Hi Michael, I am the founder of OLLO Audio. I've seen your videos before, nice that there's someone dedicated to spatial audio, really great! I hope you'll allow me to elaborate a bit here,... The bass is shy with the S5X (and is lifted short of 2dB with the 1.3 calibration, the USC plugin you can get for your unit too) as that's what the empiric research showed to be welcomed in spatial audio mixing when using binaural renderers. There's a full video on KZfaq on how we captured Dolby certified studio with the exact same ear simulator that was then used in tuning the headphones. Using just room measurements, the bass would need to be stronger, probably closer to what NDH30 has but with user testing (blind tests) engineers were able to position (or identify the virtual position and movement) sound with a lot higher accuracy and consistency when the prototype units had less bass and strong high end presence. As you're already educated, the HRTFs rely on different cues and a slight boost in high frequencies is welcomed for mixing on headphones but is NOT welcomed when calibrating speakers in a room. Virtualisation with headphones will forever be virtualisation, getting closer to reality, but spatialisation will "probably" never become localisation. Thanks for the review and kind words. Stay safe and sound. RG

Thanks for your review! I was interested in the Ollo S5X, but then opted for the Austrian Audio Hx60, I have yet to hear them, but I will see. Have you had experience with Austrian Audio?

What headphones would you recommend for mixing and mastering Audeze, Sennheiser, Ollo

I've heard people say that headphones with 'good soundstage' basically sound like monitors in front of you (90degrees, crosstalk, etc) when listening to stereo music. Following that logic, wouldn't headphones with bad soundstage (sounds super dry and close to the ear and with no crosstalk at all and 180degrees) be better for 3D audio production? The depth can be faked using the hrtf and ITD. Wouldn't a headphone with 'good soundstage' have trouble recreating super close to your ear and dry sounds as well as negatively impact the stereo perception by distorting the soundstage? I'd highly suggest taking a look at 'Soundstage and Imaging of Headphones by RTINGS here on youtube. I would be really intrigued to know your opinion on that video and on the matter of Good/bad soundstage for 3D audio production. Cheers and thanks you for making these as always!

Good headphone info! I'd be interested in seeing how to implement binaural rendering with head tracking in Reaper. If others might also be interested , perhaps a conversion from the Atmos source to ambisonics, then to binaural output.

I have to tell you that i have been using the S5X for 6 months for spacial audio and in my humble view i have not heard a better headphone. I would also like to say that as a company Ollo are great company to deal with and very knowledgable :) Headphones are very subjective lol But the thing that makes the Ollo better in my opion for spacial audio is the position of the speaker inside the headphones :) Its positioned very different to any other headphone.. I have HEDD headphones 4X price of the S5X and i think the S5x is better.

Should look more at Sony's MV1 which is actually designed for spatial Mixing. They also offer personalized HRTF measuring service for it at certain stores and studios which they provide you with an EQ file you can use when mixing. Sony did testing for for this for a long time and technically started developing it during the time of the MDR-Z1R as well. Their FR looks weird but its designed to be much easier to EQ out using their HRTF Filters.. I dont think it FR in regards to immersion is necessarily 100% gimmick. I think there needs to be more published studies on it but Dolby themselves have a patent on something called the Elevation curve (realistically Elevation EQ) where they bump up response at 7khz +5 db and pull down 12khz -7db which allegedly the greater the difference in these 2 regions gives an improved sense of height imaging. Seemingly based on the FR that we see on Sony MDR-MV1 this does seem to be kinda similar case where both regions look similar by default because EQ'ing these extremes would be near impossible in those frequencies. You can give it a shot and see how it sounds in EQ on your end as well.

I find the Oslo also to have a lack of punchy bass response. I really wanted to like these due to the build quality and specs, but I'm thinking about returning them. I'm going to listen more to tracks I know well in Atmos first, but as of today, I'm just not ready to commit to keeping them. They are beautifully built and the most comfortable headphones I've worn.

So these should be good for gaming

Pro gamer headphone??