New Music Gear Monday: Focal Clear Professional Headphones

If you’re like me then you’re always on the lookout for the ultimate set of headphones. I have about a dozen, all of which I like for one reason or another, and I find myself mixing and matching to the situation. I’d like to trade them all in for one good pair that I could use for everything. I’m not sure if that’s the goal of the new Focal Clear Professional headphones, but providing the finest reference sound that money can buy certainly is.

Indeed, the aim for the open-back Clear Professional phones was “listening quality aimed to match the best monitor speakers in a room with perfect acoustics.” That’s important, since so many of us are now relegated to home studios where blasting a mix just isn’t possible any more.

Clear Professional uses a new generation of Focal’s 40mm full-­range speaker which features a 24.5mm diameter, 5.5mm long unsupported copper coil  that weighs just 100mg. The material chosen, copper, has the effect of achieving an extremely high magnetic field in the coil. Focal claims this is what makes the phones’ bass articulation worthy of the best subwoofers.

Clear Professional has a 55-Ohm impedance that makes them easy to drive directly connected to the headphone output of a laptop or even mobile phone. The phones come with a rigid carrying case in the shape of the headphones that can store one cable and even an iLok key (not provided), and two OFC copper 24AWG cables with a very low resistance – A 5m spiral for home use, and a 1.2m cable fitted with a 3.5mm stereo jack connector. Both 3.5mm and 6.35mm jack adapters are also included. There’s also an optional specifically designed stand for the phones available.

At an MSRP of $1699USD, Focal’s Clear Professional headphone is not cheap by any means, but if you’re on a quest for the ultimate intimate sound, they’re worth checking out. Find out more here.