LB-acoustics MYSPHERE 3.1/3.2

Headphones
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M0N has a comparison topic between high end headphones in which some impressions have been posted, but I believe there are enough owners of a mypshere here to warrant its own thread, not to mention it deserves its own thread as well.

Months ago, I purchased a mysphere 3.2 from woo audio during a yearly sale, and I knew it was going to be an investment, essentially. Only having a SE cable for it and only being able to run it off a pendant, it was okay, but not entirely special, I still much preferred my adx5k for most listening that I would have used the mysphere for and obviously its capability was quite handicapped. However, with a balanced cable to run it off the p6p and a pass amp to drive it on my desktop, it has easily become the best audio experience I can currently have. They definitely need high-end enough source gear to be worth a purchase at all.

Things just sound sooooooooo right on it. Everything sounds so onpoint and natural especially anything mids related, vocals sound exacting and the placement of individual instruments is incredibly convincing and immersive. I feel like it’s incredibly difficult not to sit up and listen with utmost attention most of the time.
I’ve even gotten mostly used to the fit of them which one would probably say is the worst aspect of the mysphere and can wear them for quite a long time without annoyance. For a purchase made on a whim, it’s astonishing how much joy they bring : )

If you’ve had the chance to hear or own them, please share any thoughts you might have.

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I resisted a MySphere purchase for a long time, @M0N would insist I needed them, but so many of the reviews I read, both professional and by users seemed indifferent to them often calling out weak Bass response.

I picked up a pair of 3.1’s from Woo last week and I have to say these headphones are criminally underrated, they rival the Susvara in Naturalness of timbre and tonality. I have the Bass frames with mine, which are a relative recent addition, but while they aren’t going to remind you of the sub-bass from a 1266, they have surprisingly good Bass response.

Staging is unique, they really do remind me of a good pair of near field monitors, though to be clear, they still stage in and around your head like headphones.

They do vary HUGELY with what you use to drive them.

They are an amazing set of headphones, something anyone playing with TOTL really should hear. I’d keep mine over the 1266 if I had to make the call.

I’m still trying to get past the continuously fiddling with the headband stage, but they aren’t uncomfortable for me, though it did take some experimentation to figure out how to position them to get to that point, the instructions really aren’t helpful in that regard,

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Yesssssssssss finally people are getting sucked into the spheres lol. Would absolutely agree, underrated for sure. One of my favorites overall at this point, to the point where I’ve now got a 3.1 to go along with my 3.2. Really have heard nothing like it and nothing that comes close to doing what it does (well, ignoring the k1000 but this is a direct step above that imo). I would absolutely agree a lot of the reviews I’d read didn’t do them justice. My only gripe I can think of would be comfort, if they could make it actually something I could call comfortable it would be a total win (it’s honestly fine wearing it, just somewhat irritating to readjust and place at times). Ah and personally not a fan of stock cable for both feel/ergo and sound, really worthwhile replacing that

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I love reading about this pair of headphones because I literally had never heard of them or seen a review of them until I saw M0N’s comparison post. They seem really unique and interesting, but I definitely think I would want to hear a pair before I ever bought one personally. Would love to see more people chime in to learn about them though because they are crazy unique!

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Also since I know this will be brought up at some point, will copy over a comparison I did between the raal sr1a, moreso what I think the mysphere does better. In almost every review of the raal it’s made out to be infinitely better than the mysphere, and I really don’t think that’s the case after giving both a fair shake

I personally like the mysphere more than the raal for a few reasons:

  • More realistic presentation/more immersive stage + blacker background
  • Better midrange texture
  • More organic timbre in the midrange
  • More refined tonality
  • More realistic transient response
  • Better macrodynamics and more convincing presentation of dynamics
  • Better tonal density
  • More impact in the midrange and low end

These are really what push it over the bar for me over the raal, but the raal does have some distinct advantages over the mysphere. Strengths of the raal over the mysphere

  • More resolution in the bass and treble (but I personally feel that the mysphere equals midrange resolution
  • Better speed and separation
  • Better texture in bass and treble (but mysphere as better midrange texture)
  • Much more control and tightness (except in the midrange)
  • More grandiose presentation
  • Better extension

To touch on stage and presentation, mysphere more accurately recreates the way a pair of nearfield monitors would present to me and also lays out different aspects in a way that feels more how it would be done in life, where with the raal, I think that it presents more like a big panel speaker which does give you a more grand and wall of sound presentation, but it lacks natural space and that’s also not how an actual stage in front of you would be laid out

When it comes to texture, I do think the sr1a takes the cake in the bass and the treble, but the midrange feels more nuanced and tangible on the myspheres, but again that’s only in the midrange and that advantage disappears when you deviate from the middle of the spectrum

The timbre thing is interesting, while the raal better recreates timbre to the recording, the mysphere imo has more convincing timbre to life in the midrange but the raal is doing it better in the low end and treble, but it might be in presentation of timbre or something, but the mysphere to me sounds more convincing and liquid when it comes to lower, center, and upper midrange

The tonality thing is more preference, but to me the mysphere’s neutral-natural but slightly mid centric signature better suits more organic music and offers more convincing balance than the raal, which does have a damn flat studio neutral bright signature, but it’s not one I’d say is as convincing, but I do think the raal’s tonality better suits both inorganic music and studio work (and also potentially classical)

Transient response is an arguable one. I do think the raal offers more precision to the recording and the chain in this regard, but to me it goes a bit too far with it’s attack and decay to the point it where it doesn’t sound as organic as an actual instrument, so it feels exaggerated, basically too precise to a flaw (although this is more observable in the midrange and bass, I think it’s transient response is most organic in the treble and better than the mysphere in that area)

When it comes to macrodynamics, I do think the raal just lacks there, it can’t make those bigger swings sound natural and feels limited, where the mysphere to me can handle those with more ease and realism (but again the raal can pull off those more minute changes with ease)

The tonal density thing is fairly apparent to me with the raal, it’s pretty thin and it’s weighting is hard to get to a level where it feels appropriate, the mysphere more accurately weights instruments and can adjust it’s weight more to the recording

On that note, to me the mysphere does a better job at disappearing and adapting to the recording, moreso than the raal does. But this one will strongly depend on the person

Impact wise, neither really hit all that hard, but the mysphere can deliver a more actual punch than the raal can from my experiences

But to sum it up, anything that happens in the midrange, I honestly feel that the mysphere either equals or outperforms the raal in assuming equal level source gear chains and synergy, and also I personally feel the mysphere offers a more true to life experience where the raal delivers a more true to recording one (but the raal is more impressive when you go for treble or lower bass). Both are equally valid approaches and which one people gravitate to is preference, both are solid and will impress if they are given adequate source gear imo. Scaling wise both can really go high if you let them, although to me the mysphere is more picky on synergy imo (especially the 3.1) where the raal can impress more on less impressive source gear than the mysphere could

Just feel like putting that out there since I’m somewhat tired of people not considering the mysphere but looking into the raal

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With more time on the 3.1, these perform better with the eddie current than the 3.2 did by a reasonably large margin, interesting. I actually still like the 3.2 more on the aic 10 but it def still does the 3.1 justice. The wa8 does so much better with the 3.1, this is actually truly portable and I might like it more than the portable mass kobo for the 3.2 depending on what I am listening to. But the biggest wow moment is with the angstrom, this thing just takes off, and it really is my favorite pairing by far, like holy shit does everything I could ask for, but I need more listening time lol

Also I should likely update my amp list for how something works with the 3.1 vs 3.2 (was meaning to do that but forgot)

Edit: decided to do something else instead

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Currious about 3.1 on more of your portable stuff when you get a chance to comment. HPA-01M, Phantasy II, and p6p direct would be my 3 big curiosities. Tbh, the load of the 3.1 always struck me as (theoreticaly) much more doable as a portable. Also, is the 3.1 more technicaly capable than the 3.2 iirc?

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Well right away still like the 3.2 more on the mass kobo, need to try the phatlab, and the mysphere did not take well to the bakoon from my experience, perhaps the 3.1 would be different but didn’t like the 3.2 on current or voltage tbh (well voltage was good but it abs wouldn’t be my first pick)

You would also expect it to work well with most solid states and be a bad match with most tube amps, but it sounds pretty bad on some SS and excellent on some tube, it’s a very misleading number, from my experience the 3.2 is easier to drive

Yes a bit but depends on the amp

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IIRC, you don’t have a C9 on hand, right? Since it does well with the WA-8, would be curious there. You guys have gotten me somewhat curious about these.

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No I don’t unfortunately. I do have to wonder what would end up pairing better more because the c9 can be tube or ss

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Yeah, could be an interesting experiment sometime if I happen to catch one at a good price. Doesn’t seem like they come up that frequently based on HiFiShark.

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Too new. But I did like the c9 with the 3.2 in ss mode, but I already felt that (depending on pairing) tube wise the wa8 was ahead, and I bet the wa8 would pull ahead of the c9 with the 3.1, but no real way of knowing

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I’d have thought the MySphere and 1266 for that matter just are not good portable choices, not for lack of amps but for the fact neither is particularly forgiving of you moving your head very much.
I mean I guess the MySphere is better than the 1266 in this regard, but neither seems portable friendly.

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I think “portable” hear is more on the “transportable” side of things

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I personally think the 1266 is a larger offender there, I can actually somewhat walk around a bit and not have positioning that screwed up

Also I actually think the phatlab handles the 3.2 better, seems to kinda wimp out with the 3.1

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All right, yeah I think the 3.1 has surprised me the most with the angstrom, it has pretty insane amounts of control over the midrange and treble, and extremely organic presentation, so much body and weight when it calls for it but isn’t there all the time, a pretty neutral experience overall, lots of romance and sweetness but still is pretty neutral leaning overall. Both spatially and dynamically huge. Really hard to not love this combo, takes basically everything I like about the mysphere and bumps those overall to a much higher level. So now the 3.1 is living on the angstrom and the 3.2 are sticking on the riviera, but I honestly am liking the angstrom more with the myspheres in general at this point (so I moved it above the aic lol)

With the 3.1 the stella hp vs aic 10:

  • stella more neutral and organic, aic a bit more warmer colored and less organic, the angstrom has a more convincing tonality imo
  • stella more reaching when it comes to stage and presents things in a more convincing manner where the aic is more meh in comparison
  • background blacker on the stella
  • stella does a much better job with microdynamics and still almost holds up to macro, aic holds it slightly with macro
  • timbre wise the stella takes it
  • tonal density wise the stella is more balanced where the aic leans too far
  • for impact and slam, while the aic does have a bit more tightness and control over the low end, the stella bests it in midrange impact and authority. Although bass is a bit more rounded on the stella, lower bass is the weakest part of the angstrom
  • the stella actually feels like it offers more control over the driver in all except the real deep bass
  • resolution wise the angstrom offers more resolving power
  • speed and separation the aic pulls ahead in the bass but the stella does better in the midrange and esp treble
  • extension wise the aic reaches better into the low end where the stella pulls much more from the treble

Overall I like the angstrom more here with the 3.1

With the 3.2 the stella hp vs aic 10:

  • stella is a bit more mid centric where the aic sounds more balanced to me here, although more of a toss up for which one I like more
  • stage wise I’m actually less sure here, one doesn’t seem to have that big of a leg up compared to the other, perhaps the stella has sharper imaging and a bit more depth where the aic 10 feels like it can give a bit more width
  • background blacker on the stella
  • stella does a better job with microdynamics but now isn’t as strong in macro, aic holds it with macro and isn’t that far off with micro
  • timbre wise both are very good but I might actually lean aic more here
  • tonal density wise the stella actually feels too lean where the aic is more just right
  • for impact and slam, the aic pulls ahead and feels like it just can hit harder with more authority
  • the aic has more control and grip over the driver for sure
  • resolution wise the angstrom offers more resolving power
  • speed and separation the aic pulls ahead overall
  • extension wise the aic reaches better into the low end where the stella pulls more from the treble

Overall it’s more a toss up depending on how I’m feeling but I might choose the riviera if I had to pick 1

Pretty interesting exercise lol, basically I think the 3.1 + stella offers the more balanced, technical, and convincing experience, where the 3.2 + aic 10 offers a more sweetened and rich, impactful, and fun experience. Def does show how much more the 3.1 can be influenced by the chain, and honestly can show more of that chain which can be both good and bad depending on what you are running lol.

I haven’t done a true 3.1 vs 3.2 comparison but I do think both could be worthwhile but it EXTREMELY depends on the source chain you are going to use. BUT if you have something that can run them equally well:

The 3.1 is:

  • more technically capable
  • more neutral overall, slightly forward and lean at times
  • way more picky on source gear pairings

The 3.2 is:

  • more midrange focused and a bit thicker and slightly more chill
  • more forgiving to poor synergy matches
  • more fun leaning rather than technical

It’s really hard though since this is all generalized, and with how much the 3.1 can change it’s one of those things where I would really consider synergy more than base signature or traits for which one you go with. I think if given the choice between the two it would always come down to the amp and there wouldn’t really be a reliable winner if that makes sense. I do think the 3.1 is a bit more impressive with the right amp than any pairings I could get with the 3.2, but it’s easier to get good sound out of the 3.2 than 3.1

A quick note on the ec studio t. With the mysphere 3.2 it sounded like it lacked control and was a bit more dull and blunted, nice nuance and sweetness but didn’t really have the drive I wanted with them. But the 3.1 seems to much better take advantage of the control the ec can offer with things like the utopia and just resulted in a more enjoyable and satisfying experience to me

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Not sure why I’m doing this, but just felt the urge to since there’s just generally less information about the mysphere than other headphones. Made some formal impressions for the headphone with pairing and synergy comparisons

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Phantasy ii or 428 don’t make the minimum list? :cry:

I jest. Awesome writeup as always

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I wasn’t thinking in terms of portables, I did add the wa8 so I can say the 424/428 is something I would be comfortable adding. But the phantasy won’t cut it from my experience

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Yes! Good read M0N and very relevant for me right now. Looking forward to your thoughts on the 3.2 with the liquid gold.

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