Audio-Technica ATH-M40FS

My love for Audio Technica runs deep. They're a very good brand that makes a lot of good gear. They're reasonable with their prices and they have good customer support.

These were my very 1st pair of closed back headphones. I purchased them years ago and wound up purchasing the same model years later (in the future).

What I love:

Cheap/Affordable and they're closed back. Very flat sounding which makes them good for mixing or better yet detailing a mix. Did I say affordable? (40-60 bucks). Accurate across the board, meaning if you purchase 2-3 pair, they are going to sound the same. That's important to me as a consumer

What I Don't Like

They start to breakdown after a couple years. The ear pieces, the material starts to flake off and it gets nasty because it's all around your ears, neck etc. It's kind of annoying. This is why I had to purchase a second pair and yes that one broke began breaking down as well.

Did I Try Other Brands?:

Hmmm, you know, I did actually. Farting around in studios, I've always been use to using the MDR 7506 by Sony, but when I went to purchase my own pair of headphones they were out of my price range at the time, both times actually.

Are They Worth The Money?

No, I don't think they are and If I had to do it all over again I wouldn't waste my time with them because for just 50-60 more dollars you could get a good pair of headphones that would last longer... Going with the cheaper option made me spend 3 times as much

1st pair, 2nd pair and then finally some headphones that were better in both sound and build. Again, I love Audio Technica, but I don't think I'd give these headphones another chance.

if all you have is $60, please save the money and get some cans with a better build unless it is an absolute emergency.

The ATH-M40fs are a pair of closed circuit studio headphones. They are very affordable only costing 69 bucks. They are very comfortable around your ear and you can wear them for hours without them getting uncomfortable or irritating you. The cushions around your ear are soft and keep some of the outside unwanted noise away from your ears. The ear pieces do rotate so you can listen easy DJ style or “one ear monitoring”. The driver size on the ATH-M40fs is 40mm and the frequency response is 5Hz to 28 kHz with an impedance of 60 ohms.
These headphones sound decent; I would not use them for any serious mixing of your music, Mainly for just listening or playback purposes. We had a bunch of these headphones and use to use them for playback listening especially when we were on the road. The best part to us about this headphones is that they cost was so low. We could buy many of these and not stress out if one of them got broken or crushed at a show or in the van because they didn’t cost that much and we could replace them quickly. Before we had these we were using a pair of Shure headphones that cost 180 dollars and when they started breaking it was really hurting our pockets.
The sound that you will get while using the ATH-M40fs is pretty clean. The bass can be a little heavy sometimes depending on what style of music you are listening to in them. The mids sit nice in the ATH-M40fs headphones and the highs are pretty clean and crisp. I do recommend getting these headphones if you are a gigging band and you travel a lot and need some headphones that don’t cost a lot to use for general listening to music with and listening to playback with.

For the price, the ATH-M40FS headphones are a steal. Over the years I've used many different headphones offered by a variety of high dollar big name companies. I was sold on the Audio Technica's immediately, They far surpassed many much more expensive headphones that I had used. With the M40FS you get a really flat response from well below the 20hz range to well above the 20kHz range. I've recommended these heaphones to several friends, both listeners and engineers, and all of them have been impressed. I've been using this model of Audio Technica headphones for just about 12 years now. I've put them through the wringer, turned way, WAY up to make a drummer comfortable with his headphone mix, abused by dropping, cord snags, you name it. These headphones are truly deserving of a workhorse reputation. The drivers on these headphones can handle tons of abuse, but the earpieces? Well, let's just say that over the life time of these heaphones they'll probably enounter enough sweat, friction, or something else that will degrade them, however, after 8-10 years of hard use you really should expect any product made by any manufacturer to be in less than perfect condition. But, here's the great thing, not only has this particular model been in production for many, many years, Audio Technica still sells refurbishing items for them. If that doesn't speak volumes for the quality of the drivers and the quality of Audio Technica's products I really don't know what does. As an engineer, I have to tell you, I've been using the same set of these since 2000-2001, the next pair of headphones that I will buy, if I really need to, will be another pair of Audio Technica M40-FS's. Buy them!!