Lindy HF110 Open Backed Headphones Review

A very pleasing pair of headphones, the Lindy HF110 Open Backed Headphones are more than acceptable at this price point (approx £85 on Amazon). They are well worth a listen.

Design

These are large open backed, over ear headphones with a detachable 3 meter balanced cable running into each ear cup separately, terminated with a gold plated 3.5mm jack with a screw-on 6.3mm adapter.  The Lindy HF110 headphones have 42mm copper clad aluminium wire voice coils to provide sensitivity and ‘accurate mid and high tone reproduction as well as a powerful defined bass response’.  They do the job nicely, despite all that waffle!  The headphone cups do not swivel, they do give a bit for odd shaped heads and the headband extends for ‘big heads!’

In The Box

The substantial packaging encloses a large padded carry bag for the headphones. The three meter balanced cable, a spare pair of soft cushion, ‘protein leather’ ear pads as well as the headphones themselves, of course.

Quality

The quality feels really good to me, a soft cushioned head band makes the headphones tight but comfortable.   I thought the tightness would be an issue, but as you’ll see later this was not an issue at all.  Overall, I was surprised by the quality and feel from these headphones.

I noticed the 3.5mm jack connector and screw are all metal, rather than moulded plastic which means two things; firstly there is probably a quality termination in there and secondly, if there any future connector issues that are not covered by the two year guarantee, you’ll be able to get the terminal repaired at little cost, very cute.

Performance

I was delighted by these Lindy HF110s.  I played them randomly for a few hours to ease them off before listening then I watched ‘The Martian’ on my iPad and thought I would test the headphones at the same time.

In two one-hour long sittings they were perfectly adequate and there was plenty of detail and accuracy from them. (Plot spoiler alert) In the middle of the film there was a welcome ‘Middle Eight’ section where Matt Damon prepares to leave Mars to the strains of Bowie’s “Starman” and the headphones sprang into life.  They were impressive, the Open backed nature of them gives a natural feel to the lower frequencies.

In respect of wear,  I have had no dis-comfort despite feeling initially the headphones were tight on my head.  They are very easy to wear indeed, and I imagine as the headband relaxes a bit they will only get more comfortable.  I had no ‘sweaty headband’ issues either to report.

I’ve had the headphones on the iPad, then I thought I would hook them to some hi resolution tracks on my JRiver/iMac into an Acoustic Research UA-1 headphone amplifier.  The resolution is detailed and good.  The frequency range offered by the Lindy HF110 is wide so there should be plenty of dynamic range here.  Tonality is fine, the bass is quite tight although on faster paced tracks it does get a bit loose.  The sound does get a fraction more confused on more complex songs but really that is probably only to be expected.  There is more than enough from the sound presentation, the soundstage is clear and wide enough to pick out instruments when you listen for them on less complicated pieces of music, for example vocal vs orchestral.

Overall for eighty odd quid a decent pair of headphones.  As with all this stuff, eighty or eight hundred pounds, try and get a listen first and compare them top other similarly priced models on what you would probably be using them more for.  For example these are more ‘lounge’ than ‘street’ due to their size, although these days…