Grado Launches Third Generation Headphones: The e-Series

Brooklyn-based headphone designer, Grado, has just unveiled their third generation of professional headphones.

After 60 years in the making, the company believes it has reached its most sophisticated designs yet with the e-Series. The headphone designs have a heavy influence of metal and wood integration to provide a clean, less obtrusive listening experience.

The e-Series is comprised of the PS1000e and the PS500e. The PS1000e is available now for $1,695 MSRP while the PS500e is available for $595 MSRP. Here is a more in-depth perspective from Grado:

The Grado PS500e

PS500e

Most people like music, but Grado PS500e headphones are too good for most people. We make them for music connoisseurs. For the ones who anticipate Amy Winehouse’s breath between lyrics. For the ones who absolutely need to place the second violin with their eyes closed. If you get chills from a Cuban trombone solo, we need to talk.

The PS500e is the younger brother to the PS1000e, with newly redesigned 44mm speaker and the improved 8 conductor cable design anda smaller metal and wood hybrid air chamber. Both the hidden mahogany core and and powder-coated aluminum housing parts under-go damping treatments that help control and dissipate resonances, for an undistorted flow of the musical signal. The PS500e boasts an overall sound that is pure Grado, with warm harmonic colors, rich full bodied vocals, excellent dynamics, and an ultra-smooth top end. The PS500e is a compact monitoring tool that will put a smile on the face of the most demanding music professionals, as well as the most demanding audiophiles.

PS1000e

By using tone-wood clad with metal alloy we’ve obliterated two of the most vexing issues in headphone design: ringing in the chamber, and transient distortion. This gives audio professionals the security of consistent response throughout the frequency range. Did we mention they look awesome? You could pay more for headphones, but you can’t afford anything less.

The Grado PS1000e

This hybrid design has an inner sleeve of hand-crafted mahogany made by using the new series ‘e’ curing process. Its outer housing, machined from chrome-plated aluminum, utilizes a special processing and casting method to increase the porosity of the alloy. This combination of wood and metal insures that the earphone chamber has no ‘ringing’ which might obscure detail or add coloration. The way the wood and metal housing moves air and reacts to sound vibrations is virtually unaffected by transient distortions. Grado has also designed the cable for the PS1000e; the twelve-conductor cable design uses UHPLC (Ultra-High Purity, Long Crystal) copper, improves control and stability of the total range of the frequency spectrum. The PS1000e also has a new 50mm driver and a newly re-configured voice coil and diaphragm design, resulting in unsurpassed speed and accuracy responses.

The cushion design creates the correct balance between the driver and housing to support the desired musicality. The cushion design also makes the PS1000e one of the most comfortable headphones in the world. Grado has taken all of our knowledge and over 60 years of experience in controlling resonances and eliminating distortions, and put them into our finest headphone ever, the PS1000e. Grado is unbelievably proud of this flagship product… listen and enjoy.

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