For more than a hundred years, the Japanese audio equipment manufacturer Denon has been delighting quality sound lovers with its devices. For many decades, the company has been known to audiophiles as a developer primarily of turntables, amplifiers, receivers and blu-ray players. By the way, Denon still remains a trendsetter in this class of Hi-Fi devices. However, time does not stand still, and the Japanese do not intend to lag behind the “Depeche Mode” of the modern audio industry. Therefore, it was clear that such an eminent and experienced manufacturer could not help but produce devices that are now commonly called “personal audio,” or, more simply, headphones and portable amplifiers. And entering this market was very, very successful...
Build quality
· The body of the Denon AH-MM400 is predominantly made using lightweight metal, synthetic leather and wood. The suspension to which the bowls are attached, the end of the headband, the frames around the bowls themselves (although it may be plastic), as well as a relief insert in the center of the bowls with the company logo, are made of metal. Wood is present exclusively in the bowls, and the headband upholstery is made of leatherette, which is stitched with fabric at the bottom, while the headband itself (namely at its base) and the plugs near the 3.5mm entrance are made of plastic. In general, the headphones feel quite solid and strong in your hands, with the exception of slight flimsiness and creaking in the area of the connections of different parts of the structure. The cable, on the contrary, was frankly upsetting. Not only is it thin, without any external weaving, made from a thousand times recycled rubber, which directly smells of something that was shamelessly saved on, but it also gets wildly tangled, and at the same time it takes far from the most easily restored form. It would seem much worse, but in addition to all of the above, it has a proprietary oval connection socket (instead of the usual round one), as well as an extremely inconvenient location of the control panel. The remote control is also unprepossessingly assembled and can clearly crack if there is some unfortunate impact/sufficient load on it. On the one hand, there is a pause button (aka answering a call, etc.) along with volume control buttons, which, by the way, never worked in conjunction with my phone, and on the other side there is (you know what quality) microphone. It would be nice if this cable could easily be replaced with any other with the now popular unbalanced 3.5mm connector, but due to the proprietary form factor, carrying out this kind of replacement cannot be considered a trivial and easy task, and considering all the other, far from being enough stars with sky, the parameters of this cable, from my point of view, this is a big minus for the Denon AH-MM400.
Denon AH-MM400 headphones, review. Magazine "AudioVideo Salon"
The Denon Music Maniac series of headphones, as the name suggests, is addressed to serious music lovers who do not want to part with their favorite music under any circumstances. The recently released AH-MM400 model will not disappoint them either in terms of workmanship or sound character.
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Sound production technique
The Denon Music Maniac series of headphones, as the name suggests, is addressed to serious music lovers who do not want to part with their favorite music under any circumstances. The recently released AH-MM400 model will not disappoint them either in terms of workmanship or sound character.
Not a single detail of the AH-MM400 allows you to doubt that you are holding a first-class product in your hands. The headband is carefully covered with soft, pleasant-to-touch materials and ends with aluminum clamps for adjusting the reach of the suspensions. The rotating mechanisms are also made of light alloy and hold the cups exactly on the axis of the emitters. The cups themselves are not simple either. Their external parts are made of solid American walnut. Inside, the wooden parts are given a complex shape to suppress standing waves, and on the outside they are impregnated with a special varnish and decorated with aluminum overlays. I do not rule out that all this helps combat unwanted resonances. The ear pads are made of a material that can remember its shape under deformation, and are covered with thin leatherette. The volume of the soft cushions is similar to that of on-ear headphones, and the diameter of the ear pads is the same as that of enveloping ones. This intermediate solution does not cause (at least for me) any discomfort, and the degree of noise insulation is one of the best that can be found in closed models.
Unique 40mm carbon paper diaphragms with a free edge are optimized primarily for minimal distortion rather than high sensitivity. 96 dB/mW is by no means a record value for headphones, and in order to make further judgments about the sound of the AH-MM400 more objective, we are printing another box - with a compact amplifier-converter Denon DA-10.
This stylish device combines the pinnacle of digital technology (on board – 32-bit Burr Brown PCM-1795, dual clock generator, asynchronous USB receiver) with typically audiophile features: an output path on discrete elements, separate power circuits from the internal Li-Ion battery, adjustment volume potentiometer... The DA-10 has only one drawback - its size is not very suitable for working outside the home. When paired with an iPhone, for example, and even in the included case, it will noticeably bulge out in a jacket or coat pocket.
But the flagship “Maniacs” with this box sound so good that you want to let others listen to them. They don't bombard you with an abundance of unimportant sound details. Analytical, meticulous, meticulous – this is not their thing. Here we need to talk about completely different qualities - super dynamics, articulation, exemplary linearity.
Of course, if you try really hard, you will notice that at 300 and 600 Hz the cups barely “sing along”. In the region of 10 kHz, some kind of “steel” microresonance of the membrane appears. And, perhaps, that’s all. Any other headphones have a dozen problem areas in the sound range, if not more. And Denon specialists managed to achieve amazing balance from closed phones. The space is three-dimensional and convincing, filled with both “air” and infra-low vibrations that hover in large concert halls. The muted studio atmosphere, on the contrary, turns out to be distinctly intimate and cozy. The bass is only a little more massive than required, but it captivates with its plasticity. The top is dynamic and transparent. The main band is not forced either in the “chest”, or in the middle, or in the sibilant part, which is why at first it seems as if the edges of the range are slightly raised, but after listening, you understand that only such a musical balance is the only correct one. It does not interfere with listening to the playing technique of musicians, the vocal characteristics of singers, or rare techniques of sound production...
Stereo phones Denon AH—MM400
Manufacturer D&M Holdings Inc (Japan)
www.denon.ru
Resistance: 32 Ohm || Playback range: 10 - 40000 Hz || Sensitivity: 96 dB/mW || Input power: up to 1 W || Weight: 310 g
COMPONENTS
- Telephone converter/amplifier Denon DA-10
- Laptop Apple MacBook Air A1465
Prepared based on materials from the AudioVideo Salon magazine, April 2015
www.salonav.com This review was read 10,974 times
Design
· Naturally, due to the fact that wood is present in the finishing of the case, this immediately adds +10 points in terms of appearance. For some, but not for others. I'm more of the former, but that's not the end of the story. I can’t understand why, but it would seem that initially coolly assembled ears using expensive materials such as wood and metal look somehow a little toy-like - maybe it’s the half-matte metal (it would be better if it were either purely glossy or purely matte ), or whether it’s the slightly glossy headband (which I personally would like to see more in the color of the wooden bowls) - I can’t give an exact answer. But what I can definitely answer is that the cable of this model does not add any appearance points at all; rather, on the contrary, it takes away.
A little bit of nostalgia
With great pleasure and nostalgia I remember the now classic D-series from Denon - D2000, D5000 and the masterpiece “seven-thousanders” that crown it all. Even then, many audiophiles started talking about the special, easily recognizable “Denon” sound, so different from the sound standard accepted in Japan with an emphasis on high frequencies, which often gave us Europeans a headache. Well, we can’t understand these strange inhabitants of the Land of the Rising Sun... It was all the more pleasant to hear in Denon headphones a sound that is dearer to the European ear, with a “darker” color, a solid but not booming bass, and a smooth middle. And the wooden cups of the same D-7000 added some elusive charm to all this.
\ Denon D-7000
Ergonomics
· The headphones seem to be full-size, but, looking at the dimensions of the ear pads, some may consider them almost on-ear. At first it was extremely uncomfortable for me to keep them on my head for more than 35-40 minutes, but then this time increased to about an hour (maybe a little more), after which it remained +/- at this mark and did not increase. The problem area, in my case, was the middle of the head under the headband, as well as the pressure on the edges of the ears. The headphones don’t weigh much (310g), and the headband backing doesn’t seem to be very thin. If this is the case, then maybe they do not press hard enough on the sides, which is why the weight falls more on the upper part of the structure, thereby causing a burning sensation on the surface of the head? The answer is also no, but the problem is still present: first, after the twentieth minute, I began to feel a burning sensation near the top of my head, then, at the fiftieth minute, an unpleasant sensation was added to the tips of my ears, after which another 10-15 minutes passed and the pain disappeared the desire to endure - here is the very hour of use that I was talking about. Yes, you can take off your headphones for 5-7 minutes, and then get the next 40 minutes of listening before the next painful mark comes, but, you know, this doesn’t make the situation much better.
Assembly: 7.5/10
Appearance: 6/10
Comfort: 5/10
Equipment: 4/10
Solidity in appearance
However, all this is a thing of the past, but what will Denon be able to surprise us with in 2015, and will it be able to?
Well, let's watch and listen, because in front of me are Denon MM-400 headphones from the latest 2015 collection. And it is not by chance that I use the word “collection”, which relates more to the field of clothing, fashion and style. At first glance, the MM-400 makes an impression... the impression of not just an audio device, but also an accessory from the “wardrobe” of a person of a certain status and position in life. Classic lines with modern elements in design, cups made of American walnut, all-aluminum headband construction, ear pads made of a special material with a “memory effect”... The first association that comes to mind when looking at the MM-400 is Solidity. Yes, exactly Solidity - these headphones are clearly not for teenagers who want to surprise their company with the brightness and unusualness of the accessory. There are classics in every line. The classic is extremely stylish and sophisticated, which will look great next to a Brioni suit, a Louis Vuitton briefcase and a business class ticket in a Petek wallet. These are headphones for a successful man, a wonderful gift for the boss.
However, no matter how beautiful and stylish headphones are, they remain, first and foremost, headphones - the device with which we listen to music. Therefore, sound, whatever one may say, is of great importance. Let's hear how the MM-400 is doing with this. Since the headphones are positioned by the manufacturer as portable, i.e. for listening to music, primarily “on the go”, on the road, an iPhone was taken for the test (fortunately, the MM-400 also combines the function of a headset for Apple devices) devices) and the equally solid Sony Walkman NW-ZX2.
Well what can I say? First, I'll tell you about the landing. She is very comfortable. The ear pads do not fit very tightly to the ears, without creating excess pressure on the head. Of course, I don’t recommend dancing with these headphones on; they might fall off, but they’re not made for dancers. I did not experience any discomfort from wearing the MM-400 on my head, despite the fact that I did not take it off for several hours at a time. Moreover, at a certain stage of use you simply stop noticing them on your head.
Sound
Devices: iBasso DC02, Audioquest Dragonfly Cobalt, FiiO A5, Meizu 16th and iPad Pro 2022 11''.
Resources: Tidal HiFi (FLAC + MQA), as well as Deezer Premium/HiFi (MP3 320 kbps + FLAC).
The sound of these headphones leans more towards the warm side, with a quite flat midrange, a slight emphasis in the lower frequencies and slightly smoothed out highs.
Low Frequencies
The bass has good resolution and structure. The speed, as well as the sense of control, is above average - the blow is transferred quite well. I didn’t really find any downsides, as such, with the exception of a rare lack of “meat” at frequencies below 50-40Hz. In terms of the dry amount of bass, there are also no complaints or wishes in general.
Mid frequencies
The mids have an evenly developed character and a lively presentation, so that neither instruments nor vocalists are left deprived. Male vocals sound equally good compared to female ones, with the exception of the deepest voices, which benefit a little due to the “feeding” from slightly emphasized low frequencies. The instruments reveal themselves brightly and richly, with the exception of the wind instruments and some strings: in the sound of the former one can almost always hear a slight nasal character and tightness, while the latter suffer from problems in the upper frequencies (more on this in the next subsection).
High frequencies
The highs have a soft and smooth presentation - just like the previous headphones I reviewed, only if they cost less than a hundred dollars, then this sample exceeds the three and a half hundred mark, and therefore there could potentially be more complaints against them. Yes, the absolute advantage of them is the absence of cutting sibilants, but almost everything else can be called disadvantages: resolution, clarity, amount of “air” after 10 kHz, transparency - all these characteristics are not ones that the Denon AH-MM400 could boast of.
Volume
After a rather negative picture in terms of HF, I was pleasantly surprised by the volume, and frankly, it’s not bad here, considering the fact that these are closed-type headphones. I see no reason to rant further on this topic.
Sound picture
The sound picture is also not one of the bad characteristics of this model: the division into left/right channel and center is outlined perfectly. There is also a diagonal, but it is still more blurred in comparison with the three directions indicated above. There is no rear image at all, but the situation is similar for almost all headphones on the market, so I’m already used to it.
Bass: 8.5/10
Mids: 8/10
High frequencies: 5.5/10
Volume: 8/10
Sound picture: 8/10
Summary
So, what did we get in the end?
And we received from Denon excellent headphones with a solid design, calm, smooth sound that does not tire the ears, in the best traditions of classic Denon models. In addition, headphones with excellent potential for improving sound quality by adding a portable amplifier. An expensive-looking, expensive-sounding thing that you wouldn’t even dare call an accessory. Moreover, taking into account the cost of the headphones, I can confidently say that in terms of price/quality ratio, it is very difficult to find analogues for this model in this price range, because headphones comparable in build quality and sound to the MM-400 are already much more expensive . And finally, good news for those who are interested in buying Denon headphones. Until November 26, 2015
you have the opportunity to get a 15% discount on the entire line of Denon headphones and amplifiers in our store.
Just enter promo code denongt
and enjoy great sound from Denon.
Music recommendations:
The nature of the sound and presentation of these headphones are more similar to such genres as Jazz, Soul, Blues, Country, Chill or Reggae. Let's move on to specific tracks: Liquid Spirit (Gregory Porter), Right Back Round Again (Joshua Redman), You Know I'm No Good (Amy Winehouse), Nobody Knows My Name (Jose James), That Man (Caro Emerald), Liberian Calypso (Nina Simone), Koto (Clozee), Same Old Train (Alison Krauss), Don't Talk (Melody Gardot), Feelin' the Same and Natty Dread by Clinton Fearon and Israel Vibration respectively.
Additionally:
1. Since these headphones have wood in their construction, you should be careful when handling them: do not wear them in particularly humid weather, try not to store them in very dry/humid areas, and also avoid prolonged exposure to direct sunlight, since wood can lose its structural integrity, dry out/get saturated with moisture, and then crack, even despite polishing, sanding and applying a paint coating on top.
2. When I talked about the inconvenient location of the control panel, I meant that it was too close to the end of the cable (9cm, to be precise). Because of this, it sometimes peeks out from under your outerwear, if, like me, in order to prevent the cable from dangling and getting tangled less, you prefer to pull it inside.
3. This full-size pair noticeably changes its sonic signature depending on how much they cover your ears. The metal sliders have a scale with marks from one to seven, using which you can adjust and trim the height of the headphones on both sides. In my case, for full ear coverage and optimal weight distribution, I wore these headphones 3 clicks past the 7 mark (yes, there is still room for a slide above the scale provided), so if I moved at least 2 steps in one side or another on the left and right cups, this resulted either in a failure of voices, or in cutting sections of the high frequencies, or the bottom became somehow drier and flatter, and all due to a change in fit, which was reflected in the form of deviations of the contact points the ear cushion with the ears from the normal state, as well as by changing the inclination of the drivers, in relation to the ear in the standard position. You may not come across this feature, but since this is still a review, and after almost three weeks of use, I decided to include this detail in the published review text.
