« Great for tracking, not the best sound »

I own these along with AKG K240 Studios. I first bought the K240's over these for the comfort along with the sound quality. While these sound very good they just don't match the clarity and smoothness of the semi open back AKG's. These are fully closed back so give you a sorta pressured feeling. The speakers are pumping towards your head with no where else for the sound to go. It's great for cutting out outside noise as well as helping eliminate headphone bleed when tracking but the tone suffers. These have a very true sound to them, it doesn't over exaggerate anything too much, it does have a bit of bass boost but nothing dramatic. I own both so I can use the Shure's for tracking and the AKG for listening and mixing where best sound is most crucial. Compared to some headphones such as the Audio Technica ATH-M50 there's no contest, these win by a landslide. The ATH's have very ice picky highs which becomes painful very quickly and they're also very uncomfortable. These have much smoother highs but still no where near as smooth as the AKG's.

One other problem with these is the comfort. These get kind of painful after extended use. I normally where them for well over an hour and it has a clamp feel on your head. Starts to give me a headache as well as hurts the tops of my ears. There's just way too much force pushing the muffs together and your head is what suffers. Other than that they'd get a better rating.

One more nice plus is they also have a detachable cord and leather bag. Unfortunately the cord is coiled so it being 8 feet actually comes out to about 4 coiled, it can be stretched but it just puts more pressure on your head. There is a straight cord that can be ordered but still haven't found anyone who carries it.