I am a Brüel & Kjaer person.

As long as the midrange is not sucked out or isolated in the audio spectrum I can really enjoy the music. Semi-open and open AKG headphones really did influence my preferences.

Strangely enough the B&K curve is the opposite of the AKG sound (talking K500/K501/601/701) with less bass and hotter treble.
In the end you may be an 'inverted' B&K person not a converted B&K person

The older HD650 is more like a B&K signature.

The newer K127 and K7xx are closer to the B&K curve, maybe even leaning toward OW.

I thought the highs needed more decibels. B&K with more highs, I am good...

updated my plot:



the OW curve is now based on Harman's plots instead of derived from DF vs OW differences.

In your data, I want to know where the B&K Target is deprived from. Is that a ortho-telephonic gain from B&K company?

In your data, I want to know where the B&K Target is deprived from. Is that a orto-telephonic gain from B&K company?

http://s1217.photobucket.com/user/mitchatola/media/bandk.jpg.html

http://www.bksv.com/doc/17-197.pdf

a very, very old B&K plot from a test record.
It is just to show that most target responses have many commonalities but differ just slightly.
Differences do not seem to be more than 3 dB (which is quite audible already)

The compensation plots are more worrying though with differences up to 10dB.
Which one, would you say, is closest to perceived SQ and with what HP/EP ?
You could draw OW in there too (although that may not apply exactly to that specific test fixture)

No you can't compare a compensation curve to a target curve.

A compensation is needed to get to a target curve because the measurement system does not have a linear frequency response.
The O-W correction curve applied to a measurement rig exactly (or very closely) the same as the one O-W use will/should yield the the target curve compared to 'flat' SPL.
In other words (substantially) elevated bass and slightly rolled off treble which is 'preferred' over completely flat SPL or other types of FR response by most people all over the world and ages.
This should sound about the same as a 'flat' speaker in a 'room'.
Some like their headphones to 'sound' similar to this, I have slightly different preferences and am NOT looking to emulate speakers in a 'room' at all but want to hear what the mics picked up.

yeah, some mics are used very close to the instrument and thus should best be reproduced by flat speakers away from you where recordings with mics further from the sound source may best be listened to on flat headphones.
That's where the whole 'room' things often fail... the recordings.

The target (room curves) are 'accumulated' signals at a listening spot (very averaged so VERY different from everyone's listening/living room spaces) where direct sound + reflections are accumulated.
The speaker itself should be 'flat' (presumably at 1m on axis in non reverbant room) in order to get a similar MEASUREMENT.

I capitalize measurement because while it is true that the treble and above all bass response in small rooms alters we can still perceive the speaker ITSELF as 'flat' yet we MEASURE accumulated sounds.
When doing SPL measurements the time component is 'removed' because ONLY the FR is measured and NOT the time.

For this reason alone I feel headphones do NOT have to have a 'room' target response at all but should be flat with a bit of (sub)bass boost to liven it up for several reasons.
Others disagree and Harman (like many others) have shown that most people (trained or not) actually PREFER some bass boost and gently rolled of treble.

All of this has absolutely nothing to do with compensation curves but all with personal preferences AND lets not forget source material.
Not all recordings are 'mixed' using good monitoring setups + there is also something as studio house sounds and preferences of recording personel etc.
All these factors compile to a bunch of very different sounding recordings.
Some of those recordings really NEED bass added and treble reduced to sound 'more real' where recordings where little was being 'altered' a 'flat reproduction' is more 'real' sounding.

So in the end ... its the recording quality that matters most.
For getting out the finest nuances in well made recordings good gear is essential which cannot be 'shown' in a 'room curve' at all.

Best to forget about this all and simply enjoy the music you like on your speakers/headphones if all you care about is sound/reproduction/music/enjoyment.

However, if you like to measure and link what you hear to what you measure.
Want to 'calibrate' the rig or pioneer in HP measurement techniques or just want to apply 'standard' measurement techniques then this is a fun and heavily debated subject.

Measuring is fun for some and perhaps useful, to others it says nothing and may even hate those that do like measurements.

Just my opinion on this.