ok, my headphones aren't broken, at least. phew.

the noise-cancelling phones are designed to compensate for signals out of a low quality device, and provide somewhat of a bass boost in addition to blocking out surrounding noise. the old sennheisers are open-backed, so they sound a bit more airy; that's normally a net benefit, but it does lose a tad of bass compression out of this device. conversely, the noise-cancelling phones consistently distort the heavier bass tones when plugged into the recording pc.

overall, it sounds the way it's supposed to, with those caveats kept in mind.

i'm going to listen a little more, but i should be back on the pc by the end of the night.

well, this is rather comical.

if i can reduce at least part of the problem to the headphones, the first thing i want to check is the cord, right? i can replace the cord. i can't replace the phones [they're long out of production].

about two years ago now, i had the cord replaced, but it was unstable in the left side so i replaced it a second time. meaning, i have a backup. and, i checked the backup and sure enough it seemed to sound better. but, i have to be careful - this is in the realm of bias, and i can hardly double-blind it.

but, i had to really push the left side in to account for the short.

so, i put the working cord back in and made sure it was really pushed in as tight as i could push it. and that seems to have made the difference.

i need to test. i've been through this so many times. but it maybe explains the randomness, if the cord was just not quite in enough.

well, if that turns out to be it, it's worth a laugh from future readers, i guess. fuck.

i think the device is just about charged. i'll find out soon.

it's the kind of thing that snaps in really easily. but it's also ancient. so, it would be easy to not realize it's not pushed in far enough.

i'm starting to think i damaged my mixing phones. i need to recharge my mp3 player, but that's going to be the crux of testing today.

the playback from the computer seems to sound better through the other phones, which is a serious departure from previous testing.

if i can determine that this is true, i'm not sure where i go from there.

my mixing phones are very old sennheisers with very good specs. my walking phones are a newer sennheiser model with a noise-reduction filter. they're fine for sitting on the bus, but i can't use them to mix because of that filter. that just doesn't make any sense. yet, if it turns out that the old sennheisers sound poorly through the mp3 player then the reality is that i'm dealing with some serious degradation that is an absolute hard block.

i'll have to buy new phones before i can do any further mixes. which will mean that i'll have to put aside the next few months for reading, as i save up.

i'm not there yet, but it's pretty clear. and i suppose it's the obvious answer, in hindsight, as i tested everything else with little effect.

the only glimmer of hope is that there was so much variation in the output; that it did sound right from time to time.

i'll know in a few hours.

i can at least state with certainty that the mixes sound pristine through the new phones, out of the mp3 player, so the mixes are good and i'm not hearing things. if they don't sound pristine through the old phones, that's the obvious problem.

i've been trying to figure out now, for three months, why i can't get the mixes to sound right....

once i figure this out, i'll be back on track. but, if the phones are broken, it's going to be a while.