This and That:
I bought the Fostex out of curiosity and since it's a cheap planar magnetic headphone. I don't plan on modding it.
Aside from the headphone, all you get is two cables (an orange on with 3.5 mm plug and a black one with 6.3 mm plug).
The visual motto is studio-oriented "form follows function", even though I wouldn't describe my T50RP mk3 as ugly.
Dominant on the third generation T50RP are mainly plastic and soft pleather. Only the rails for the height adjustment are made of metal.
The plastic used doesn't necessarily look high-end optically and haptically, but definitely doesn't detract from the robustness of the headphone.
The suspensions of the shells look a bit rickety, but also ensure quick adaption.
In my opinion, the cable's locking mechanism is "hated" for no real reason.
The headband is this but still quite soft. The ear cups are easy to adjust, but on the other hand, the ear pads, while very soft, are quite thin as well and not deep at all wherefore one's ears will touch the thick, soft foam underneath. Comfort isn't that high for longer listening sessions and there are some hot spots. Nope, the pads would definitely benefit from more depth, comfort-wise.
Sound:
My T50RP mk3 is 100% stock and wasn't modified at all, not even slightly.
Tonality:
The T50RP mk3 is advertised as a relatively neutral headphone - I wouldn't quite agree with that, but the T50RP takes a rather neutral direction compared to most open-back headphones in this price range. At least it can definitely be described as balanced. Sudden spikes or drops are not present after all, which is a good thing.
Compared to a truly nearing neutral headphone, after listening to sine sweeps and music, but especially the former, I would attest the Fostex a moderate W-shaped tonality, which is noticeable in a slightly raised upper bass, slightly raised upper treble and a very small elevation of the central midrange.
So what I hear is a steady, fairly flat 350 to 100 Hz rise, where the kick bass emphasis is a little more than 4 dB. This boost is maintained up to about 70 Hz; below that, the bass drops relatively quickly, with not much level below 50 Hz.
Around 1 kHz there is a mild boost, which can only be perceived with sine sweeps. When listening to real music, the midrange is rather mildly pushed into the background, which is due to the slightly recessed level between 300 and 600 Hz. If you adjust this range with an equalizer (in my ears it is a little less than 2 dB that I have to add between 300 and 600 kHz), the vocal range becomes flat.
Above 1 kHz I can hear a steady increase in level from 3 kHz on, which ends in a mild emphasis between 7 and 11 kHz. The following super treble extension is good.
The slightly elevated upper bass is not distracting as it is not accentuated too much and therefore does not thump too much. It also stays out of the upper fundamentals, so that it doesn't tend to colour or bloom in the midrange.
Since the bass range rolls off below the upper bass, you can't really expect any real sub-bass - without any mods, the Fostex is a headphone that kicks/thumps rather than extending deep.
So the Fostex definitely doesn't have the seemingly bottomless bass extension, which I know from my HiFiman HE-400 and Audeze LCD-X, which reache linearly into the deep bass without rolling off. Even when compared to several dynamic driver headphones such as my Sennheiser HD 600, Beyerdynamic DT880 Edt. 600 Ohm or AKG K701, it falls short when it's about bass extension.
Voices are just slightly more on the bright side than what would actually be neutral - this gives them a mild openness, but sometimes also makes them lack just a little fundamental body. Subjectively, this also gives the impression that they are somewhat distanced. Only ~ 2 dB more level between 300 and 600 Hz would be enough to make the vocal range appear completely natural to my ears instead of a little distant, as it is without any EQ adjustments.
The upper treble is a little metallic/slightly sizzling, but thanks to the even boost in this range together with the even boost of this accentuation, it's more soft than hard.
This overall description may sound a bit too critical in some parts, but it's not really meant to be - apart from the bass extension weakness and the not completely natural sounding upper high frequencies, that's all I have to criticize about my T50RP mk3, so the Fostex, unlike some of its competitors in its price range, doesn't have any sudden dips or peaks, but sounds still quite balanced - after all, my HD 600, K701, DT880 Edt. and HE-400 are not perfect either, tonally.
If the level in the upper treble were dialed back by just few dB, I wouldn't have anything more to complain about in terms of the naturalness of the Fostex' presentation.
Resolution:
Here I can actually make it quite short - what the T50RP mk3 delivers is very convincing. In its price range, it is definitely one of the best headphones and can also compete technically with headphones of the $300 class without major problems. However, as far as haptics and material selection are concerned, these headphones are usually of higher quality and primarily designed for hi-fi customers, which again explains the price difference to the Fostex, which packs very convincing technology into a rather simple enclosure.
Not too surprising for headphones with orthodynamic drivers, the T50RP mk3 sounds fast and true to impulse. The bass range is fast, tight and precise, but this is to be expected in most cases with a tuning with a low-frequency bass roll-off. If you help the Fostex with an equalizer and raise both the low bass and the fundamentals while reducing the upper bass a bit, its bass range will still remain fast and controlled. Here I see the Fostex clearly ahead of my rather slow sounding Sennheiser HD 600, which also has a bit of a disadvantage against its direct competitors, the K701 from AKG and Beyerdynamic DT880 Edition, in terms of bass speed, tightness and general speed (and nevertheless it is still one of my favourite full-sized headphones, especially for Jazz).
No, the Fostex definitely doesn't have to hide.
In the midrange it seems a bit less detailed in male voices than in the other frequency ranges and with female vocal material, but this is definitely only due to the mild fundamental range dip.
The Fostex is also convincing in the high frequencies and delivers a credible separation of individual notes and instruments, while here it also shows a good speed and therefore doesn't appear soft or flat (in terms of details).
Spatial Presentation:
Spatial Presentation:
As far as the spatial presentation is concerned, I am a little bit split - on the one hand the Fostex presents a credible, neither too narrow nor too wide imaginary space, and the basic width already somewhat leaves the space between my ears. It also has a pleasant spatial depth, which to my ears is about 60% of the width.
Even with more complex or faster recordings, the stage remains neatly connected and individual instruments are well separated from each other. On the other hand I would like to see a little more empty space/air between single instruments and also a more exact depth layering, because although it doesn't seem blurry, I am missing the last bit of differentiation between single layers and mainly only clear front-back effects are noticeable instead of fine layers.
In summary, one can say that the stage can convince me in terms of instrument separation, but it lacks the last bit of portraying emptiness convincingly in order to be really three-dimensionally authentic. Here my HD 600 and DT880 Edition convince me a bit more, even though the former doesn't retain the same control with more complex music material, and even though the latter is spatially more compact, but offers the slightly sharper location of instruments.
Conclusion:
Especially good technical performance for the price (even without any mods). Lacks extension in the bass. Could be a bit more realistic in the upper highs, but its more expensive competition isn't flawless either. Shallow ear pads.