The Ups and Downs
If this headphone has one flaw, it would be the upper region. While not particularly amazing, it certainly isn’t lacking either. I consider it to be a tad out of place with the rest of the headphone in terms. For my tastes, its a bit bright and snappy with cymbal high hats and fast piano key strikes. Treble heads look elsewhere if that is your thing, but know that the Mad Dog’s upper regions are still highly engaging and fun. I find them to provide a smooth experience so long as the track isn’t fast paced. Cymbals and piano keys in a faster genre seem to bleed and fuse together a bit too much for my tastes. I consider this to be a small gripe due to the original unmodded T50RP upper region boasting a noticeably inferior upper area experience. Mr.Speakers properly dampened the drivers, something that was sorely lacking on the original Fostex T50RP.
( Kingdom Hearts Piano Collection )
Takehito Yamada’s Kingdom Hearts Piano Collection is by far my favorite instrumental album along with the Final Fantasy X Piano Collection. Both are absolutely stellar, but one of my favorite tracks off either album would be Dearly Beloved. A highly vibrant but slow, emotional track. It breaks my heart that this track is only just over two minutes in length due to showcasing the type of upper regions the Mad Dog works best with. Slow paced piano key strikes have an excellent and realistic sonic decay rate, in turn providing a deep, fatigue free experience. The Upper region of this headphone is indeed a bit bright as I’ve mentioned, which seems to get a bit smeared during a fast paced jazz piano track for example. However, slow to moderately paced listening tracks in the classical or jazz genres will suit this headphone nicely. Screaming guitars also are highly engaging, as are violins and flutes. Once again, the Mad Dog is showcasing it’s well roundedness by handling most genres nicely.
Sound staging and Comfort
Combined with a spacious amplifier like my Burson HA-160, the Mad Dog performs on a grand scale with regard to the stereo imaging depth. That reach out and touch the artist value is high on this headphone and to my surprise ended up testing extremely well with online gaming and FPS shooters. Borderlands and Battlefield are video games that are extremely immersing and engaging in the sound staging departments. Bullets whizzing by, characters speaking from a distance, sneaking enemies just around the corner are easily placed and spotted, even if they are not visible and happened to be hiding, unseen behind a wall hoping to take you out by surprise. No need to worry about those sneak attacks of your best friend trying to stab you in the back, the Mad Dog has excellent spacial placement of sounds. You will hear them coming. I believe this headphone to have one of the best, if not the best sound stage depth in its class, excellent height and average width. The experience seems set up for those who enjoy intimacy in their presentation qualities.
The Alpha pads are very plush and comfortable, offering a great deal of physical give and an excellent feeling of your ears sinking into the lambskin pads themselves. Comfy and cozy. The Mad Dog provides a very good airiness to the presentation with decent instrument separation. Scalability is phenomenal. Going from my International in Dac mode to something like my Burson HA-160 is quite a step up in dynamics, adding a fantastic and very needed warmth to the low end over the closer to sterilized feel of the low end via the International alone.
End Credits
Is this the end, or just the beginning? MrSpeakers has a new model coming out very soon called the Alpha Dog. Promises of a superior product over the Mad Dog seems absolutely insane and excites me greatly that there is even more potential goodness to squeeze out of the T50RP drivers. If MrSpeakers says they can do it or have already done it, I have no trouble blindly trusting them and placing my pre-order immediately if that option were available. I’ve not been this impressed with a headphone in a very long time and I can’t find any problems with it. The headphone is great to lounge around the house with and enjoy movies and gaming, as well as high quality music of almost any genre. Not many headphones out there can boast such qualities, yet one that costs only $299? My goodness, no question about it. The Mad Dog is my favorite mid tier closed back headphone of all time. Highly musical, highly engaging, highly responsive and useful in multiple media applications. Coming in a variety of cable options, the Mad Dogs scores a rare 9/10 Value.
