TASCAM TH-02 Professional Studio Monitor Headphones, Wired, Over Ear — for Recording, Podcast, DJ, Music and Guitar, with 1/4 Inch Jack Adapter

After a rough start, these headphones have highly impressed me. What was the rough start? Well, when they arrived the TH-02 headphones were exceedingly tight on my head. Other reviewers have mistakenly diagnosed this as a problem with the earpads and purchased after-market earpads for themselves. There is nothing wrong with the leather-like earpads, and I have found them comfortable (if just barely too small for my sizeable ears). But the fit was so tight on my head that these made my ears sore to wear after just a half hour. So I left them stretching on my router overnight, and after that they were golden. First of all, the audio quality I am getting out of these is nothing short of incredible for a pair of headphones that cost me less than twenty bucks. They compete easily with my beloved IEMs that I was using before getting this pair, and at less than half the price. Second, I love the clean black-and-white look of this pair of headphones. Not only does it match with the overall visual style of my whole PC and audio set-up, but it is a nicer and more professional look than you can find in many more expensive options. Third, the construction of them is also surprisingly high-quality at their price. Nothing about the pair seems flimsy or cheap; all of the connections are solid and all of the points of articulation move in a consistent fashion every time. Finally, I have noticed other people remarking on the very long cord that this pair of headphones features. It is indeed rather long! I view this as a good thing, because I can run them directly out of the audio output on the back of my PC (leaving my front-facing audio jacks open for other applications). But if you're looking for headphones that you can carry with you everywhere, you might want to consider tying up some of the cable length somehow.

I was recently in need of closed headphones and curious about what the market offers. I thought I might share my findings with someone in a similar situation. The Tascam TH-02 turns out to be an excellent value among the eight headphone models that I have compared. Below is my review of these headphones. I am a speaker builder with measurement equipment, so I know what is neutral and undistorted sound. Unlike speaker systems, most headphones have no crossover or frequency response correction circuit. So, it is critical to be able to know how much such uneven responses affect perception of their sound with respect to accuracy and neutrality. I have good sense of it since I have been measuring sound. But I do not have proper equipment for headphone measurement, mostly importantly a dummy torso/head, nor am I willing to invest time in making a DIY setup. This is the reason why my search and audition have been limited to headphones for which measurement data exist, with some exceptions (see below). I made use of three different sources for the data: InnerFidelity.com, Headphone.com, and en.GoldenEars.net. While there is consistency within each site's measurements, there is also inconsistency between them, due to different measurement conditions and compensation methods. So, I researched and took those into account. One may say we can use EQ to remedy irregular frequency responses. But EQ has its own limitations. Some minor EQ'ing can help, but headphones that need too extensive correction should be avoided. The foremost reason is the loss of dynamic range. Theoretically, with EQ you can only limit, not increase, dynamic range in a certain frequency band. On the source side, you lose digital bit depth, and on the headphone side, you suppress the driver's efficient response range. Below is the list of headphones that I have auditioned (in the order of their street prices): - Tascam TH-02 ($30; no data available) - Panasonic RP-HTF600-S ($32; semi-open headphones) - Brainwavz HM3 / Incipio F38 ($35; no data available) - Tascam TH-2000 ($50; no data available) - AKG K518LE ($50) - Sennheiser HD429 ($65) - Creative Aurvana Live! ($70) - KRK KNS6400 ($85) - Shure SRH440 ($90) My DIY speaker system (it measures very flat) served as a reference with respect to tonal balance. I also own some open headphones like Sony MDR-MA900 and Sennheiser PX100, which also provided a baseline when I evaluated tonal balance of the headphones under comparison. I used a desktop headphone amp that has flat FR and reasonably low output impedance. I will give short, summarized impressions for one by one. Tascam TH-02 (no measurement data available) This is a really nice surprise. There is a little hump in the bass and midbass regions, and some wide, shallow dip in upper mids and lower treble (i.e., slightly polite presentation). Otherwise, these are relatively accurate headphones at a fraction ($30) of cost of headphones of comparable quality. Construction is good for the price. The pad size is between over-ear and on-ear, but comfortable enough. Panasonic RP-HTF600-S (semi-open headphones) Warm tone, deep bass. Treble is there, but upper mids and lower treble are lacking. Comfortable to wear. A good value, but not great for those looking for reasonably accurate sound. Brainwavz HM3 / Incipio F38 (no data available) Mid/upper bass ruins the sound which has otherwise good midrange-treble balance. Very uncomfortable to wear due to non-swivel cups. Tascam TH-2000 (no data available) Simply inferior to its younger brother TH02. Very dull and muddy presentation. The model uses the same ear cups as TH02 but contains different drive units. The driver may have better components but execution must be bad. Not worth the asking price. AKG K518LE You need to remove the thick foam pad at the driver's front (easily removable) to have better bass-to-mids balance. Even the pad removed, the phones still have bass-oriented sound, but not bad. Mids to treble balance is good. Somewhat similar sound signature to Tascam TH-02's. But the TH-02 sounds a little more natural. The headband can be too small for some people. The clamping force is a bit above a comfortable level. Sennheiser HD429 Anothter pair of headphones with bass emphasis. Not overly bassy, though. But a bigger problem is treble, which is a little too polite to be neutral. I would not consider these headphones a good value. Creative Aurvana Live! Smooth and warm tone. Bass is somewhat loose at times. Treble has sparkles and at the same time sounds smooth. But relative to bass and treble, upper mids and lower treble are somewhat recessed, making the headphones' sound colored. Some people may feel them musical and full, but I prefer the Tascam TH02 at a lower price. The appearance is very good, though, with some feel of high quality. Very comfortable to wear with memory foam pads. KRK KNS6400 It has much more neutral sound than the headphones described above. Mid- and upper bass is somewhat lacking, and treble is a little overly presented. Good monitor-type sound. But there is one problem with these headphones. They are not very efficient, which means their usability is limited---you need a desktop headphone amp or a high-current capable portable amp to make them sound good. A little too bright treble is a weakness, too. Shure SRH440 Without doubt, these are the best of the bunch. In terms of clarity, they are in a different league---perhaps, the KNS6400 is close but also with weaknesses (see above). Treble is sometimes a little on the bright side, but not as bright as the KNS6400's. Some people may find them bright with bright recordings, but the headphones should not be blamed for that. These produce very neutral and accurate sound. Bass is sufficient and often pleasantly strong in the mid- and upper bass regions, but deeper bass is not covered by these cans. Most music recordings do not contain this deep bass, anyway. I summarize my findings with the following top two picks: 1. Shure SRH440: These are the headphones you can safely choose under $100 if what you are looking for is accurate, neutral sound. 2. Tascam TH-02: This is a secret gem. At $30, you get really good closed cans. Its overall presentation is not as clear as the SRH440's, but with their price factored in, you cannot complain. They are definitely in the same league as the AKG K518LE (foam pads removed) and the Creative Aurvana Live. It may depend on personal preference, but among the three, my pick is the Tascam. The Creative has a better look and feel, but I'd choose the Tascam for its sound. Another headphone model I wanted to include in my search was the Sennheiser HD 280 Pro ($90-$100), but after I listened to the Shure SRH440, I decided not to. According to HeadRoom's measurements and many people's common impressions, the HD 280 Pro has a little subdued treble compared to the SRH440 which has great mids to treble balance when compared to my reference speakers. The Sennheiser covers the lowest octave much better than the Shure, but that is not my priority. I also considered the Koss ProDJ100 because of good reviews, but ruled them out because of their measurements. Their response might be flat in fundamental tones from most instruments but not with harmonics due to a large dip around 5-6kHz. Some people may think they sound good, but there is no way for them to sound accurate and natural by my standard. UPDATE: I think the following info may be useful for your purchase decision: They do sound "like" $100 phones. But IMO they are not truly comparable to those headphones. You will notice slightly less clean bass/lower mids, slightly weak lower treble, and somewhat strong treble (which you already did). Note I used the word "slightly." They are kind of moderately well balanced. I can confidently say that they are comparable to any good, major-brand headphones retailing at $50 - $80 (e.g., AKG K518LE, Creative Aurvana Live, Senheiser HD 429, etc), basically telling that they can compete with things costing double their price. By the way, if you can play with a good EQ software like Electi-Q or Rockbox built-in EQ, you will be able to obtain better tonal balance by slightly increasing the upper mids / lower treble (from 1.5 to 5 kHz) by about 4.0 dB and lowering the treble from 8 to 10 kHz by about 3 dB. Here is the EQ setting I use: Filter 1 Center Freq: 3000 Hz Gain: 4.0 dB Bandwidth (BW): 2.5 Filter 2 Center Freq: 9000 Hz Gain: -2.5 dB Bandwidth (BW): 1.0 You will hear much better tonal balance. If you feel the treble still a bit too much (it sounds fine to me), you may adjust the gain of Filter 2 (e.g., -3 to -5 dB).

Price is great, drivers sound good if you need a neutral natural sound for mixing audio, these are great. My only complaint is the earpads are on the smaller size, yes they do fit over the ear and I can deal with the fit its fairly comfortable, but the foam is not very good, probably not memory foam, or very little. Better earpads would be a great improvement in comfort. I usually don't wear them for more than 20 minutes at a time, but still I'm buying replacement ear pads to make these more comfortable for longer wearing times. I like the sound, I like the price. mine were missing the 1/4 inch adapter, I've got plenty around the place, not a big deal, but indicative of Amazon of late - shipping someone else's return and charging full price. Not worth the effort of returning them - lets face it the UPS store is most likely the front door to hell, especially at the holidays. no way I'm going near that place. - and thats the best return spot I've got near me... if you step up to around 35$ you can do better in comfort but the sound will be more bassy, great if thats your thing, but if you are trying to get a neutral sound to mix from, you need something like these. soundwise as good as 75 to 100$ cans, just wish they'd put a few more pennies into putting decent ear pads on the things. At least its easy to correct for about 10$ or so.. If you've got small ears and have never used memory foam earpads, you won't have a problem with the stock earpads. The lead cable is plenty long enough. They are good headphones with average earpads. The headband and cans adjustments are quite a range to fit most any head comfortably. I couldn't wear them all day, but maybe when I put the new earpads on I will...

Bad news first: the pads that come with these headphones are so, so terrible. I would rather strap baked bean cans to the side of my head. With this said, it is entirely possible to replace them with Brainwavs pads that are absolutely heavenly which completely removes one of the only bad aspects of these headphones. Obviously this factors into the cost but Brainwavs pads are worth the cost anyway so if this pushes things over you budget I would consider just buying earbuds or something. The next negative is that I "had" to equalize a small range to get a sound signature that I don't consider too tinny. Just something I found, but I also did some other stuff to emphasize the midrange. I think these headphones are considered neutral but with a slightly emphasized bass. Use case for me is a gamer, and also pleb-tier audiophile. And by that I simply mean I refuse to listen to audio that isn't at least 320kbp/s. For my purposes these headphones are so incredible. I love using them in games and I frequently use them to listen to music (which consists of mainly degenerate weeb music and sometimes pop-y rock stuff). So yeah I would recommend them for rock and pop stuff. Songs like "IT Is The End" by "Ice Nine Kills". There are a few characteristics about the build that should give you a good idea on what to expect. They are light as fudge (pardon my language), the padding for the headband has the thinnest skin I've ever felt in my life, and the cable is long as hell and non-detachable. The headphones feel super solid though and I'm happy with their build quality. TL;DR get some Brainwavs pads or these pass as cartilage torture devices. Sound is beautiful and great for listening to rock / pop songs (I mainly listen to weeb stuff now but I have a backstory of rock). Build quality is totally passable but I am gentle--I can totally see these losing durability relatively quickly if you are a rough handler. Cable is long and non-detachable. You should consider equalizing if anything displeases you. I think the price is entirely justifiable; the previous headphones I used were HD 598 Cs, which were honestly super nice but now I just consider these the younger brother of those. My recommended usage for these is leaving them permanently plugged into a PC or other device which is immobile and not jumping between devices with them, they are cumbersome.

I love my Tascam headphones and its 9.5 foot chord! Yes, Tascam may not be the top brand on the market and I’m certainly not what you would call audiophile, but the sound quality and comfort is comparable to some of the big name brands for a fraction of the cost and depending on your needs. Prior to my purchase, I never heard of the Tascam brand. I usually stick with Sennheiser or Sony but price was my motivator. Design/build: They have the look and feel of lightweight studio headphones. But… Everything nowadays is plastic and ditto for the headphones. The over-the-head band is plastic with soft foam like material for cushioning. The earcups (ditto) are plastic with the same foam material. They look good and are decently built. I do love the 9.5 foot chord and 3.5mm to 1/4" Adapter so I’m not tethered to sitting in front of my home studio. Comfort. The ear and head cushions are comfortable and a perfect fit for my size head. The clamping pressure of the headband is mild. They are tight enough to stay on for long periods of time without getting a pressure headache. As over-the-head headphones that rest on ear are concerned, I have found them rather comfortable after 5+ hours (daily) and even after having fallen asleep wearing them on several occasions. The headphones survived and so did my ears with no discomfort the next morning! Noise Cancelling? Nope. Since the headphones met my price point I never considered “noise cancelling” as a must have feature. The headphones are not “noise cancelling” (so don’t expect to “tune out” your barking dog or TV set), on the other hand, anyone near to you will not be too bothered by your music so I guess it does provide some noise blocking. Movies, audiobooks and radio: My listening experience is 5-6 hours a day of mixed media. I have found music, vocals and speech to come in clear with a nice balance. They are exceptional for casual listening. Audio mixing and editing: I use audition & cakewalk for personal projects and have found them suitable for my purposes, BUT I would caution against using these for serious professional work. If cost is not an issue, I would definitely consider upgrading. Gaming. Great sound. Overall, I am pleased with my purchase. As they say, you get what you pay for. For once, I can honestly say you’re getting a better value for the price which just doesn’t happen much anymore. These are a great price, good value, portable, durable, and good sound quality at a price that’s hard to beat. I’m assuming you don’t have money to burn if you are considering these, so take a chance. I think you will be satisfied with the purchase.

I only just received these, but thought I'd give my first impression. I purchased headphones because I figured it was a more pleasant way to listen to music at work than in-ear type. I chose this model because they were on sale, seemed to be a diamond in the rough, and reviews indicated it would be good for large heads(I wear an XL hat size). The build is average. They don't feel flimsy in my hands, but you can see the plastic parts are nothing special, strength-wise. The padding for the headband is a little uneven on the seam, as you open up the headband to put the unit on your head, it sort of looks warped. The 3 meter cable is attached to the base of the left headphone. The headphones can both swivel 90 degrees forward, maybe 35 degrees back, and 90 degrees downward. The swivel joint above the ear pieces allow them to fold upward into the headband. I listened to about 45 minutes of music straight to start, and was pretty pleased. I'm not especially particular, but do like good sound. There's some good bass, classical music was clear. The headphones did make me realize I had low quality recordings for a few of my songs that I tried out(listening to the HD equivalent on YouTube cleared up problems I heard). I wasn't totally blown away, either. I do hear a little noise when they're plugged into my computer and nothing is playing, though not so for my iPod(so I'm not sure if this can be blamed on the headphones). They are comfortable, but not as comfortable as I'd like. I do feel some pushing against my ears, the round ear pads aren't big enough to fit my whole ear. They do get warmer than I'd like. I definitely feel relieved to have them off. I think they are noticeably uncomfortable after about an hour. I was a little hesitant to get over-ear headphones in fear of this, and unfortunately it did turn out to be a problem. Who knows, maybe they'll wear in and improve. I'll update this review if I have more to report. For now, I'd say they're worth the cost, even if they aren't a shining diamond in the rough. If I could give about 3.5 stars I would; but for now, I'll give 3. They are accurately priced, and overall a typical quality product. Some exceptional pros are balanced by some cons. Update 7/19: I've been stretching out the headphones on a box for a couple days, it's helped a bit. What's funny is that the adjustable portion can get huge! It's comfortable on my head at about the 3rd of the 10 size notches...but the pushing against your head is the tight part. If you adjust them larger, they just fall below your ears, rather than loosen up. Also, I compared them to the Sennheiser HD201. The TASCAMs have better sound, but the Sennheiser is more comfortable(they're lighter and the ear cups are oval shaped and fit better). Update 7/23: I think the box stretching has been helping, I'm able to wear them for about 2 hours now before I notice them getting uncomfortable. Still a relatively short amount of time. Update 8/9/2013: The headphones have been living on a box just wider than my head anytime they aren't in use. The comfort is marginally improving, I'm guessing due to the stretching out, my head/ears getting used to the pressure, and me learning ways to sort of adjust them periodically to shift the pressure. However, I think my rating will remain at 3 stars. The sound is good enough to give it a couple stars, and the price low enough for one more. However, a month should be long enough for the phones to break-in to a standard usable degree, and that hasn't happened to my satisfaction. CONCLUSION: I would suggest you find a different pair if you have an exceptionally big head(mine is about 24"/61cm circumference, or US hat size 7 and 5/8). The clamping definitely leads to discomfort, the round ear pads don't quite do the trick, and it makes your head pretty warm. It's not unbearable, but if you can find an alternative it's probably best. That being said, note that I have only reduced stars for the fit!! I can't speak for someone with a bit smaller of a head(and ears?)...if these fit comfortably, which I imagine they would for many people, they are a 5 star product! Great sounding, sturdy enough build, etc. Update 11/14/13: A friend of mine picked up a pair of Audio-Technica M50s around the same time I bought this pair, and I was able to try them out and compare for a good half hour today. I'm not very experienced with sound quality, but I felt that the M50s were definitely the winner. The most obvious difference was the added volume, but generally the sound was more pleasing to my ears. The bass seemed more supported, higher notes felt smoother and less static-like, etc. Besides the volume, these differences weren't huge. I had to compare somewhat carefully to notice them. The point of this update is just to say that you aren't getting $150 headphones for $30 with the TASCAMs. You are getting very good headphones, the sound of which should more than satisfy most people. I think you're pursuing diminishing returns in sound quality alone to pay much more than this for headphones(in this case, you'd pay 5X more for the M50s...but I don't think you're getting 5X the sound quality). The M50s are significantly more comfortable(though they do make your ears warmer), and the build feels better(stronger, smoother adjustments, prettier, etc.). All these things combined, and you may start to consider the price difference reasonable.

I have done stage and studio work for years, and I needed a simple set of clean, true response headphones that weren't bank breaking for some current projects. Based on reviews I bought these after having tried a high rated off brand that were ok, but also physically broke in aanner where all I could do was use stiff wire to fix. I own a lot of tascam products and trust the nàme. Caveat is I also got these as open box. Initial test- even before full break in (headphones and speakers actually need a few hours break in for the materials to get flexibility) they performed way better than most headphones at several times the price. The response was true. They also isolated very well, which is important again for when you need to hear what is actually being fed as a signal and not the bleed. They also handled bumping up EQ in all ranges without any muddying, and handled volume without distortion (although again- good isolation and sound focus means that your ears get proper volume pressure without excessive volume increase). The clarity and separation was remarkable, no matter what source I used them with ( for the record I used them with a studio recording board, a Regular stereo receiver, and through a professional rackmount stage headphone mixer). Additionally - I have normal sized ears and the pads fit around my ears fine and felt comfortable. Can't say aboutong period use yet or not. Anyhow these perform as well as 100$ plus units, and have about the truest representation of any up to that price, and many above.

I've just purchased my 3rd pair of these headphones in around 2 years. I think they are a great value for a basic headphone. On music they are nothing special at all. Just decent, though the bass response is nicely emphasized. This, coupled with the rolled off high frequency response makes them very pleasant to listen to. The level of detail isn't great or even good. But they are extremely non-fatiguing. This is in contrast to many, many other headphones that seem to "poke you in the eardrum" with sizzly highs. These are just smooth and easy. I use them primarily for non-music sources like movies, youtube, etc and find them to be nearly perfect for that. The stock ear pads are complete JUNK. Super hard and uncomfortable. I have replaced each of mine with aftermarket ear pads from Brainwavz. The Brainwavz pads fit very well and are very thick and quite comfy. It's funny to put $20 to $25 ear pads on a $15 pair of headphones. But the combination is fantastic. So why have I bought 3 pairs of these? Because the first two pairs broke after approximately 1 year of use each. The 2nd pair broke last night. The head band, near the bottom where the ear cup attaches snapped neatly off of the frame, leaving me with a dangling ear cup on the right side. No problem. They are only $15 brand new and ship for free with Prime. <click> New pair ordered. I have a far superior set of headphones that sell for around $250 new. I do not use them for casual use, because even as nice as they are, they are more fatiguing than these $15 comfortable, pleasant, everyday headphones. Brian.

Der Kopfhörer ist vielleicht nicht ganz so subtil zusammenfaltbar wie Konkurrenzmodelle, aber für den Preis sind die Tonqualität, der Sitz und die Verarbeitung super!

Estos auriculares, están muy bien mirando calidad y precio. El sonido muy bueno.

Excelentes audífonos para estudio, aunque la salida del audio es plana, me toco equalizar y los bajos son excelentes. La marca Japonesa Tascam es de lo mejor en audio..

Tek kelimeyle berbat bir kulaklık. Müziği açtığım an bir yanlışlık olmalı diyerek kabloyu kontrol ettim. Midler aşırı derecede ön planda, bu kulaklıkla sesleri doğru duymanız, mix & mastering yapmanız asla mümkün değil. Ürünü indirimdeyken aldığım için belki de bozuk bir kulaklık gönderildi bilmiyorum. Hayal kırıklığı ve anında iade.

Tascam reste du Tascam, de l'excellent produit de production musical Pro ! Mais à ce prix là, acheter autre chose pour à qualité égale serait vraiment stupide ! La qualité sonore est exceptionnel en pré mixage ou même pour les enregistrements voix ou instrument acoustique ! Merci Amazon, toujours aussi bon !!