Sennheiser CX400 Counterfeit Dilemma

[mrsimes]

I've been seeing loads of good reviews of the Sennheiser CX400 headphones.

I decided (possibly against better judgement) to purchase a pair from a reputable seller on Ebay. The seller had 100% positive feedback and lots of it and has been selling these headphones for a while.

They only cost £15 which was pretty cheap and when they arrived a visual inspection suggested I'd got a good deal - the packaging perfect and all looked good. However when it came to listening through them, I was somewhat disappointed. They do not meet anywhere near my expectations. The bass seems pretty overpowering and the midrange/trebles are hollow sounding.

I've tried them connected to various gear:
Creative Zen Stone
I-River H340
IBM Thinkpad Laptop
Squeezebox V3

The audio experience is marginally better on the I-River with the equalisation settings adjusted to the extreme.

Having done some research, I'm 99% sure these are actually counterfeit headphones. For example, there was no batch code printed on the bottom of the box, the groove on the headphones is central whereas on the original I understand it is more towards the edge, the pouch is clearly plastic whereas the original is leather(?).

I suspect the counterfeits are coming from this company:
http://www.diytrade.com/china/4/prod...eration_2.html

But how can this company claim to be selling official Sennheiser? Do they produce the official Sennheiser and these are being "skimmed" off or are they just blatent liars?

I contacted Sennheiser to find out where I could purchase genuine Sennheiser products in my area. They advised I should try Richer Sounds.
I popped down to Richer Sounds yesterday and they had some in stock.

My dilemma is - if these are fake, will the real Sennheiser's sound any better? Particularly if they're coming off the same production line. I don't really want to spend £50 on an official pair if they're actually going to sound the same as the fakes because they're produced at the same factory!

Unfortunately there's no way to listen to the official pair as Richer Sounds cannot open the pack due to health and safety of reselling ear canal headphones (completely understandable), so I can only really go on reviews and what I've already experienced with my fakes.

Has anyone else purchased a fake, realised and then purchased the real thing? Was there any difference?

Thanks,

S

[spl23]

It is very unlikely that fake Sennheisers are coming off the same production line as the real thing. You do hear about companies in China in which an "overnight" shift uses the production line to produce fakes, but that tends to be for CDs / DVDs. It makes no sense to produce a batch of headphones and sell them to Sennheiser, and then use the same line to produce a batch of "fakes" that you then sell for less - the company in question would be better off selling them all to Sennheiser, as they'd make more money.

I'd also ignore the insistence from that company that they are selling "100% Genuine" Sennheisers at 5% of the normal price - that's just a lie. They also seem to produce / sell "genuine" Bose Triports and Sony IEMs - which gives a good idea of what else is out there in counterfeit land.

I have read reports from a lot of people unhappy with the sound of counterfeit Sennheisers - I haven't read many reports from people unhappy with the sound of the real thing. I think it is therefore safe to assume that if you have indeed got fakes (and it sounds as if you do), then genuine Sennheisers will sound better.

To be honest, given the fact that the market is absolutely flooded with fakes, I wouldn't even consider buying them off eBay or the like - if you want Sennheisers, the only place to go is an authorised dealer. Yes, it'll cost more, but you will actually get Sennheisers rather than something that just looks like them...