Hi-Fi Choice - May

HEADPHONES
£220-£350
GROUPTEST
Sennheiser
Momentum 2.0 £270
Sennheiser’s Momentum headphone range is very
popular, but can the tweaked mk 2 shade its rivals?
DETAILS
PRODUCT
Sennheiser
Momentum 2.0
ORIGIN
Germany
TYPE
Over-ear closedback
headphone
WEIGHT
190g
FEATURES
● 40mm dynamic
drivers
● Quoted sensitivity:
113dB/mW
● 1.4m cable with
3.5mm mini-jack
● Travel case
DISTRIBUTOR
Sennheiser UK
TELEPHONE
0333 2408185
WEBSITE
en-uk.sennheiser.
com
M
arrying classy design and
premium sound quality for
reasonable money was
what the original
Momentum had down to a degree that
must have made the opposition green
with envy. Hoards of headphone
enthusiasts obviously agreed.
Sennheiser reckoned it wasn’t beyond
improvement, though, and set about
designing second-generation models
with a few key tweaks.
Top of the list was easier portability.
Simple fix – add a couple of hinges to
the headband, allowing the ear cups to
fold in on themselves. Thus articulated,
the M2 doesn’t need the previous
model’s bulky carrying case and now
slips comfortably into a more modestly
sized zip-up faux suede pouch.
Ear cups have expanded in size and
changed shape to properly envelop the
lughole rather than pin down parts of
it. As well as enhancing comfort, the
larger, leather-covered memory-foam
ear pads also give better noise isolation
and reduce bass leakage. And while it
was at it, Sennheiser re-profiled the
leather-swathed headband to sit more
snugly on the wearer’s head.
The 1.4m twist-to-lock cable now
sprouts from the right ear cup instead
of the left, but features a smaller
in-line remote made from black rather
than silver plastic (Apple or Android/
Windows compatible, you choose
when you buy). Intriguingly, colour
schemes have been woven into this.
Android and Windows users get the
choice of black or ivory ear cups, while
Sounds as if it has
been voiced to
please a broad cross
section of listeners
for those of the Apple persuasion
there’s an additional brown finish.
Either way, the combination of
stitched leather and skeletal
aluminium framework looks great and
suggests a lightness and comfort that’s
entirely borne out in practice. At just
190g, this is the lightest in the group
and the easiest to forget you’re
wearing. To be fair, it also looks and
feels less robust than some of the
others – an impression reinforced by
the rather vulnerable exposed ear
cup-to-headband wiring.
Sound quality
Rather like the B&O, first impressions
are of the smile-inducing kind. The
Sennheiser sounds as if it has been
voiced to please a broad cross section
of listeners, from audiophiles who love
to scavenge detail deep within the
mix to people who simply appreciate
good quality sound and can tell the
difference between properly defined
and pitched bass performance and a
bloated thump.
Immediately appealing is a spacious
soundstage that has the happy knack
of placing vocalists and players outside
the head rather than using your
cranium as a rather claustrophobic
auditorium. The M2 manages this
EXTRA MOMENTUM
The Momentum family contains a
wireless version of the full-sized
over-ear models here and a smaller
and less conspicuous on-ear version,
which costs about £100 less and
has also undergone a number of
improvements in mk2 guise mirroring
those granted the over-ear model.
Go wireless and the cost of owning a
Momentum jumps considerably, but
then so does the convenience factor.
With battery, aptX Bluetooth and
active noise cancellation on board
you can expect over 20 hours of
music playback with the NC engaged
and even when the juice runs out, just
plug in the supplied cable and you
can continue listening, albeit only
passively. The right ear cup hosts
the music and power controls. A
multi-function button takes care
of volume adjustment as well as a
selection of other functions, which
can be fiddly and confusing until you
have had a chance to get used to it.
more successfully than the Oppo, for
example, and is unusual in this respect
for a closed-back design.
There’s an impression, not
unpleasant at all, that the sun shines
on everything the M2 plays. It isn’t
spotlighting so much as an early
evening glow that picks out the
necessary beauty of the music and its
timbral character without the need to
be stringently analytical. Take Brasilia
from Robert Len’s Fragile. This
hauntingly beautiful 24/96 FLAC
builds slowly from delicate solo
clarinet to the baleful swell of a full
horn section. Handled by the M2,
the piece has space to breathe and
proceeds with a melancholy grace
that’s perfectly judged. Open, clear,
musically supple and tuned to please,
this might not be the most accurate
headphone in this group, but it gets an
awful lot right ●
OUR VERDICT
SOUND QUALITY
VALUE FOR MONEY
BUILD QUALITY
EASE OF DRIVE
OVERALL
LIKE: Brings out the
best in music; light and
portable; great design
DISLIKE: Not as robust
feeling as some
WE SAY: The original
Momentum was a big
hit and this model is
even better still
MAY 2016 37