On the hunt for past weeks. Finally got one offering a secondhand pair that’s only been used for a few hours, basically new. The dark and muddy impressions are true but I’ve really fell for the design since first I saw it. Fortunately it responds very well to EQ. Now it’s a favourite pair! My only regret is not getting the classic or anniversary colorway but doesn’t matter.
My beloved X2HR’s suspension band wore out (5 years of daily use) and while I was poking around on amazon to order a replacement pair I saw the Porta Pro’s were on sale (prime day or somesuch) so I bought a pair when I ordered the X2HR’s and they are impressive. Warmer than the X2HR’s they do bring some bass lol, but fun to rock out to some Priest with.
Honestly if I had of known they were this good (I mean I had seen posts and videos but never owned any Koss stuff) I probably would of skipped replacing my X2HR’s and saved the money hehe. More comfortable than I would of thought as well. The last pair of on ears I had were probably from a walkman or discman and I remember those being itchy as hell but the stock pads were ok and the yaxi ones were even better. Kind of want to try some of their other less dark headphones now (KPH40 or KSC75’s maybe at some point).
People who say it’s muddy are just used to harsh sounding headphones, which is 99 percent of the mid to hi-fi tier ones. The Porta Pros sound much more natural. I just demoed a bunch of pretty expensive ones up to around 1500 dollars. Porta Pro most natural sounding of the all, and not at all muddy sounding. But yes, they don’t make your ears bleed.
Yep I did more inclined towards neutral to harsh sounding earphones. My pair before this porta pro were Galaxy Buds+, Buds2, Moondrop Aria and a few chi-fi iems. Even back in 2020 I didn’t find the KZ ZSN Pro X to be sharp at all, even though almost everyone complained about it harsh high and metallic timbre, especially the sibilance lol. It’s not that the Porta Pro are bad, it does have a surprising amount of soundstage and imaging, just not what I’m used to