Cheapest Sennheiser HD25 Replacement pads

I am a proud owner of an old, aged, sennheiser HD25 1-II headphones, a few years back (2007?) my Pioneer HDJ1000 headphones broke after a gig (those things are rubbish!!! The hinges broke within 3 months!)

So later on I received as a present from my wife,  - The Sennheiser HD25 1-II Headphones! And man they are very durable!

Over the last few years, these headphones never failed me, and apart from the peeling leather pads, and the slightly faded, worn out 1/4 inch jack, they look and sound just like brand new

So, other than being bullet proof, they do sound crystal clear, and they do look damn good!

Anyways I went to the local Sennheiser shop the other day here in Singapore to quote on replacing the aged pads, perhaps the same leather one or perhaps a velour one, after some research I have found the velour ones do last longer, while the leather ones WILL peel off in time and leaving black leather residues on your face (dont you just hate when that happens?)

So I decided on the velour ones! But the price they quoted me was CRAZY expensive , $50SGD for a piece of Velour? Hmm... Does Not Compute!

so I went to ebay, found a seller in the UK who is selling it at about half price, problem was the shipping cost somehow would cost about the same as the pads themselves, so in total it would be the same price as if I bought the official one from sennheiser!

And then I found out that JUNO sells them for just 9.99 pounds (about $20 SGD) plus the shipping is only 2 pounds for Royal Airmail Firstclass! What a bargain! It even comes with the headband pad as a bonus which costs about SGD$40 in the sennheiser retailer as well!

So if you guys are looking for Sennheiser HD25 replacement pads, you can try Juno (link here) they also have it in different other colors (like red or blue) but I wanna keep it looking as close to the classic one as possible which is why I chose the black velour!

Oh and yes I do recommend these headphones, these would probably be the last headphone you'll ever buy, as everything is replaceable from the Cords to the drivers, so essentially It's a headphone you can use for like.. forever!


UPDATE: 

Look what just arrived in the mailbox 3 days later!

They fit really really awesome, in case you are wondering on "How to Change Sennheiser HD25 replacement Pads" you simply pull of the old ones, invert the new ones (and stretch the side a bit so they can fit), put the inverted new pads over the headphone, and slowly peel the sides in, into the headphones

Are they any good? Hell yeah, my Sennheiser HD25's look brand new now!!

Harmonic Table Keyboard!

Check out this interesting gadget! 

This is a really weird (cheesy?) commercial but it pretty much sums up what the harmonic table keyboard really is


They  are basically a traditional piano keyboard with a re-designed layout, the notes vertically ascend by the musical interval of a perfect fifth while diagonally they ascend by four semitones, interesting no?

Funny Japanese Korg nanoPAD2 review - LOL!!!

Watch it even if you dont speak Japanese!!! LMFAO!!

You may remember my Korg nanoPAD2 review (Here If you missed it)
It seems like some people are making good use of the XY Pads (which I admit is kinda cool, though i still think the 16 drum pads dont feel too great at all! BOO!)

Here is another cool video!




Oh and did you know you can hook up the nanoSeries2 to the iPad?



Before you run out to buy one... WAIT!! 
Before you run out to buy the nanoPAD2 - remember to TEST a unit first!! When they first announced the nanoPad2 i was hyped up and bought one straight away without even trying the display unit they had, so yeah it does have a great number of pads (16 pads + XY Pad over 4 banks) but if the FEEL of the pad is really important to you, DO test it out before purchasing!

As I discussed in my review, with the amount of controls they provide they are good for certain uses,
I bought it primarily to control KONG drum designer in Reason, in the end I ended up still using my old Akai LPD8 even though it has less buttons because it just feels better

Propellerheads Reason Wallpapers - Just For Fun!

We Love Propellerheads' REASON!

I was browsing around the internet for some Reason wallpapers and I COULD NOT FIND ANY! So I did these quick ones in a few minutes, they are simple, minimalistic, yet fills the desktop real nice, I made two of them, one for my Macbook Pro 13 inch (1280 * 800) and one for my 21 inch iMac (full hd 1920 * 1080)

They are by no means extreme works of art but they look sweet and provide easy visibility of your desktop icons and dont tire your eyes so much~ I made them for me but i thought im sure some would be interested on them as well!

Here they are for your enjoyment!

Macbook Pro 13 inch size, 1280x800:

Propellerheads Reason Wallpaper 1280 x 800

And for the FULL HD size, 1920x1080:

Propellerheads Reason Wallpaper 1920 x 1080 Full HD

Edit: For some reason the full HD one is not uploaded in FULL HD when you click above! The original one is 1920x1080 but when i uploaded it here they shrunk it down to 1600 something...

Solution: If you want to download the HD one with no size loss, click here to go to the one I hosted in deviantart

The Innofader : Coming to the Kontrol S4!

I saw this on the native instruments forum : Innofader on the S4!

What does this mean? it means that the innofader may (or may not - still in testing phases) come to the Traktor Kontrol S4 soon!! While the stock S4 crossfader is not too bad, it is still an alpha fader, contact based so one day (depends on  how much you trash it, the more the sooner) it will die and start bleeding, as in it will send out signals when they are not supposed to

the innofader is an optical, contact-free crossfader that is built to last for a LONG LONG time! A bit like the Rane TTM-56S crossfader, imagine using the S4's timecode mode (hooked up to two turntables) with this fader : means you have a lean mean scratch machine with good xfaders!!

Stanton's take on Pioneer CDJ-400 : CMP.800

Oh hello there stanton! Havent I seen you in awhile?

I have a love hate relationship with stanton - I owned some of their products with mixed results, I had the Stanton T150 turntables which were kinda awesome, and i had a lot of their older CDJ's in the past that broke down pretty quickly (CD lens died in 3 months - MEH!) and some of their mixers  - so Im actually kind of neutral regarding how I feel about stanton products, they do try to do original things every one in awhile (such as the SC System series midi controllers) which is cool

I just realized that something has slipped under my radar, Stanton has apparently designed (to be released soon) a new CDJ/media player/midi assignable controller kinda thing that has an uncanny resemblance to the good ol' Pioneer CDJ400 - with a Twist!

This is the Stanton CMP.800:

Hmmm... this looks like something *wink wink*

Hmmm..... again, looks like the black CDJ-400K with that orange ring!

Hmm.. not a bad series of connections!

Stanton  has apparently spied on what people want in a unit, depending on how much they are selling for and how the build quality is, this could be a very well a nice cdj/mp3/midi controller combo - if you click on the pic above to see the larger version, they even added a dual layer (A/B deck) into the midi implementation - CLEVER!

Just as MIDI controllers are on the rise, and becoming more and more common, instead of releasing a plain old cd deck, Stanton kept this in mind and implemented some pretty cool dual layered midi functions into the thing...

So this can act something like the Denon DN-SC2000 dual deck midi controller that also plays CD's and MP3 thumb drives - very innovative! I like how they put a lot of connections into the unit, the long 100mm pitch slider and increased pitch slider resolution (up to 0.02%! that's kinda like the pioneer cdj's!), they even threw in a digital output and a headphone jack!

If you look at the cheapest of the pioneer CDJ series at the moment, the CDJ-350, the CDJ-350 pales in comparison about the features , the stanton unit even has HOTCUES! Something that is normally only found on Pioneer's premium range of CDJs! but the reliability of the stanton unit still unknown, I did have some terrible experience with stanton CDJ's failing very quickly but they might have stepped their game up production wise for their newer products - cant confirm until I actually have a play with one!


I personally have moved to timecode vinyl + Traktor2 + Midi controllers, CDJs arent exactly my thing anymore (other than being overpriced units that plays cds, oh wait... i dont burn CDs anymore!), but this cool little unit if priced right might just be a handy little backup midi controller with bonus cdj-like features!

More details HERE

This will be available around June 2011, Price is TBA (this will be a dealbreaker for many)

Crazy Over Reason

For my EMP (Electronic Music Production) module of my Audio Engineering diploma in SAE, I got to know and learn Propellerheads' Reason 5 Software - WOW!!! This thing is crazy!!

Not only you get to visualize the patches (and the cables between them), it is very very unique from other software that it is not exactly a DAW - its more like a midi/sampling powerhouse, the more i get to know Reason, the more I realize how complex and deep this piece of software is - and it is surprisingly stable and VERY VERY low on cpu!!

Anyway, just wanted to show my appreciation for this uber-AWESOME software

I am still learning it, there's just so much to learn! The propellerheads youtube channel has some really cool clips and tutorial of Reason, some are shown below to showcase how cool REASON is!


 





Like what you see? (and hear lol)  Download the DEMO now to try it for yourself!

Oh and just for fun... wanna see the biggest drum pad in the world??

Macbook Pro Protection To The EXTREME!

G-Form Extreme Sleeve for Macbook Pro

Yes we all love our macbook pro - sometimes a bit too much, considering how much they cost and they contain our most precious song library!!

Ever wondered what's the most extreme protection for the macbook pro? This is it:

It is so extreme that you can even THROW YOUR MACBOOK PRO out of the window and it will most likely survive it! (But just to be safe, my advise - you should never throw a macbook out of the window!!) 

Dont believe it? See the video below, pretty cool!

Cool Video: Live Beats with Novation Ultranova & Launchpad

Hmmm... For a long time I've been thinking to get the launchpad, maybe I should!

One of those songs that get stuck in your head

Wooot??? 

for some weird reason this song gets stuck in my head! Even though the song might sound like a knock-off version of Sidney samson's RIVERSIDE (seriously!! Dont believe me? Listen to the clip below!) , the video clip for this song is really funny, reminds me of a place I used to call home (Sydney, Australia) where everyone shuffles in the club!

Worth watching even just for the movie clip! By the way as a comparison



Sound similar? Hmmmmmmmm.....................