As far as marketing goes, being able to announce (as Grado can) that your headphones are “hand-assembled in Brooklyn, USA” is not to be sniffed at.
In terms of the user’s experience of a pair of the new Grado Signature S750 hard-wired open-backed over-ear headphones, though, being hand assembled turns out to be something of a double-edged sword. Like the little girl in the Longfellow poem, when the Signature S750 are good they are very good indeed, but when they are bad they are horrid.
They sound amazing, but a few small issues with fit leave a bit to be desired, which isn't something you'd expect from $1,650 audiophile headphones. Still, if you're the right type of listener, these high-end headphones present music in as pristine a manner as a nice pair of stereo speakers in a good room.
Courtesy of Grado
Musically Magnificent
All that’s very good indeed about these new Grado headphones concerns the way they sound. The company has developed a new driver for this model, a 50-mm dynamic design that uses a paper and carbon fiber composite diaphragm in front of a lightweight copper-plated aluminum voice coil. It claims these drivers are good for a frequency response of 6 Hz to 46 kHz, which is a massive tonal range for any headphones.
The new “B” ear cushions Grado has designed for the Signature S750 have a noticeably flat surface. The company suggests the arrangement reduces physical and aural fatigue by distributing the clamping pressure more evenly. It also allows the diaphragm itself to be much closer to the listener’s ear than is usual, and it features a smaller-than-usual interior opening to finesse the sonic balance.