so well with the Fostex.
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So I have some things to note, first of all when I thought of Fostex headphones I just connected them with V shapes, maybe a little unrefined and even if they are good I just assumed they would have a “fun” sound as in nice and punchy, tons of bass quantity kind of like a Nighthawk. The Pearl White 900 however has been completely different than anything I ever expected. To me, more than neutral (I consider the HD600 the most neutral headphones ive heard) the PW are just so revealing and such a refined sound signature that they sound like legit studio monitors. The amount of depth, detail, accuracy and it’s got the best treble I’ve ever heard. The treble on these dude’s is so incredibly detailed, precice and full of life that it’s been such a game changer. The bass is awesome no doubt but it’s more of a fast/deep type of bass instead of boomy/quantitve type of bass that I expected (except on the WA8 it is super boomy, tons of quantity and impact). Mids are awesome as hell and the whole package of treble + mids + bass is what makes these sound very studio-esque to me. The amount of depth is really ridiculous, without a doubt the best I have heard as well although because of the depth and the quality vs quantity type of bass I think it has shown itself to scale more than anything I have heard but with of course the caveat of lesser recordings sounding less engaging due to less interesting nature (less depth, less fun imaging tricks etc). The type of depth that this headphone has is ridiculously awesome, phenomenal tonal balance and just an awesome neutral sound signature with ridiculous techincal abilities. Now then, even tho it Is more revealing than any other gear ive ever heard make no mistake, I still was able to enjoy everything that I played on it including some Train, Heize, Albert Hammond etc. Everything has been awesome on it so far!
Also something else to mention is that it’s the most amp picky headphone I’ve ever heard, it can go from bass-light to bloomy (boomy) and thick to anywhere in the middle depedning on the amp. Even on (imo) pretty good amps like the RS6 amp it’s had moments of brilliance but big short comings. On the WA8 it’s awesome for sure but the sound signature changes too much. On the Questyle dongle dac it’s actually surprisingly good lol and of course on stuff like the Pass Labs it really takes out the best of this headphone. It’s already been the best headphone I’ve ever listened to and I look forward to it scaling with other source gear in the future. It’s the most refined sound that i’ve ever heard, and the opposite of what I expected a Fostex to be tbh.
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Now you need to hear the 909.
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I’ve said it before Fostex 9xx’s are underrated.
Dangit @Littledrummerboy you are making me want to splurge on a new set - when I am really trying to be happy with what I have. … Not sure how much I still like you now ( jk )
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hahaha, you have the susvara and the d8k pro tho haha! I’m sure you are totally fine lol! But yeah man, specially to me moving up this much wit the fostex has been amazing! I get the hype altho also surprised because at least around the people I talk to I don’t feel like this headphone has much discussion around it.
I mean it’s like WOW, this is such an amazing headphone! Also it on the right gear sounds suuuuper open! Honestly I’m shocked, of course most nice closed backs sound fairly open but man I am shocked. The PWs are so damn open and airy sounding 
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My black one came in the other day, and it’s pretty much as you described. The T50RP MK2 Argons were my last pair of Fostex headphones, so I was expecting something with a similar warm-tilt, but these are very clean sounding with ridiculous, snappy bass. They actually make my LCD-XC (2021) sound comparatively warm, which was something I very much wasn’t expecting.
On the note of the LCD-XC, one thing I wish the TH900 had was a bit more weight to them. Compared to my other cans they feel a bit chintzy for something in the kilobuck range.
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Im curious to hear about wether you have any new updates on your thoughts on them?
Great minds think alike, I usually want my cans to have some heft, you pay big bucks for something, you want it to feel substantial. I know some people have issues with weight of gear but I’m not asking for something ridiculously heavy either. Something like the Focal stuff tends to have a perfect balance of reasonable heft that gives that premium feel + is still super comfortable.
Also Recently I’ve been reeeally jamming to these guys. They really do everything well and legit have the best bass and treble I’ve ever heard, midrange is no slouch either but the bass is very impactful, tight and finds a way to insert itself into every track in such a great way. Treble as mentioned before is very airy, detailed and full of life. I’ve changed my thoughts on these guys being very studio or neutral as they have quite the energy with both bass and treble being so prevalent. Mids are still awesome however.
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As for more expanded thoughts, I do find the bass impact/quantity and control some of the best in my collection. It’s a clean bass, though, so I do find myself pulling it out more for pop and EDM vs something like funk or acoustic. The treble detail is very good, but it has that more-forward-than-resolving quality, if that makes any sense. Soundstage is oblong compared to my LCD-XC which is more circular. While separation is pretty good, layering and imaging are huge standouts with this headphone. The term “holographic” has made a lot more sense recently.
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Just got these in today, was slightly worried that my amp may not work too well with them, but so far it’s been an excellent experience. I’ll be posting impressions here when I can gather some thoughts.
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Alright then! I feel like I finally have a good grasp on the sound of this headphone and have more developed thoughts on everything regarding it! So first of all some “quirks” if you willl that I noticed in daily usage, personally I find myself listening to it at fairly high levels and def higher than most headphones I think. And I have narrowed down the reasons as to why I do that, first I think that even though the bass has tons of rumble and physical feel to it the mids and treble don’t have a very viseral or physical presence to it (slam factor) so to kind of get that to a level I like I raise the volume lol. Also second factor might be because the mids are at a slight U shape, I probably raise the volume to get the mids to a certain level of forwardness haha. Ok then, I also have the PW in a very stable chain now and a chain that I believe showcases the sound signature very well too Pass Labs HPA1-Hiby RS6 Dac and I find both to be fairly Neutral and balance soundstage width out since the RS6 Dac has a more narrow but deep soundstage while the HPA1 imo has a fairly wide soundstage! Also generally feels wider and deeper than any amp Ive heard. As I mentioned before I still maintain the general sound signature of the Fostex to be a bit of a studio neutral (what I call Neutral with raised treble i guess lol) sound signature but there’s def some incredibly impressive subbass presence going on. Midbass is a bit more lax, to my ears it def feels like the midbass and lower mids are a bit on the leaner side and in fact certain recordings don’t sound as fun since the bass is really where the impact is with this headphone but I would definetly say that that’s probably less than 20% of my music where it’s noticeably less fun (due to that reason). However maaaan It’s also a reaaaally interesting sound at times, It feels like the whole time you have a magnifying glass on the music. I’ve had many long sessions already because It’s so interesting to get so close to the music at times, even though Rina Sawayama’s album SAWAYAMA is extremely compressed sounding It’s actually PRETTY AWESOME on these lol! Actually not just this one but honestly most of my loud K-Pop songs have been awesome too! It must have something to do with the already very forward leaning vocals plus the treble on this type of music just being made to stand out more with the treble that comes from the PWs. There’s alot of qualities from the headphone that make it a bit more track picky than your average headphone although it’s again not bad at all and because of what It does do like crazy subbass and super prominent/sparkly treble it’s an EASY win over most things with albums like Injury Reserve’s - Live from the dentist office. I mean wow that’s such an obvious listen on these cans, the subbass is so damn visceral and rich on this and basically most good hip-hop I’ve found. Again because of my description I would assume that some less bass heavy sounding albums would be meh on this but as long as the recording has some nice meat on it it’s totally awesome on the headphone.
I may be crazy, specially since I def don’t (haven’t) heard much live music but I feel like I can kind of tell what’s a real drum on these headphones vs what Isn’t. You just hear certain drums that seem more limp, def don’t feel full while you listen to stuff like La Oreja De Van Gogh, Milet the bass textures and it’s presence is just soooo good. It’s made me start to listen to more japanese music (altho that’s also thanks to @Towa) and alot of the groups that my mom used to listen to because bands, with real instruments reeeally sound good. BUT AGAIN so does synthetic fucking kpop hahahaha. So idk its weird, alot sounds great some doesn’t as much but it’s a very small group.
Dynamics are another big win for the PWs imo, I just feel like you really get the presence of big sound from them since you really hear the scale of the sounds that come from it. More than the lowest sound to highest sound you really understand the level of contrast when you hear a giant drum note hitting to a super crystal clean high note in the same song. It’s absolutely awesome. Soundstage is very deep and defined but soundstage width is def on the more narrow side, it’s not a dealbreaker however because it’s negated as long as either Dac or Amp give some extra width. Treble is also super magical because it gives the entire headphone a very airy presence in addition to a very spatially impressive sound. That and combined with the depth has been legit mind bogglong, I’m like how is this possible! AND IT GET’S ME VEEEERY INTERESTED IN HIGHER END STUFF WITH MORE TECHNICAL ABILITIES 
hahaha.
Tonal balance is pretty great, It’s what I would call a good tonal balance that dosen’t feel to skewed one direction or another and timbre wise most things sound great althought my biggest focus (vocals) aren’t the best ive heard but more than good enough considering it’s not the biggest focus on this headphone.
To summarize, I came in thinking this would be my just fun, jam out headphone but It ended up being the most technical headphone I’ve ever heard, very well balanced but picky with source and more or less picky with track and of course it is super enjoyable but I think the main enjoyment comes really from the experience that you get with the ridiculous technical abilities it has like it’s extremely great dynamics, it’s amazing depth, separation and airy sound signature with very deep controlled bass. I still don’t consider it as well rounded to me anyways as other headphones like LCD 2PF, VC, Andromeda’s because I generally prioritize driver excersion (general slam) and soul and I would say that again while the bass has ridiculous, ridiculous slam it’s a more light sounding driver (kinda like the LSA HP-2 imo) and even though it most definetly has great soul it’s also not the priority. Awesome headphone! and generally my favorite audio experience so far for sure.
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Great write up, thanks.
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Not really the price range you want to be in for the Fostex TH900, but I find the Little Labs Monotor has really good synergy with the TH900PW despite the amp is designed for high impedance cans like Sennheiser HD600. Really organic timbre, good slam and impact and speed, the treble is well controlled in a really pleasant way, spatial recreation is good too. I feel like the voicing of this amp strengthens the enjoyable traits of the 900. The slightly annoyance is you may went to use an ifi iematch for it as the volume pot is really not the best at lower volume
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I’m kind of curious what amps people have had good success with the th900 say sub $1500 range and maybe also $500 and below. Most curious about the Pearl White specifically.
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Just found this after making that post
I should chime in and say while I did like them on the QS, that noise floor is definitely noticeable given the sensitivity of the cans.
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THEY’RE BEAUTIFUL!
U gonna buy it?